Hoarders Bingo

Jar of urine

Dead cat

Hoarder says, “Keep!” for the first time

A visit from a city official

A smirking "1-800-GOT-JUNK" worker.

Shitting on the floor.

Tragically unflattering closeup of a hoarding specialist

A QVC box placed prominently.

Black mold

Cans of expired food

The only open space in the house is a recliner serving as a bed/dining area.

Bonus points if a ceiling-high pile of unread newspapers is within arm's reach.

White trash momma and daughter getting into a screeching argument on the front lawn about throwing away some old piece of furniture that's been covered in cat piss for 30 years.

Hazmat suits

Retching

The crying adult children

Foetus in thefreezer

Hoarding is a mental illness, so keep joking about mentally ill people.

I can't believe series like this pass as 'entertainment'.

Rat poop on the kitchen shelves.

Dead cats.

The "shocked" friend that "had no idea the house looked like this.."

The rustle of multiple cockroaches in the piles of discarded take-out containers.

Mice droppings. References to the mess as "the hoard." Dr. Robyn Zasio.

"I don't have a clutter problem, I have a lack of storage problem!" 6 foot piles of clothing, papers, boxes, books, trash, i.e. "Lasagna" At least one Christmas tree left up year-round.

Dr. Robin Zasio stepping over piles of human shit in her designer heels and wardrobe.

I'm a collector NOT a hoarder.

A bathtub used for storage space.

Weirdly disquieting items - like life size ventriloquist dummies that look kind of like muppets.

One lady had them custom made 20 years ago, yet never actually BECAME a ventriloquist.

the electricity and water that's been turned off for 32 years.

The therapists, cleanup crew and professional organizers trying to conceal their horror when they first walk into the house.

Flinging used diapers against the wall. Well, at least one episode had that.

[quote]Dead cat

It’s better when they’re found in a box and still retain the 90 degree angle box shape when removed, as though freeze dried.

The hysterical breakdown that occurs when some decades-old piece of garbage is about to get tossed in the dumpster.

Hoarder believes trash is "worth something."

A plastic coat hanger broken in half which the hoarder will not throw out because they will maybe find a use for it in a craft project one day. When asked by the therapist if they ever make craft projects the hoarder answers “no”.

When the hoarder finally loses it and tells the team trying to help them part with garbage to just throw everything away and to “just throw me on top as well”

R34 made me laugh out loud.

Condemnation order from local authority.

The adult child’s former room, now part of the pile.

Snakes!

Dr. Robin Zasio in Capri pants, flip flops and a sleeveless top clutching an air mask to her face.

Cat (s) has/have their own jars of urine.

A dead parent (not the corpse on premises, but the dead parent as the trigger to the hoarding).

Living in a car parked next to the house.

Walking around with a pick up tool

Green yard bags full of diapers

Regrigerator full of decaying meat and food that expired in the last decade. Homeowner insists “It’s still good.”

Either angry adult children who left home at age 16 or passive, pallid, obese adult children who never left and sit in the trash, becoming part of the hoard.

A 348-cassette VHS collection next to a VHS player that hasn't worked since May 29, 1994.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

The clothes on the bed piled nearly to the ceiling. The hoarder has just enough room to sleep completely curled up in a tiny ball on the furthermost corner of the bed where they’ll never be found again if that mountain of clothing falls onto them. That bed is also where they eat all their meals.

R33 I remember that lady. She had fast food containers in her bed.

A blocked toilet that’s been that way for years.

Discontinued food lines.

R51 That's where the nest of toilet paper comes into play.

The frustrated and exasperated neighbors, ready to go over to the Hoarder's house in the middle of the night with a can of gasoline and a lighter, and end this insane bullshit once and for all.

Rooms inside the house where the doors haven't been opened since 1981.

The narrow path in the packed hallways.

Doing the dishes in the bathroom sink or tub b/c the kitchen sink can't be found

Doing the dishes?!! Surely you jest!

