The material presented
here is not Al-Anon Conference Approved Literature. It is a method
to exchange
information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal
level.
I wrote about looking more closely at myself now that my A husband is no longer drinking (although a raging dry drunk with no program).
For many years he has said nothing about my clutter issues, and the cost of my storage facilities, because I realize now it was guilt. How could he confront me about my issues of clutter in our basement, garage, and storage facilities (2!) when he was such a horrible OBVIOUS mess? My problem was easy to conceal, I never let anyone in my basement, garage, or storage places. But HE had to deal with it as he struggled to get his bike or lawn mower out to use them, or had to try to navigate the mass of boxes on his way to change a fuse in the basement.
Now that he is sober, he is no longer keeping quiet, he has forced me to face my own issues. I am actually grateful since it can only make my life better.
Well, a friend, an ACOA in therapy, has agreed to help me get rid of my clutter now that I have decided to face it.
It has been VERY eye opening! My friend is helping me since she said she had the SAME problem! Her therapist helped her get rid of her clutter.
She said that she learned that for many of us, disappointed in our close family relationships, learn to turn to "stuff" to fill the void in our hearts and the hurt we feel. We can't get rid of parents and get new ones to fill our needs, you are stuck with what you got. And it isn't so easy to trade in spouses with kids and other complications. So, we are left with all of these emotional needs our addicts can't fulfull. What do we do with those needs? Find a way to fill them, and since people can't do it, maybe "things" can!
This means that many of my things have emotional meaning to me. For example, all of my MANY perfume gift sets, avon fragrance kits, all kinds of spa equipment etc, meant taking care of ME and being good to me, never mind that I have enough stuff to take care of me for 100 more years! All of my books and paper from college signify to me that I am a complete person WITHOUT my A, I was before and I still am, I am not only defined by being married to an A. My keeping all of my daughter's baby things and kid toys kept my dream of having another baby someday alive, I have had to let that dream go now, she is grown now, it is a little late to try and give her a sibling. My immense Barbie collection is a connection to the happiness Barbie brought me as a child. I am selling my Barbie collection, at least most of it, this is very hard since they bring me so much happiness ( I am keeping a few favorites, like my silkstone Barbies).
The last thing, was that when we bought this house, I had just started a new job, so I simply put my old furniture and stuff in storage and bought all new stuff. As time went on, and my A husband and I underwent so many long separations and he discussed divorce so many times, I planned to keep all of that stuff, to give him in a "separation of propery" agreement. He would get all of the old stuff, in storage, and I would get to keep the new stuff. He agreed to this, the stuff I bought was furniture and things that I liked, and the old stuff was stuff he said he liked. So, keeping the storage stuff was like a protection or insurance to let me keep all of my new stuff, bought with my hard earned money.
No longer being able to afford the storage places means I have to donate all of that stuff, and in a divorce or separation, I will lose half of my hard earned furnishings. It is like having the rug pulled out from under me, no more security that my stuff will stay mine. It has extra significance since I bought it all myself, with my own money, which I worked hard for.
It is VERY VERY VERY hard to get rid of so much stuff that means emotional secuirty and happiness to me. I have used things and stuff to try and find happiness with so much hurt and pain and emptiness in my alcoholic marriage.
My friend has had to literally pry some things from my hand with brute force to put in the donate pile, LOL, when the "keep" pile gets too big and threatens to bury me in an avalanche, LOL.
I really have no choice, the basement stuff was damaged in a flood and a lot of it is moldy and yucky, I have to get rid of most things there as they are a health hazard. I cannot reclutter the basement since the flooding may happen again, and it has to be easy to clean out and drain, sigh.
I can only keep a FEW storage boxes in the garage, along one wall, single layer. That means I have to get rid of like 95% of my stuff! I am currently unalbe to work due to being temporarilty disabled with torn tendons in both feet and having orthopedic "boots" on and being in a lot of pain, so I can't pay for my storage facilities, and my husband refuses to pay anymore. I think this is fair, he is working hard to pay all bills, including extra medical bills, so I can get better. I agree it is not right at this time to cuase so much extra expense with all of my storage facilities.
Can anyone else relate to this?
I am finding this an extremely difficult process and very painful both physically (due to my injuries), emotionally, and mentally.
I many times have to stop and pray for strength, to not put anymore stuff in the "keep" pile, it is so painful and difficult to let go of what has kept me going for so many years. My friend starts every session of helping me with a prayer for me to let go, and start healing and stop using THINGS to deal with my pain, I can't afford to do that anymore. Many times we pray together. Still it is difficult.
I am asking for your prayers and positive thoughts for me to LET GO of my stuff and really start living...I really need them, sometimes it is so hard I feel almost physically sick, but I am determined to NOT go back into denial.
i hear great knowledge, strength and insight in your posts about decluttering and furthermore, purging the useless stuff. I understand the emotional attachment you have to those things and I also understand from you that you are coming to terms with it being your time to choose a different way.
I can absolutely RELATE to everything you shared about clutter. I had to go out and purchase a book about organizing my space that broke down the psychology of why we keep THINGS. Yes, they do fill the void and hold emotional significance, but they keep us from our real issues which are control over the internal environment in our family dynamic usually, but could also be any number of things at work, home or school.
