Advice on hoarding

[Sneezy]

My mom, covert NPD, is in her eighties and if there is one thing this forum has taught me, it's to pick my battles.  Actually, the less I JADE, the fewer battles mom and I have.  But I do have to speak up when it is a safety issue.  For example, I will not take her out if she doesn't bring and use her walker.  The latest issue is her hoarding. Mom has always been a bit of a hoarder.  When I was growing up, I don't remember ever seeing the tops of our kitchen counters, as they were covered in piles of stuff.  But now that mom is older, it seems to be getting worse.  Which is not uncommon in the elderly.

Mom's biggest problem is clothes.  She has two dressers and a walk-in closet that are stuffed with clothes.  There are clothes hanging over every door (no closing the bathroom door for privacy in mom's apartment).  There are piles of clothes in her bedroom.  Even her suitcases are stuffed with extra clothes.  She has also started hoarding food.  She orders extra at every meal and brings all the little cups of yogurt and jello and whatever and puts them in her fridge.  I am extra careful whenever I open her kitchen cupboards, as who knows what might come tumbling out.

I think mom's PD is making it worse.  If I bring up her hoarding, she takes it as criticism.  I am saying that she is not perfect, and that really gets her upset.  I am also playing into her "poor me, everyone is always mean to me" persona.  And another thought I had is that, in mom's mind, if she has saved something it must be very valuable just because she saved it.  And everything she does and everything about her is perfect, including all the stuff she saves.  She used to be quite the collector and she thinks that her children should be fighting over her collections simply because they are hers.  The truth is, none of us wants her ceramic hippos or her stuffed mini teddy bears or her matchbook covers.

It's becoming a safety issue.  So what do I do about it?  I've offered to help her clean out her closets.  One box at a time - we can figure out if anyone in the family might want one or two ceramic hippos and then donate the rest.  Once the boxes are gone, maybe we can figure out what clothes will fit in her closet and donate the rest?  As I'm sure you can imagine, mom is having none of it.  She is offended that I would even suggest that she needs to clean out her apartment or get rid of any of her precious things.  Any ideas?

[FromTheSwamp]

I dealt with this exact same problem. I had to let it go. Hoarding is pathological behavior and isn't solved by someone coming in to help.  Any gentle suggestion of help was met with anger and denial. 

Yes, it was and is a safety issue, but it's their stuff and their decisions.  Their pile of expired food and bad decisions, but there it is. 

Every person is different of course, so others may have better experiences.

[square]

I'm close to someone in this situation.

Your options are:

1) Keep offering, pushing, and/or fighting
2) Give up
3) Give up but be willing to act later if something changes or happens

If you choose any version of option 1, you will surely fail. Even if you manage some small victory like cleaning out some of the clothes, the victory will not be maintained. Effort and worry will be for nothing.

Option 2 is a reasonable choice, imho. You have to remember she is an adult. It's very hard to watch, but we just can't control other adults. Others may hold you responsible but they would be wrong to do so. You can't fix this.

Option 3 is also reasonable. Things that may change include her falling and getting hurt because of the hoarding, or her needing assisted living for reasons unrelated to the hoarding. You could, but would not have to, strongarm her into moving to a monitored facility. It's a gray area because she has a right to live as she chooses but an elderly adult who is unable to live safely can to some extent be forced into supervision. But with this you also have to make peace with the idea she may be harmed due to her choices, and you are not (cannot) be responsible.

So imho, option 1 is a waste, and options 2 and 3 are both reasonable, and which you ultimately choose depends on many factors.

My friend chose option 3, her father no longer has running water and it cannot be fixed due to the hoard, so she is strongarming him out now. But the red line was not merely "this doesn't seem safe at all" but "literally any judge would order him out." It would have been okay if she did nothing, though, or merely reported him to elder authorities and let them deal with it.

[Cat of the Canals]

I agree with the above and would add... if she has the ability to buy things herself, it seems that any purging is only going to (in her mind) create space for more, and then you'll be right back where you are now.

You've said your piece, and she has refused help. I don't think there's much more you can do at that point.

[Poison Ivy]

I mostly agree with the other responses. However, I also think that if you feel unsafe or you think your mom is unsafe in her home, it's appropriate to tell her that.

[wisingup]

It is incredibly difficult to watch our parents, or anyone, engage in these kinds of self-destructive behaviors.  But hoarding, or drinking, or being a hermit - these behaviors are driven by anxiety & somehow offer relief in the short-term.  Losing control over it will cause the sufferer a great deal of anxiety & probably make things worse.  Sigh.  It is so hard to stand on the sidelines & watch.  My dad drank himself to death, & my uBPDm has alienated everyone she cares about & there's not a damn thing I can do about it.

[Sneezy]

3) Give up but be willing to act later if something changes or happens

For now, I will go with option three.  Although I am going to express my concerns about safety one more time.  A friend's mom fell last week (tripped over some clothes that were on the floor).  I am going to mention this to my mom and then let her know that I am concerned about her tripping over the things in her apartment.  And then I will let it go.

The more I consider what you all are saying, the more I realize that my mom doesn't want to clean out her apartment and she will be very resentful if I try to help her get rid of anything.  And, Cat is right - she will just fill up any empty space with more stuff.

I do get to set some boundaries around this.  The most important for me is that I no longer want to enable her hoarding.  I used to take mom shopping and I HATE shopping and am just not going to do it any longer.  I will still encourage her to go out with friends or take the shopping van provided by her senior living facility.  It is good for her to get out.  But there is no reason for me to follow her around for hours at the mall while she buys stuff she doesn't need and doesn't have room for.  Also, I've noticed that she buys much less stuff when she is the one who has to haul it up to her apartment.

I am also refusing to take the blame for the state of her apartment.  In the past, she has gotten embarrassed about how bad it looks, especially when relatives are in town and stop by to visit.  She has gone so far as to blame me and state that her apartment is a mess because I won't help her go through things and clean up.  That line of discussion gets stopped from now on with a simple "you know that's not the case, mom" and then a change of subject.  Luckily, none of our relatives ever buys that - they all know how mom is.

DH is also opting out.  In the past, he has built shelves and bookcases and cabinets for her to store her stuff.  There is not a free inch of floor space for any more.  Mom has been bugging me to take her shopping for another storage cabinet (which DH would end up putting together and moving for her).  We just both said no.  More furniture is not the answer.  I can't stop her from buying something and paying to have it assembled and delivered, but we don't have to enable this ridiculousness.

[Poison Ivy]

Great ideas, Sneezy! I think these will help you and might even contribute to lessening of the hoarding.