Reading this gives me the heebie-jeebies. I can't watch the show. I can barely talk about the show. I'm the opposite of a hoarder. Seeing the insides of some of these houses makes me want to run screaming into the night.

The buckets of shit in the backyard, because the plumbing stopped working YEARS ago.

The hoarder insisting that their home does NOT smell bad.

They don’t shit in the yard! They shit in the floor! Watch more hoarders programs and see for yourself!

The years of purchased new clothes piled to the ceiling, still in the bags they left the store in.

The dead rodents have been there so long that only their skeletons remain.

r62 there have been several Hoarders episodes where they shit in buckets in the yard. I guess shitting in the house was too "low-class" for them.

Well, once you allow the cats to shit on the floor, what difference does it make?

The crying adult child of the hoarder confessing, “It feels like you choose this...stuff over me!”

I hate shit on carpeting

Especially shag.

I'm the roof that is about to cave in.

The “clean” hoarder house at the final reveal which you know must still stink to high heaven even after years of cat shit, piss, mold and rotting food have been scrubbed away.

The glazed-over, catatonic expressions of the Hoarder's friends and relatives, seeing the inside of the house for the first time in 20 years.

Dorothy Breninger's juicy panties, excited about more shit to go through.

Dorothy Breninger's juicy panties, excited for more hoard to roll around in.

The shopping addiction hoarder, who looks normal at work, but her house and 6 storage units full of clothing, shoes, handbags she’ll never use suggests otherwise.

The garage sale that never happened.

The maggots.

The 3,000 rats.

The rats that are playing cards and smoking.

Cockroaches. Millions of them crawling all over your 'clean' dishes and cooking area.

The expert/long lost relative/adult child stepping inside the front gate and saying “oh wow, you can smell it from here”

The free space should be a set of Ann Miller's "carn cob holders".

The worthless collection of ugly porcelain horses/cats/dogs the hoarder has been collecting since 1981 and refuses to part with, despite not having seen most of the collection since 1996 because it’s buried under a pile of crap on a sideboard in the dining room.

The forgotten spouse who's still around here somewhere, using a broken-down lawn chair to sleep in while the other nurses a cigarette and resentment

it's really sad.

The overweight teenage daughter with the quasi-clean bedroom who hasn't had friends over since second grade.

A tall pile of the home owner's own shit growing from the toilet seat. Saw it, got eye cancer.

the city inspectors that don't get paid nearly enough to deal with this shit.

The discarded rubbish belonging to other people the hoarder “saves”. Now why would you throw this out when it’s still perfectly usable?” asks the hoarder to the camera, holding up a an umbrella which only opens half way.

The shit soup in the plugged up bathtub.

Dead body!

Hoard pile avalanche

Broken support beam in house or hole in floor

“Hoarder Hangover” - when the hoarder is all excited the first day and gets rid of stuff but the next day regrets it and gets depressed/angry that they were “forced to throw things away”

Lots of actual hoarders posting here, I have a feeling. It takes one to know one!

R95 Ooooh sick burn, bro....

The dollar signs that hoarder has in their head for how much money the stuff will make when they eventually get around to selling it.

You are only as sick as your secrets. I am a pack rat without actual rats and man enough to admit that fact. You have to call a thing a thing and I openly state here that I have way too much crap.

I feel better now.

And yes, I am working on it every day. It is a process. No shame to admit you need help or feel ashamed. As Rizzo says, there are worse things I could do.

Thanks for the laugh R82 - I keep cracking myself up whenever I think of "carn".

R98 good on you. I hope it gets better. I know there’s a lot of joking on here but if anything the show Hoarders has taught me that it’s an illness and there’s usually underlying trauma that triggers it. So good luck with everything.

Btw do the rats bother you? Or have you learnt to live with it? More than anything I’d find that very difficult.

I have no rats, just an overwhelming amount of stuff that is very hard to part with. I have someone coming in to help me in a week or so. I want to do a lot of prep work before he arrives.

Thanks for the kind words. It is very refreshing around here.

I’m the piles of years-old newspapers stacked on the stairs

[quote]Lots of actual hoarders posting here, I have a feeling. It takes one to know one!

