Going through my mother's crap - A new kind of yuck

[TimetoHeal]

So, we're at the point of going through my mom's crap at her house.  It's really unpleasant and a lot of work.  In fact, it's more than I am even supposed to be doing, because my brother engaged a lady who comes in and sells everything the family doesn't want, donates the rest, and then gets rid of the junk.  He did this in order for me NOT to have to go over there every darn week and go through stuff with her.  As you can imagine, she is not happy about this and keeps dragging her feet.  We had to tell the lady she wasn't ready.  I know she will drag this on indefinitely if we don't give her a cutoff time.  I'm sure she loves giving me something else to do for her and having me forced to interact with her.  I'm really tired of lugging heavy bags to and from her house to her AL apartment.  Oh the positive side, I've gotten some good workouts, I guess.   

It's also been really weird and disturbing to see what she thinks is so important to keep getting.  It's mostly her toiletries (she has like 20 tubes of toothpaste, 20 of every kind of OTC medicine you can imagine, etc. etc.  More toilet paper or paper towels than one can use in a lifetime.  Yes, she is a hoarder).  Her files for taxes and stuff, which are important, but money is VERY important to my mother.  And a few religious relics.  She has not picked a single family picture with any of her children or grandchildren or anything else that would give her apartment a "homey" feeling.  She has some very nice and expensive artwork that she has collected over the years, and she doesn't even want 1 or 2 cheery pieces.  She says she has no way to hang it on the wall. Yet every other resident has stuff on their walls.    I pointed out some stand up pictures in frames that don't have to be hung with her grandchildren and said she could just put those on her dresser or nightstand.  She didn't want them, but said she couldn't throw them away because they have holy relics pasted to them. So she just stacked them in a pile to "go back for later".     I have to admit, that is hurtful.  Not a single damn picture of me, my brother, or our kids is important to her.  But the holy relics are!

It's been eye opening for me as well, going through some of our old family photo albums and mine and my brother's baby books.  It gives a a glimpse into her mind during those days and brings up a lot of memories about my childhood.  I grabbed them to bring home so that I can process some of that and maybe process it in therapy. 

I know I'm rambling a bit, but one more thing:  Is it weird that I don't want any of her nice stuff?  I mean, she's got some very high-end furniture and artwork that I always thought I would want when she passed.  It's stuff I could never afford on my own.  But I find myself not wanting anything that is attached to her or her house or her energy, no matter how nice.  Have you all experienced that as well?

Thanks if you read all this! 

[SeaBreeze]

I'm sorry you're dealing with all this, well...crap. Literally and figuratively.

My late uNPD mother, co-morbid schizo-affective disorder, was a weird mix of semi-homeless minimalist yet with a mini-hoard of the strangest items she managed to carry or store for the final 2 decades of her life. When she passed away 10 years ago, she had a storage unit of just plain crap in my former town, a few states away. I mailed the storage facility a copy of her death certificate, along with a waiver giving them rights to auction off or trash her belongings, because nothing was worth sorting through or keeping. (It was most likely all trashed.) My brother and my DD went through her remaining items she left in plastic tubs in my brother's basement, and they shared some cathartic laughs and knowing sighs over the odd things she thought were worth keeping.

She actually gave me most of the family photos when I first left home. She kept a few of mine and my brother's childhood photos, as well as the grandkids photos, which she had trimmed down with scissors to just our heads and bodies because she said it took up less space in storage? So at least she valued these photos, but no idea where some of them were even taken with no backgrounds, only our disembodied faces as any point of reference. (Thank goodness she gave me all the vintage family photos before she did the same to them?!)

So while it was fairly easy to deal with late uNPDm's belongings, it still came with some baggage. On the off chance there may have been anything of value in that storage unit, be it monetary or sentimental value, I certainly don't seem to have missed it!

[TimetoHeal]

Thanks for the perspective, SeaBreeze!

That's crazy about your mother cutting out the pictures from the backgrounds!  I can't imagine it really made that much difference in how much room they took up.  Their minds just don't work exactly right, do they?  But we already knew that. LOL. 

Yeah, I'm thinking even if I just told the lady to get started and never went back over there, I wouldn't miss a thing. 

[walking on broken glass]

Hi Time to Heal!

That sounds tough. I am sorry 😔 I hope you soon get to the stage where you get your mum to agree on the clearance and there's no going back and forth and no hideous discoveries. The hoarding is familiar from my own mum! She has cupboards full of tubs of toothpaste, hygienic towels, tissues etc that she will never be able to consume in her lifetime. I dread the future when I will have to tackle that. I don't think it's strange that you don't want your mum's stuff. I wouldn't want them either. Recently, I gave away some presents and clothes she had given me because I couldn't stand having them and looking at them. If you are able to separate the items from the emotional resonance they cause, it makes sense to have them. Otherwise they are just painful reminders.

