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Post by howardsgirlfriend on Sept 15, 2009 11:23:04 GMT -5
Our squalor is entirely related to our hoarding, mostly caused by disorganiztion + difficulty discarding (as opposed to over-acquiring.) In fact, until the "are you a hoarder" poll, it never occured to me that someone could have squalor without hoarding. So....
Please help me learn. If you don't have hoarding (yours or someone else's) in your home, but do have squalor, how did that happen?
I always thought that when I got organized, my squalor issues would be resolved, but maybe that's not as true as I thought.
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Post by CourageouslyLion SeeksSerenity on Sept 15, 2009 11:36:02 GMT -5
- For me, it was simply resistance to "having to" do something. Like a little kid saying "you can't make me do that!" ... even if it's ME telling ME that I should clean. (as explained in the "demand resistance" thread here: takeonestepatatime.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=402 ) Also ... there was apathy. I simply didn't care if the house looked disorderly. And I was born without a sense of smell, so I am not bothered by odors if they occur. Furthermore, I have that simple desire to have fun, and/or be intellectual, and/or pursue spirituality --- and therefore tend to put housekeeping as my lowest priority. However, from being at these forums, I'm gradually retraining my mind to feel that housekeeping might be a desireable thing to accomplish. ------------------------------ Editing to add ... Another factor ... I've never written about this before ... but when I was a teenager, there was cruel adult relative living in my home, who controlled everyone, and we all lived in fear of her. Furthermore, she was an obsessive cleanie. Before she moved in, I was ALREADY resistant to cleaning, resistant to routines, resistant to rules, etc. I believe this "resistance" or "self-will" is an ingrained pattern that I have to work deeply to get through. Anyhow, I was already that way before she moved in ... so I cannot blame my resistance on her. But her cruel and demanding presence in my home did tend to inflame my pre-existing distain for housekeeping. She has been out of my life for decades, but I've only recently begun to let go of my resentment about that old situation. And "release of resentment" is helping me to heal. Now I just need to roll up my sleeves and get to work! - |
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Post by gottaproblem on Sept 15, 2009 12:10:51 GMT -5
Maybe I am just L*A*Z*Y. I do tend to put people before things and like clss I also like to have fun and am resistant to cleaning.  |
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Post by 60isolderthanithot on Sept 15, 2009 16:59:30 GMT -5
This is an interesting question. Have we defined "squalor" as clutter caused by piles of things? If we've defined it as including hoarding, then there's a sort of tautology about the question.
I had a professor whose office was a wreck the same way my house was but I remember people laughing about it, not calling him squalid. I had another guy, who turned out to be a drug addict, say that my house looked like a crack addict lived there! That woke me up for sure.
I am not sure we're talking about the same thing when we use a word like hoarder. I thought it was people who couldn't throw away things like banana peels. I thought of "squalor" as a provocative word. I'm not sure hoarder is much better. I confess I'm not sure if confrontation with words like that works to HELP people find other ways to live. It might be. I noticed that it got my attention sharply when the picture of "crack house" entered my mind.
The bare facts are: about two years ago, I found this group. I had known for many years I had a problem but didn't have a name for it. I had so many other issues, it didn't feel to me as if worrying about clutter was the most urgent emergency. Now I realize the clutter was the "fever thermometer," it told of sickness within. It was the materialization of many inner conflicts. When I got help with THOSE CONFLICTS, which began in here, online, with strangers who told stories that I could have written, I somehow began to behave differently, in ways that lowered the clutter/hoarding/squalor. There was no one major epiphany, really, there was the steady growth of little successes which led me to bigger ones. One square foot, cleaned in 30 second sessions led to a clean sink every day and a refigerator that no longer had any rotten food in it. I wasn't hoarding the old food, I just had no energy left to clean as my life slowed to a crawl.
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Post by Perfect Mess on Sept 15, 2009 17:01:03 GMT -5
For me, it started out when we moved into a house when I was 3 months pregnant. I had ZERO energy to unpack everything. After the baby was born, I had ZERO energy to do anything but take care of the baby. After I returned to wrok and she started sleeping thru the night, I'm not sure what my excuse was. The house teetered between acceptable to dirty and nasty , back to so-so. It wasn't until after baby #2 was born that it became blindingly obvious I was suffering from depression. I couldn't say when it started, but I could identify that I was a different person before we moved into this house. My therapist says it was post pardum snow balled into something bigger.
A messy house was the least of my problems. rediscovering why being alive was worth it and saving my marriage after finding out my husband had cheated on me were the biggest things. I put the marriage on hold and he moved out while I figured myself out and went on medication.
