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Donna
COH & ACOA
Joined: Jul 22, 2006
Posts: 2038
Location: Cabo
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 Posted:
Fri Jan 04, 2008 8:33 am Post subject: 1/1/08: New York Times Article/Comments posted |
 
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New York Times
A Clutter Too Deep for Mere Bins and Shelves
By TARA PARKER-POPE
Published: January 1, 2008
After the holidays, many shoppers load up their carts with storage bins, shelving systems and color-coded containers, all in a resolute quest to get organized for the new year.
The country’s collective desire to clean up is evident in the proliferation of organization-oriented businesses like the Container Store and California Closets. Reality shows like “Mission Organization” on HGTV and “How Clean is Your House?” on Lifetime feed a national obsession to declutter. The magazine Real Simple has even created a $13 special issue on cleaning house.
Getting organized is unquestionably good for both mind and body — reducing risks for falls, helping eliminate germs and making it easier to find things like medicine and exercise gear.
“If you can’t find your sneakers, you aren’t taking a walk,” said Dr. Pamela Peeke, assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of Maryland and the author of “Fit to Live” (Rodale, 2007), which devotes a section to the link between health and organization. “How are you going to shoot a couple of hoops with your son if you can’t even find the basketball?”
But experts say the problem with all this is that many people are going about it in the wrong way. Too often they approach clutter and disorganization as a space problem that can be solved by acquiring bins and organizers.
Measures like these “are based on the concept that this is a house problem,” said David F. Tolin, director of the anxiety disorders center at the Institute of Living in Hartford and an adjunct associate professor of psychiatry at Yale.
“It isn’t a house problem,” he went on. “It’s a person problem. The person needs to fundamentally change their behavior.”
Excessive clutter and disorganization are often symptoms of a bigger health problem. People who have suffered an emotional trauma or a brain injury often find housecleaning an insurmountable task. Attention deficit disorder, depression, chronic pain and grief can prevent people from getting organized or lead to a buildup of clutter. At its most extreme, chronic disorganization is called hoarding, a condition many experts believe is a mental illness in its own right, although psychiatrists have yet to formally recognize it.
Compulsive hoarding is defined, in part, by clutter that so overtakes living, dining and sleeping spaces that it harms the person’s quality of life. A compulsive hoarder finds it impossible, even painful, to part with possessions. It’s not clear how many people suffer from compulsive hoarding, but estimates start at about 1.5 million Americans.
Dr. Tolin recently studied compulsive hoarders using brain-scan technology. While in the scanner, hoarders looked at various possessions and made decisions about whether to keep them or throw them away. The items were shredded in front of them, so they knew the decision was irreversible. When a hoarder was making decisions about throwing away items, the researchers saw increased activity in the orbitofrontal cortex, a part of the brain involved in decision-making and planning.
“That part of the brain seemed to be stressed to the max,” Dr. Tolin said. By comparison, people who didn’t hoard showed no extra brain activity.
While hoarders are a minority, many psychologists and organization experts say the rest of us can learn from them. The spectrum from cleanliness to messiness includes large numbers of people who are chronically disorganized and suffering either emotionally, physically or socially. Cognitive behavioral therapy may help: a recent study of hoarders showed that six months’ therapy resulted in a marked decline in clutter in the patient’s living space.
Although chronic disorganization is not a medical diagnosis, therapists and doctors sometimes call on professional organizers to help patients. One of them is Lynne Johnson, a professional organizer from Quincy, Mass., who is president of the National Study Group on Chronic Disorganization.
Ms. Johnson explains that some people look at a shelf stacked with coffee mugs and see only mugs. But people with serious disorganization problems might see each one as a unique item — a souvenir from Yellowstone or a treasured gift from Grandma.
Many clients have already accumulated numerous storage bins and other such items in a futile attempt to get organized. Usually the home space is adequate, she says, but the challenge is in teaching them how to group, sort, set priorities and discard.
Ms. Johnson says she often sees a link between her client’s efforts to get organized and weight loss. “I think someone decides, ‘I’m not going to live like this anymore. I’m not going to hold onto my stuff, I’m not going to hold onto my weight,’” she said. “I don’t know that one comes before the other. It’s part of that same life-change decision.”
On its Web site, www.nsgcd.org, the group offers a scale to help people gauge the seriousness of their clutter problem. It also includes a referral tool for finding a professional organizer. But since the hourly fees can range from $60 to $100 or more, it may be worth consulting a new book by Dr. Tolin, “Buried in Treasures” (Oxford, 2007), which offers self-assessments and advice for people with hoarding tendencies.
Dr. Peeke says she often instructs patients trying to lose weight to at least create one clean and uncluttered place in their home. She also suggests keeping a gym bag with workout clothes and sneakers in an uncluttered area to make it easier to exercise. She recalls one patient whose garage was “a solid cube of clutter.” The woman cleaned up her home and also lost about 50 pounds.
“It wasn’t, at the end of the day, about her weight,” Dr. Peeke said. “It was about uncluttering at multiple levels of her life.”
E-mail: well@nytimes.com.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/01/health/01well.html?ref=science
===============
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/31/tackling-clutter-to-improve-your-health/?em&ex=1199336400&en=76b447a4745994b0&ei=5087%0A
Some comments posted attached to article on their site, with some of the article author comments:
#45.