[Call Me Cordelia]

Saying she has no way to hang it on the wall sounds like a waify dog whistle that you are just (rightly!) not responding to. But yeah, no wonder you find it hurtful. It's always hard to see once again the proof of what you already know, that you are not valued. It hard to see that they don't know or understand or care that their lack of care is obvious to you. It's an unbridgeable divide, and for a child of any age that I believe will always be a grief.

And even the nice stuff would be a reminder of that grief, unless you achieve some superhuman level of detachment. So yes, I believe your feelings are perfectly understandable.

My folks were all hoarders too. I get it. It does show what the priorities really are, and it's always sad. My grandmother was a career woman back before second wave feminism really caught on, and she saved boxes and boxes of work papers from a decades-defunct company. She did keep artwork that I made for her. It was really nice. But pictures of us, of my mother, her only child, I don't think made it into her assisted living apartment either? It's hard to recall now. I do remember there was a lot of hurt and drama over what she took to that apartment, and some ridiculous things did in fact make the move, like a fake fireplace! But when it came time to clean out that apartment after her death, my mother got rid of nearly everything. My mother is/was also a hoarder. But she pretty much flushed it all, even stuff that at the time I would have liked to have. With the perspective of where I am in my life now... I can't say I blame her.

Letting go of a lifetime of hurt as represented by the accumulation of stuff is an opportunity for healing. I hope you are able to find peace through this process. I really am inspired that you are taking the opportunity to take some of that old stuff to therapy to deal with. But you are also having limits and boundaries as to how much you are willing to do and how long this can go on. I think that is brave and wise.

[TimetoHeal]

Saying she has no way to hang it on the wall sounds like a waify dog whistle that you are just (rightly!) not responding to. But yeah, no wonder you find it hurtful. It's always hard to see once again the proof of what you already know, that you are not valued. It hard to see that they don't know or understand or care that their lack of care is obvious to you. It's an unbridgeable divide, and for a child of any age that I believe will always be a grief.

Yes!  Definitely waify!  Either she wants me to volunteer to come hang everything for her, or , and I think this is more likely, she doesn't want her room to look homey and like she has a family, so people can feel sorry for her.  She keeps commenting about how other residents' rooms are so beautifully decorated.  Well, hers could easily be as well, but she is choosing not to. Almost all the other residents have something hanging on their door like a cute "Welcome" sign or floral wreath. I suggested I could get her something like that, and she's like, no I don't want anything like that.  Oh, well.  Why do I keep trying?

I think on one hand it will be healing for me, processing and going through some things and then getting rid of the ones I don't want.  But I decided last night I am NOT going to keep making endless trips back and forth lugging stuff.  It is taking a toll on me physically and I'm done.  I hope to talk to my brother today to see when we can set a cutoff point and put the house on the market whether she's "ready" or not. 

[TimetoHeal]

Recently, I gave away some presents and clothes she had given me because I couldn't stand having them and looking at them. If you are able to separate the items from the emotional resonance they cause, it makes sense to have them. Otherwise they are just painful reminders.

That is so interesting, WOBG!  I have so many things she has given me over the years already, some of it welcome, but a lot of it just exact replicas of what she has or her old stuff she was getting rid of.  I'd like to get rid of a lot of that, but then my house may be empty!  LOL.  That just shows you how enmeshed we've been and how she sees me as an extension of her.  I really don't want any more. 

[NarcKiddo]

I can totally understand your feeling of not wanting anything connected with her, even if you intrinsically like the thing. I think in your position, if the items concerned are nice and possibly valuable, then I would try renting a small storage unit and keeping them away from her and away from myself for a while. And then come back to them afresh (maybe even after her passing) to see if I had changed my mind.

What I (personally) would probably not do is keep her stuff on my premises, like in my attic, because it would probably stay there forever. I think I would want some distance between it and me, hence the storage unit idea. I say this because I have various things given to me by my mother that I simply do not want but for some reason I cannot bring myself to throw them away. It is as if I fear her coming to my house to check I still have the items!

[TimetoHeal]

That's an interesting idea, NarcKiddo, and also interesting that another friend suggested the same thing to me just this morning!  Unfortunately, I don't think the storage unit is in mine or my mother's budget right now.  She's using all she is getting from the house and her car and what she makes from her and my father's investments to pay for AL and her other "add ons" of care.  And I'm just plain poor.  LOL. 

Anyway, we are going there one more time today (I hope, and in fact, told her this was my last time), so I will make a decision then. I am leaning toward not taking anything except for some of the disposables that I can use.  Sort of like going to Costco for free!