Hello, friends.
I thought I'd take a moment to talk a little more about what we will try to do on our blog.
1. Tell our own stories and try to make a safe place in the "comments" section for other people to tell their stories of growing up with hoarders.
2. Find resources to help us all deal with the hoarders in our lives -- constructive and practical tips we learn from professionals and pass on to you, so you can help your loved ones get their lives in order if they want to.
3. General tips and resources to keep our own lives manageable. Some scientists think that the mental conditions which can lead to hoarding may be genetic. Others recognize that people who grew up in hoarder's homes do not learn effective housekeeping and object-management skills as children. Some of us automatically want to live as opposite to our childhoods as we possibly can. Others fumble to try to learn good management skills. And others struggle because we inherit the anxiety and OCD disorders which can sometimes be triggered -- often during times of stress or trauma -- to begin the hoarding response. I hope the household management tips we share, however small, are useful to you.
This weekend I started an excellent book: "STUFF: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things" by Dr. Randy O. Frost and Dr. Gail Steketee. I have read many books on hoarding and organizing, but this is the first book which has deeply resonated with me as to why hoarders can attach such importance to objects that others would find useless, and the connections they make not only to these things, but between themselves and the outer world. It gets inside the hoarder's mind in a respectful but very analytical way, and although it is a book relying heavily on psychological and academic terms, the terminology is well explained and it is written in such a way what it is not too academic for the average reader.
I'll write more about it when I am finished, but I feel so empowered by this book that I wanted to mention it before I was even finished reading it.
Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving and that this week brings good things to you.
--Maggie
