Hoarding is a mental health condition of collecting and keeping too many things that may or may not have value. Hoarding is definitely a disorder and can cause major problems rather quickly when an individual has difficulty throwing things away. This clutter literally disrupts daily living but the thought of getting rid of these things causes true distress in the individual and often leads to disagreements with others over those possessions.

There are common types of hoarding which include food hoarding, animal hoarding, sentimental hoarding and more. What many don’t realize is that hoarding can have serious consequences for the individual, their family and even their community. It can impact the individual’s day-to-day life, their relationships, careers and even their health.

In the past year of starting a volunteer rescue group to help find homes for area pound pups, we have run into many animal hoarding situations. Our little volunteer group, Paws N Claws-Eufaula, OK has seen individuals who have too many dogs and even have more puppies on the way, but can’t and won’t see that there is a problem when these animals begin to act like a pack and kill livestock or when there isn’t enough food or space to keep these animals humanely. Sadly, I know I have worked for days and exhausted my time and resources to help these individuals who often decide that they don’t want any assistance. They even get angry and offended when anyone tries to intervene to stop their hoarding patterns. Somehow, their minds believe that having 40-50 animals isn’t “hoarding” and they convince themselves that this is “normal” when clearly it is not. In fact, this type of hoarding is actually dangerous to the community as it overpopulates the area with unwanted animals.

Hoarding can be hereditary or it can be a sign of trauma. For me unfortunately, it was both. So I do understand this pattern because I have a family history of hoarding and collecting things that I should let go of instead. I know what it’s like to suffer from the inability to decide on what I should keep and what I need to let go of for my health and sanity. In my lifetime I have gone through many heartbreaking situations that I couldn’t control which have caused me to cling to sentimental things even at the cost of my own comfort. Though I can see that I have this problem, “fixing it” is not as easy as one might think. Experiencing these stressful life events of divorce, death of a loved one and even the loss of things like losing a home, all play a role in hoarding because it makes you want to hold on to all those things even tighter.

Sadly, I am not alone in this hoarding problem. In fact, an estimated 19 million Americans suffer from this disorder and it is far more common in the Western world and in the United States specifically. We live in a society that drives us to purchase more things and purchasing those things makes a hoarder actually feel better for a moment. We are also encouraged not to “waste” anything. So we aren’t allowed to waste food and we are told to eat everything on our plate. We won’t waste paper so we try to recycle everything, every time and this often becomes a vicious cycle and pattern that we repeat over and over again.

Many times people who begin hoarding actually have association issues which include indecisiveness, procrastination and even perfectionism. We can’t decide how to handle the problem, even if we know the problem exists. Though the exact cause of hoarding is unknown, this hoarding pattern is often triggered by this perfectionist personality or this family history of hoarding. People with hoarding disorders often find it hard to organize, pay attention or even make a decision to let some things go. This leads us to clinging to things that we probably should let go – to include unhealthy relationships. Yes, all these things constantly stress us and take up space in our lives, so much that we can’t enjoy our space and our lives.

So this year I am on a physical, emotional and spiritual journey of learning to let go. I’m going to read every book on the art of letting go and then put it into practice to purge my life of unnecessary clutter. I am on a personal journey to reduce the pressure I feel for everything to be perfect when there is no such thing as perfect. I am going to let go of things that no longer serve a purpose in my life. I want to declutter my mind, my space and my soul so I can find peace and clarity again. Hopefully by stopping the hoarding tendencies I will find more space and learn to live with less. Then hopefully this will give me more time and energy to enjoy the little things in life and just breathe.