No, these posts show me that there are many hateful people who do not understand that hoarding is a serious mental health issue and that corporations, who own TV channels which air shows about these sad ill people, are basically preying on mentally ill people.

Same with the other reality show garbage. People who watch reality shows want to feel they are 'better' than the 'crazies' on these shows. Especially the reality shows with rich women screaming at each other, throwing things and pulling out each others weaves. Viewers feel superior to these rich women, who despite all their wealth, are coming across as deeply unhappy and crazy.

I think most people here are not making fun of the people per se, but rather some of the more extreme common elements featured on the show and how it’s produced. Plus this is DL, not a support forum for hoarders. It’s like the fraus that start yelling at comedians because they said something insensitive or un-PC during their comedy routine. If you go to the pool, expect to get splashed.

R104, I don't find anything funny about mental illness. The way some of the hoarders on these shows are patronized is very sad.

Mental illness is basically presented as a form of entertainment and that's wrong.

I'm not a frau, I'm a gay men who knows a hoarder and it's ruined his life. He did purge a few times, then it started all over again. He's very lucky he runs a successful business from his home, hoarding hasn't ruined his financial life, but it has ruined this love life and social life. We've known each other since we were teens, his hoarding got worse in his early 30s. Then it got worse when he bought a house.

The sad part is, he's an attractive, smart and charming man.

Of course that is true what you say but at the same time it is a message board where we share our experiences and I felt like I could be honest enough to admit that this is something I struggle with. I am on not as bad off as some of the hoarders made fun of here but this struggle has impacted my life in a serious way. I don't mind joking about it but there needs to be an examination of WHY people actually do it and how to implement a plan that can change their live for the better.

There are people here in my situation reading this who can speak up if they like. But they probably don't out of a sense of shame. Come out, come out wherever you are!

Nicely said, R105.

(We posted at the same time!)

R105 I understand that Hoarders is probably being filmed so that we can be entertained by the shock of it all. But in my case it totally changed my opinion of hoarders. I used to think it was sheer laziness that got them into that position, but in 98% of cases it’s a much more complex mental health issue. I have far greater compassion now. I’m a bit of a clean freak, but I put myself in the hoarders shoes and think what if someone were to walk into my house and tell me I had to get rid of most of my stuff, including things that are valuable only to me because nobody else sees their worth. That would be very distressing. That’s why I hope r98 gets the help he needs. I now know it’s not just someone too lazy to throw out old newspapers and magazines, it’s a far greater problem than that.

Having said that some of the responses here are funny. Sometimes you have to laugh at the dark side of life. Wallowing in the awfulness doesn’t make it better.

R108. Yes, you need to find humor in the situation or it will drive you crazy.

[quote]Yes, you need to find humor in the situation or it will drive you crazy.

How about you don't watch these terrible patronizing shows which prey on mentally ill people? Then, you won't have to worry about finding humour in these sad peoples lives.

A lot of these hoarders don't have social lives because of their mental illness, they basically have no one who cares about them, to tell then they need medical help, not just need to throw out their collections. Their hoarding illness was triggered by a past traumatic experience.

R110, you know you are preaching to a hoarder right now? I find the humor in it because I know it is a self inflicted wound. I had no trauma that caused my addiction. I just love my stuff!

Interesting study about the brain of a hoarder. Gosh, I hate that word. I prefer "collector".

The one ring they need to find in the one ton of crap they have.

Funny.

R111 were your parents hoarders? I haven’t watched the show in years but I recall that occasionally a “collector” would say off hand “oh my dad was like this too”

Sorry you have hoarding issues. That show actually helps a lot more people than you think. I bet it gets some people to recognize their own tendencies and motivates them to get help. I know it gets me cleaning and organizing!

And although it’s not the same thing, most of us who grew up LGBTXYZ are still here because we learned to use humor as a survival mechanism. Obviously not everything is funny, but some of the extreme realities can be. Taking yourself too seriously is a hard way to live!