In the midst of that mess, my house was a mess. Everything I owned was out, piles of dirty clothes and dirty dishes everywhere, trash on the floor and kids toys in every room. I literally had to clean the floor with a rake.
When I did get to the point I could clean up and toss, I did so without any problems. It was the will to do it that was lacking. I couldn't care less about the stuff.
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Post by 60isolderthanithot on Sept 15, 2009 17:04:43 GMT -5
I know what I thought - when I heard "hoarding," I thought of people with emotional ties to every single item. The lady Carol, on Oprah show, who thought there was no such thing as having too many washcloths. I didn't cling to things emotionally, at least, not the mass of objects which constituted my clutter. I kept them for varying reasons which only once in a while involved emotional attachment. Many times, I was physically unable to move an item and ended up using it to hold other things. I ran out of space to clean because there was no longer a horizontal surface available to sort anything out or look at it.
So when people asked about hoarding, I didn't identify with it.
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No More Squalor
New Member
Breaking my dirty habits once and for all...
Joined: October 2008
Posts: 34
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Post by No More Squalor on Sept 15, 2009 17:09:01 GMT -5
A friend of mine lived in utter squalor, yet was not a hoarder at all.
She had a lot of rubbish in her house, yes. But it was there for the same reason the refrigerator was filthy, and the tub was full of soap scum and mildew, and the floors were an indeterminate gray-brown from years of ground-in dirt: she just didn't clean, ever. She didn't think about it, or if she did she put it off until "later," but "later" never came. She also let home repairs and maintenance slide for the same reasons.
She didn't intentionally acquire excess stuff, and she didn't cling to any of the trash that came into her house. She had no emotional attachment to any of it, or beliefs that it would come in handy, or daydreams about fixing and selling "good stuff"--she just didn't get around to throwing it out. She'd set stuff down (a drink cup, a pizza box, junk mail, the tray from a microwaved dinner), intending to deal with it later, and never get to it. She was like Steven on Hoarders, only she had lived in her house for over a decade. The dirt was ground in to every surface and the house was falling apart (because she didn't get around to doing repairs or maintenance, either).
So whenever she did get around to crisis-cleaning, she wasn't paralyzed by having to sort through and make decisions about each thing--she knew it was all trash, and could pitch it without any anxiety or feelings of loss. Underneath all the mess, she didn't have many posessions that she cared about. When she went to work overseas for a while she only had three boxes of stuff to store at her mom's, and selected those items without feeling any emotional trauma. Everything else got thrown away, recycled, or given away without a second thought.
I haven't spoken to her in a long time, but she's been back in her house for six years. The last time I drove by, I saw the familiar sight of the curtains smooshed up against the front windows and the blinds askew from junk piled against them, so nothing's changed.
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Post by megtreb on Sept 15, 2009 17:26:10 GMT -5
I'm not a hoarder, but my house is a mess. A house can have not much stuff in it and still be dirty to the point of squalor. Even if you have minimal furniture and possessions, you still have to sweep, mop, vacuum and clean. Without maintenance, floors will get dirty , windows will get dirty, walls and furniture will get covered with dust and cobwebs. The sink, kitchen counter and stove will get covered with food residues, food in the refrigerator will go bad and moldy, the bathtub and toilet will get nasty, laundry will pile up. If the trash and recycling are not taken out, they will start to overflow. If there are pets, there will be hair, litterboxes and accidents. You could go a year without acquiring anything and still have squalor.
As I type this, behind the couch I'm sitting on is a mess where my cat threw up a hairball over a week ago. I haven't cleaned it up. Why? Because it is out of sight and due to my physical problems, cleaning is a great effort for me. I can't kneel, it is hard to bend over. I get out of breath after vacuuming the rug in the living room. I know I have to do it, I just put it off.
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Post by Peach on Sept 15, 2009 17:55:10 GMT -5
There is squalor.
There is squalor with clutter and/or hoarding.
There is hoarding but without the squalor and/or clutter.
I think of a squalorous home as being a place that is dirty, unclean, unsanitary, dusty, smelly. A house can appear neat and tidy but still be squalorous, if viewed up close.
I think of hoarding as the accumulation of too much stuff that is of little or no value and refusing to let it go. Hoarders might hoard only certain objects (e.g., a 10-year supply of paper towels), muliple objects, or everything that ever enters their house. After awhile, it becomes impossible to clean around the stuff all over everything and squalor might develop. Some hoarders can successfully keep their hoarding hidden from sight, such as in closets, attic, drawers. Their house can be non-squalorous. Hoarding does not automatically lead to squalor.
Clutter is simply stuff out of its proper place. For example, if I pull out everything from our closets, desk and chests of drawers and scatter that stuff all around the house, that is clutter. As with hoarding, it becomes impossible to clean around all this stuff scattered on the floor and furniture and squalor develops.