I have very strong OCD tendencies which are magnified anytime I am asked to de-clutter or I need to get rid of things. I had to have a friend come over and help me sort through my clothes to see what I would wear again and what I wouldn't. I couldn't do this alone. I needed the support. She took one look at some ratty old sweatshirt turned to me and said, "Heather, really, isn't this from 8th grade?" I had to ask myself a series of questions about these items - when was the last time I wore/used them? If the answer was more than a year ago AND they didn't have any seasonal or specific usage (car scraper for rain or umbrella for the beach) I got rid of them. I kept one of every "necessity" and donated the rest. I wasn't looking at my items through "normal" eyes. I had used all of my THINGS to comfort me and to cushion me emotionally because I felt I'd fall apart and I'd feel BARE without them. The truth was it was only an illusion to keep me feeling secure in this.
It was HARD. SO HARD and I needed support in undergoing the changes I was going to make, but afterwards it felt good knowing that I had only what I needed.
Holding you in my prayers. I am glad you have a friend to help you with this project. I too hear a great deal of awareness and acceptance in you post.
Many of the steps I was called on to do in alanon were difficult and painful but when completed set me free.
Please keep coming back and sharing. You are doing fine.
I love your sign on name. Mary Poppins believed that " A spoonful of sugar made the medicaine go down" Let alanon and this board be your spoonful of sugar.
There is a website out there that you may want to check out called FLY LADY - all about Finally Loving Yourself and getting rid of clutter... I LOVE the site. It gives you daily email reminders to 'Free" yourself form clutter, and a workable plan to get you there... She stresses taking it easy and not burning out to get there. Her motto is your house didn't get cluttered in one day, and it certainly won;t get clean in one day. She breaks it into manageable chunks and challenges you to get rid of any 'martyr' mentality around house chores... Check her out. I love her! I am completely off the bandwagon right now, and am feeling the stress of being cluttered and unorganized. I was on the program a year or two ago, and was amazed at how much less stress I had when I wasn't surrounded by energy sucking clutter.
I am something of a hoarder and pack rat. In my case it's not just a matter of holding on to old stuff from the past, but just having too many hobbies. I've never officially given up any hobby, I just say it's dormant... so all the stuff I keep. Moving infrequently has made it easy to accumulate stuff. My last move took two 24-foot truckloads, and that was just the stuff that was packed to go on the official moving day. There was all the stuff I handled myself not trusting it to movers, a bunch of stuff that went into temporary storage months before the move, and other stuff I had kept in storage for 15+ years. Now that I'm married and we're slowly combining households, it's starting to get crowded.
We have made decent progress sorting the stuff. I am not one to throw away whole boxes of stuff without going through it, and I'm usually rewarded for taking the trouble. But when the number of 12x12x18 boxes numbers in the high 100s (or at least it did in the beginning), it is very time consuming. So after closing out my long term storage (which held a car and other stuff) two years ago, we bit the bullet and rented a new storage place. We just have too much stuff to really even have working space to go through it. The main part of the house is shaping up nicely - it's a roomy, spacious house and I'd like to keep it that way. The basement/garage is large, but just jammed full. I want to do some finishing to make it ready for my long term hobby enjoyment, but I can't clear more than 10 square feet of floor at a time... and the floor needs some patching and sealing, I need to install lighting, drywall, etc. So we're just going to move most of the stuff out of the basement to storage, and not do deep sorting right now. Pitch what we can but not spend a lot of time on the sort. Once the basement has some breathing room, the real work can begin. We'll go to storage and sort it out there. I think we can probably make a 50% reduction within a year if we just stick to it and keep working on it regularly. Then bring back some stuff that has a place, and if there's anything left, we can get a smaller storage to stash it.
A lot of that stuff doesn't mean as much now. I've begun to start shredding old paperwork (10+ years) if I don't need it for anything. Lots of hobby magazines, which are worth less than the postage it would take to ship them to an ebay buyer - but valuable references none the less. They are heavy and take up a lot of space - one of the major things we need to figure out. Then there's all those VHS tapes! Anything that is a dupe on DVD can be disposed... better to have a yard sale and let them go for 50 cents each than try and ebay them.
The emotional connection to the stuff is always interesting to me. I've become an observer of myself and my emotional reactions to uncovering a memory are enlightening. Some of my packed stuff dates all the way back to when I first moved out of my mom's house. It's like layers of an archeological dig. Here's stuff that s since I met my current wife. My single years after the move, my single years in the old house, my married years there and in the house before that. My apartment townhouse from the early 80s, my first apartment, my dorm room, back to mom's house. I used to cling to this stuff as if it were unfinished business. It may be fun to pull out a credit card statement form 1979 and see what I was buying and what it cost. But there's no reason to keep it. What amazes me is that although I moved out of her house over 30 years ago, almost every time I visit my mom she hands me *something* old from the past she came across. Maybe even a box of stuff.