Thank you so much for this article. I am married to one of these people, and I have contemplated divorce because of it.My husband does not know how to let ANYTHING go. It drives me nuts.
From TPP — family members really have a hard time with this. you should check out the chronic disorganization website link in the story or the book Buried in Treasures. Here’s an article about how hoarding affects families. Click here. You also may find the website www.childrenofhoarders.com interesting.
— Posted by Janet
#56.
My sibling’s house could be classified as a dump, a fire trap, a slip & fall hazard, a trash heap, utter chaos. We have spentless countless hours…days…weeks…months sorting, resorting, unsorting,talking about. In the end, it seems hopeless. Sometimes I think it would be better if the house burned to the ground when no one is at home, but then, of course, the few things that are of value, monetarily or emotionally, would be lost as well. Sigh.
From TPP — The problem many family members have is that they see the clutter as the problem and clearing it away as the solution. In fact, the person who is accumulating the clutter has significant health issues that need to be addressed before any housecleaning is possible. You can clear it all away but if the person hasn’t sought help for the underlying issue, then things will accumulate quickly and the clutter will soon be at previous levels or worse. Clearing away the clutter causes hoarders emotional pain. I’d advise you to read Buried In Treasures. I’d also suggest trying to get your sibling to see a therapist to discuss the issue. Finally, you can consult a professional organizer certified in hoarding disorders. These people will go into a home, in a non judgmental way, and work with the person to help them change their behavior. it’s an expensive process but the combination of behavioral therapy and a professional organizer is likely going to be more successful than the hopeless situation you describe. It is a huge challenge you face.
— Posted by Judith
67.
I take issue with this comment from TPP:
The problem many family members have is that they see the clutter as the problem and clearing it away as the solution.
This is a common misunderstanding among professionals: that family is clueless about the mental health component, all we ever want to do is clean up, and that we are taken by surprise when cleaning up merely causes distress and the hoard returns. HELLO! As family members we have a history with the person who suffers from compulsive hoarding we have every reason to know the emotional trauma caused by displacing or removing possessions. We are not surprised by or ignorant about the nature of this disorder, but we ARE trying to keep our family members safe when conditions are severe. The aspect of our experience that professionals very consistently ignore: most family members who are focused on cleaning (i.e. instead of fretting over CBT or counselling) are actually dealing with OLDER hoarders, in deep denial, living in genuinely hazardous conditions. If our loved ones died in a fire because we failed to take action, how would we be judged? Very poorly, is my guess. No one is yet taking hoarding seriously in terms of the physical dangers and true crises (that FAMILIES are privately shouldering the burden of managing). Check out the OC Foundation website pages on hoarding and you will see only the briefest mention of when conditions become severe, very casual suggestion that we call public authorities. That’s pretty weak advice: wait around until the conditions are so bad that you can call for legal intervention? Up until a few months ago, the OCF website didn’t even acknowledge that, though– it only repeated the pitiful refrain that no one dare touch the hoarder’s possessions because such an event will surely cause the hoarder to have a breakdown. Sorry, that’s not good enough, we need practical advice, people!
Thanks for mentioning Children of Hoarders– a great site, definitely.
— Posted by Elizabeth Nelson
From TPP — I apologize if it seemed like I was dismissing the challenges and acquired knowledge of family members of hoarders. You are 100% right about the safety issue, particularly as people age, and the professional organizers I spoke with all agreed that the medical community doesn’t take this seriously enough.
80.
I’ve also read “Buried in Treasure,” Tolin’s book. While it’s informative about hoarding disorders, it’s primarily for assisting people with a serious problem who can realize that they need help. But most hoarders are in total denial, so I suspect it’s not practical for the majority of cases. It’s also written for caregivers trying to get a hoarder to recognize the problem, which is next to impossible in my experience. If you’re in this situation, read it and you may feel less alone, if not less helpless. It’s a great relief to see serious thought and research finally directed at this issue, though, and I will eagerly read anything the authors produce, and cheer them on.
— Posted by Paris
114.
Tara’s article was terrific and so are all these comments. According to Dr. Randy Frost, who is one of the coauthors of Buried in Treasures, people who hoard process information differently than people who don’t.
I’m not a hoarder but I do have problems with clutter and I see in myself some of the traits researchers have identified in hoarders, including perfectionism, difficulty making decisions and an appreciation for aspects of objects that minimalists don’t seem to share.
One of Dr. Frost’s patients wanted to save an ancient ATM slip for sentimental reasons; another kept bottle caps for their beauty. Tidy, well-organized people don’t perceive or treasure detail the way hoarders do. Where hoarders (and people like me) see a multitude of colors, neatniks see black and white, and that makes their lives much easier.
As Dr. Frost told one interviewer, “If you look at something and try to decide what to do with it, and you have hundreds of thoughts about it, it’s much harder to make a decision … than if you look at something and only think it’s useful or it’s not useful.”
As mentioned earlier, www.childrenofhoarders.com is a terrific resource for relatives of hoarders. People who have serious problems with clutter should check out www.messies.com for support. I’m writing a book about clutter and have some additional resources listed there at http://stuffola.net. Please stop by and drop me a line if you have comments.
— Posted by Deborah Branscum |
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