So, yes -- one can have an organized house but it can still be squalorous, if one does not dust, vacuum, wash clothes, etc. Organization is just one tool in our fight against clutter and/or hoarding. It is not the final answer.
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Post by cosmic1 on Sept 15, 2009 18:13:04 GMT -5
I think that what differentiates the two is that hoarding includes the emotional attachment to items and the desire to keep acquiring more stuff or just not letting go of the stuff you already have. I don't consider myself a hoarder because I don't flinch about throwing stuff away. I would rather donate things that I believe someone else could use because I don't like to be wasteful, but things that are obviously worn out or damaged need to be pitched. I think for hoarders, purging brings on great feelings of anxiety and dread. Of course, I am no expert from a psychological perspective. I think I am learning from watching Hoarders that there are varying degrees and causes.
Squalor is something that I am well acquainted with. I can ignore mess and clutter for months until I get a bug up my butt to clean it up. So, I swing on the pendulum from messy to clean. One thing I have to have, though, are clear floors. I need clear walkways throughout my house, so if anything does pile up, it's by the back door where I keep the garbage. I can have a pile of boxes there for weeks and not even notice them until I realize that I keep having to move them to get into the pantry and then they have to go.
I also realized, thanks to the excellent information provided by Lion, that I am demand resistant, which I think contributes a lot to my not wanting to do housework. As a child, I was required to do chores every day, including cleaning. Somewhere along the line, I decided when I became an adult in my own house that I wasn't going to clean unless I felt like it - and I rarely felt like it. Now, that I am older and I just spent an entire vacation (again!) cleaning my house, I decided that I don't want to do that anymore (although I may slip). I want to keep things maintained and start plowing through all the stuff hidden away in my closets, file cabinet and storage containers and purge what I don't need or want anymore. When I decide to move, I don't want to have to deal with it all in a crisis mode.
I think that those of us who struggle with squalor have varying reasons and degrees of tolerance for our messes, but I don't think you necessarily have to be a hoarder to have squalor. I do think that if you are a hoarder, you certainly will have squalor.
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Post by Bizzy on Sept 15, 2009 21:10:02 GMT -5
Pickles- I got a lick out of your post. Some peoplw are just wired different from day one. My little sister was not a neatie but you could give her a cookie and she would eat it and hardly have any crumbs on her. Give me one and in 10 minutes it would be spread all over my clothes and body and anything else around me. When I was 3! I remember in High school not being able to keep shirts tucked in. Shoulder bags on my shoulder- peprers from falling out of my notebooks while I was walking-- things just seemed to fall off of shelves when I walked into a room- I am very clumsy- - and this is the truth- not just how I see myself- and i have a hard time coordinating my body movements with things around me. I bump into things and people and drop things and I have never in my life been able to figure out how women get into their purses to get things without the entire contents spilling out. My boyfrined Rod and I will go out for a burger and he will use ONE napkind. I will use 6 and stil have stuff all over me and I have good manners. My hair is flyaway and won't stay put- my shoes wont stay tied, My cell phone drops out of my picket- I trip over things and frop things I am carrying and I put things down in a nice stack and it slides to the floor. I have NO idea how I cleaned houses for 20 plus years and was good at it exept that i was trying to suport a disabled child and was highly motivated to do anything to keep food on the table - and that everything was already in its place in those houses. AND-- NO ONE WAS EVER HOME TO WATCH ME. I have not done that kind of professional cleaning for a while becdause of heath issues and because - well anyway- I know how to clean- and I clean here- but I drop the paper towels in the bucket of water, knock over the garbage can, the bottom of the garbage bag breaks on the way to the dumpster and when I gather up my mail from the box- it falls down around my feet and I have to run and keep it from flying away- letting go of the dogs leash and having to run after the dog and locking my keys in the car. That is how things feel to me. It would be funny if it were not so exhausting. I always get the dog- not alwasy the mail. When I water plants on the porch - I get water where it shouldn't be and all over me- , I stpe in dog crap when I clean up poo- I drop things and break them- I leave cupboard doors oen and whack myself on the head regularly- put dishes away and watch them tumble down and trip over rugs that there is nothing rwong with. If something can come apart, or break - or not fit right, or not open - it will happen. It is so very frustrating and makes me want to SCREAM. Doors lock on me, I set off alarms I don't mean to and cant' turn them off, I can't get gates to close properly without going back three times and I have so many bruises on my body from bonking into things that I look like an abused person. And I have age spots and hot flashes and no sex drive anymore.. NOt that those are related but they do not help. Anyway- you made me laugh. I have terrible AHDH ADHD which does NOT repsond to med and dylexia and have trouble with spacial things- - it is fine to put a name to things- but it is another to live with them. The effect is accumulative( and Not just in stuff that you dont' know what to do with) - it really wears me down. When people get short with me - for not getting it right away- or having to repeat or walk me thourgh it- or simple mucking up the works- - I have started to say - if you think this is hard to watch - try LIVING it. That is one thing about menopause. You start not to care about what you say. I don't know if that is good or bad.  . Anyhow- folks- just keep on dohg what you are dong- whatever works for you- - everyone is different. The three things works for me sometimes and the 15 mins works for me sometimes and running around with one thing in my hand talking to myself saying " put his on the refriderator with a magnet before you forget what it is!!" is sometimes the only thing that works for me that day. There are times........ that I feel as though I am channel surfing without a remote.. <<<< grin>>>>> Thanks to all of you for being so brave and being here. I think I would have lost my mind by now if not for this board-.......... although the jury is still probably out on that one. But until they offer to come in and help- to heck with them. Bizzy |
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Post by Bizzy on Sept 15, 2009 21:13:36 GMT -5
Pickles --I meant- A KICK out of your post. Not a lick out of your post. I wil never be able to tyope type ....... Arggggghhhhhh. Today is a an especially off day. |
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MiSC
Banned
Joined: May 2008
Posts: 1,611 
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Post by MiSC on Sept 15, 2009 21:31:10 GMT -5
Our squalor is entirely related to our hoarding, mostly caused by disorganiztion + difficulty discarding (as opposed to over-acquiring.) In fact, until the "are you a hoarder" poll, it never occured to me that someone could have squalor without hoarding. So.... Please help me learn. If you don't have hoarding (yours or someone else's) in your home, but do have squalor, how did that happen? I always thought that when I got organized, my squalor issues would be resolved, but maybe that's not as true as I thought. Before I say anything, you've seen that NSGCD scale, right? What we, on this board, call "squalor" is covered on the hoarding scale that professional organizers and psychologists use. The NSGCD scale provides parameters that help the pros by supplying a common language. |
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Post by 60isolderthanithot on Sept 15, 2009 22:00:31 GMT -5
Sorry, I don't think a group that makes up its own "certifications" is any more qualified to name our condition than we are.
The "pros"? Says who? The underlying organization is just another group that hopes to create a cash market for its credential - made up from whole cloth, same as the AKC or the folks who tried to put California black hair braiders out of business by creating a "license" that gave the founding group a monopoly on who would be allowed to work with people's hair. Check any book on the sociology of occupations and professions. This is a well known process.
Look, I have no particular objection to any particular group. I am saying bluntly: we should not give up our autonomy in any way to students who want to become EXPERTS ON US. The idea is silly on its face. Sheepskin psychosis is not a substitute for our personal truths. We should not accept outsiders' pronouncements on us as if they know one thing we do not know.
As far as I'm concerned, I don't feel as if I'm obliged to accept a marketing group's idea of what I should call myself as if it contained any Higher Truth. It does not. It's a MARKETING PACKAGE. Creating professional jargon is just a way to distance Outsiders from Insiders, the better to sell their package of marketing advantages.
"What we on this board call squalor" is just as legitimately called squalor as the jargon promoted by brochures made up by Learned Professionals whose overt goal is to communicate WITH ONE ANOTHER, not with us.
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Post by Meme on Sept 15, 2009 22:14:37 GMT -5
there can be many reasons-
disorganization
living with squallies
health
lack of spaceand I could make a huge list but you get the idea
we are not pigs as was stated on the doctor phil show today-
I guess I am getting cranky about the negative connotation on the word squalor as somehow
it seems to state that is all we are about--and I will not apoligize any more if some one else defines my house according to their ideals --
too much stuff for the space can be difficult and some of the stuff we need -
lack of time if we are working and raising a family
I could think of many reasons-- some of us are just squallies because we have other interests and maybe busy with those interests-- helping others or hobbies and so on---
it is not a bad thing -- I think we should understand that squalor does not define us-- some of us are very good hard working kind loving folks who never quite catch up-
poverty can add to it if we do not have things like cupboards and dressers etc-
my closet is 36 inches wide and I have no dresser in my room- now that papa hubby is not here it is easier for me to hang my clothes-but before that I did have to pile clothes in a corner--
no one goes on and on about Bill Clinton's office or the little people's house- to me we have always had a home and yes- some cluttered and sometimes messed up but always a home-
my kids had cupcakes baked for school at home rather than the bake shop and so on-
maybe we are living life rather than life living us--
just some Meme thoughts said with love-
I hope you do not think Meme is being naughty about this but it is just how I see me--
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