Some things I will never get rid of. Pictures... and negatives, are forever. I want to digitize everything so the originals can be kept safely out of harm's way. I have had my ups and downs, but the AA Promises have come true for me - I do not regret the past, nor wish to shut the door on it. However, I'm perfectly ok with keeping the past in some designated places where I can reference it and reminisce when I feel the urge - but not carry it on my back everywhere I go day in, day out. Sorting stuff with my wife is such a different experience than doing it by myself. I come across pictures or a memory, and instead of internalizing it, I can tell her the story (yeah, she likes hearing my stories - fortunately!). My parents, my grandparents, relatives, my first wife, her kids, their friends, my old friends, school, college, whatever. My father had Rolls Royce taste on a beat up Chevy budget, but fortunately my mom bought him two expensive toys before I was born - at the time, a top of the line tape recorder, and a very fine camera. As a result, many of those memories are crystal clear, and the negatives will scan and print almost like they were taken yesterday.
I was brought up after my parents' divorce being told I was FU and my "broken alcoholic home" made me into a damaged person. Through my school years I used it as an excuse to underachieve. If I could blame others, it let me off the hook. I made my own way in the world, and it wasn't until after I went through my own divorce that I visited my distant past with new vision. I loved my family, and my alcoholic dad. He let me down many times, but nobody could make me laugh the way he did - and it's a gift he passed on. The precious memories that so many would have cast off to the dump years ago are still with me. And I have dozens of spools of tape and rolls of film that haven't been looked at in 40 or even 50 years. They are there for me to examine whenever I have the urge. We can't change the past, but we can certainly change our perception of it. Today, I not only can forgive my parents, I can thank them and be grateful for what they gave me.
Long way from clutter - but that's what the topic brings up for me!
I can relate on the compulsive behavior front. As, to me, being a hoarder is along the same grounds as being a compulsive over-eater.
The thing is, I think it's more common than I like to convince myself of. Like I'm this "unique" freak of nature who wants to sit down and polish off half a jar of Nutella in one sitting. I like to try to convince myself I'm the only person on the planet who does this self-destructive behavior.
Honestly, I recognize I do that stuff because I have this huge hole in my soul that I'm trying to fill. Sometimes I try to stuff my AH or other family or friends into that hole. Sometimes I stuff food into that hole. Sometimes I stuff new purchases into that hole. The thing I keep forgetting is that hole happens to be God-shaped, and NOTHING will fill that void except for a good, solid relationship with my Higher Power.
I can get a bit on the cluttery side myself, but it eventually irritates me and I'll purge the clutter, albeit I know I go through a bit of anxiety when I do it... fighting with my inner pack-rat saying "but you might need to use that some time again in the future!!" I actually have a storage unit back on the mainland that I've had since I moved to the islands five years ago that I STILL need to dedicate some time to go back and purge. I mean I really, REALLY need to do it because it's such a waste of money. However, I just haven't made the time to go take care of it. And I know I'll still go through anxiety when I decide what to toss or sell or donate and what to keep. And then there's the expense of shipping the stuff I do decide to keep out to Hawaii, and then where to put it when it gets here!
So great you have a program friend helping you out. It's encouraging to hear someone working through the process and learning about themself.
One thing I just now thought of is I can do the storage unit thing gradually - it doesn't have to be a one-shot get it done in one visit thing. Maybe each time I find myself going back to visit family, I can at least try to get myself to go through a couple boxes.
Wow- so glad I read this post and everyone's responses, because for the longest time I kept thinking I needed to get that storage unit taken care of in one fell swoop. I was just reminded that I can do this one day or one box at a time. :)
-- Edited by Aloha on Thursday 8th of October 2009 02:04:36 PM
Thank you so much for such a meaningful post, to say I can relate is an understatement, I have a lot of de clutting to do, have done so with my wardrobe but my college life is a mess at present due to the fact that I am unable to de clutter, I am looking at it a we speak, your post has given me the motivation to start tacking this again, and it also makes me understand where it comes from, don't be too hard on yourself though,
MARY POPPINS: I CAN SO RELATE TO THE CLUTTER ISSUE! I HAVE BEEN CARRYING BOXES OF STUFF FROM MY CHILDHOOD AROUND WITH ME FOR YEARS! I HAVE SO MUCH STUFF THAT I AM CONSTANTLY RUNNING INTO THINGS AT HOME! I NO LONGER HAVE A STORAGE UNIT BUT TWO OF MY THREE BEDROOMS ARE FULL OF SO MUCH STUFF THAT I CAN'T GET AROUND ALL OF IT! I AM CONVINCED THAT I AM A "HOARDER'. BUT...THE THING IS THAT I CAN'T JUST THROW AWAY MY STUFF OR GIVE IT ALL AWAY! I THINK I CONNECT WITH STUFF AS SECURITY OR SOMETHING. ACTUALLY, I HAVE BEEN SO BLESSED WITH EXTRA MONEY THAT I COMPULSIVELY BUY MORE STUFF. THANKS FOR YOUR POST. WHAT AN EYE-OPENER FOR ME! I DON'T FEEL ALL ALONE IN THIS BECAUSE I HAVE HEARD & HAVE SEEN WHAT OTHERS HAVE GONE THROUGH. ENOUGH OUT OF ME.