I’m a “collector” who definitely has problems getting rid of stuff. My dad’s parents were “lite horders” mostly because they lived in a small 2 bedroom apt & didn’t have much room to hoard - the living room & kitchen were fine, but we weren’t allowed in their bedroom which was definitely cluttered; or my dad’s old room - that was packed pretty full of stuff - not garbage, but stuff - like I found all the cards from his first birthday after they died.

I do legit collect some interesting things but I also can see that it’s hard for me to get rid of silly things like old clothes that I no longer wear - but they still fit! I’m also not always the best with just picking up the laundry from the floor for a week — so ’ve watched the shows from time to time to scare myself a bit & keep on top of not only housekeeping - but going through and discarding stuff every few years.

Isn't there a difference between people who collector, say, vintage toys or even vintage clothing and people who just pile up newspapers and other items which are essentially garbage? That linked study didn't seem to differentiate.

A few years ago, there was a local TV news report, as well as a NY Daily News article, about a 70+ year old man who was living in a NYCHA housing project in Queens. His hoarding was so bad, he never threw out his wet garbage, he literally had bags of garbage piled to his ceilings.

The smell was so bad, it permeated the hallway and even the floors above and below him! Yet despite the tenants complaints the local NYCHA management did nothing.

A war vet's wife was pregnant with twins, think they lived on the same floor. The wife had a miscarriage due to the overwhelming stench from the hoarder's apartment. NYCHA finally sent people in hasmat suits to enter the man's apartment, they had to break down his door, rats and those giant roaches started coming out! The man was carted off to a mental ward for 'evaluation'. NYCHA then proceeded to fix the man's n apartment, they fumigated it, painted and put in all new appliances. Guess what.....they also allowed him to move back in! The reason, he was mentally ill. I'm not sure the vet's wife who miscarried twins sued NYCHA, she should have!

R118 - I’m R 117 - and I’m definately a collector - have been since I was a kid - I think it’s a personality trait yiure born with. Collected Wacky Packages and stamps and began buying books regularly as a kid - as a teen I moved on to vintage postcards and ads when we would go to flea markets. As an adult I collect vintage posters, worlds fair memorabilia & also have some toys & lunchboxes.

But I can see the urge to keep things & fight it in myself with personal ephemera and momentis (mostly I loose - I have several nice boxes with old letters & various papers from my life - the kind of stuff most people toss.

Like most human behavior things are on a spectrum - so I think the basic internal mental workings of a collector and a hoarder are very similar - it’s just a matter of degree & illness.

I have always been a collector & always was a terrible speller - forgive the typos I didn’t catch above

[quote]A war vet's wife was pregnant with twins, think they lived on the same floor. The wife had a miscarriage due to the overwhelming stench from the hoarder's apartment.

Fake. You don't miscarry from rancid odors. Even if you could there is no way to prove cause. Miscarriages can happen for a thousand reasons,

You just know at the end of the show that the “clean” house will be back in full hoarder mode in a short time.

The ungrateful hoarder that treats the cleanup crew like their hired help. Bonus points if the hoarder screams at one for throwing a prize piece of garbage away.

The follow-up shows usually have the hoarders right back to hoarding again. The older hoarders are hopeless - too old to change at that stage of life. They belong in assisted living.

I understand the respect for the individual, but sometimes when they try to rationalize with someone who is clearly not able to make healthy decisions for themselves, they need to stop wasting their time and just commit them.

When they cobble together some of the bits and pieces and frame them to make a ‘memory’ picture. Usually looks like tacky eighties craft attempts.

A refrigerator when opened kills the sanitation worker.

Death house

R119, you are collector with likely some hoarding tendencies, but you don't save literal garbage.

I saw a show years ago, it was in syndication and pre-Hoarders. A therapist hosted it, he was trying to help a woman who never threw away any plastic bottle, she had thousands in her home. She had empty shampoo and soda bottles on top of her entire bathroom counter. The therapist tried to explain how she needed to use that space for fresh items she needed to use in the bathroom, such as soap and new bottles of shampoo.

[quote]Fake. You don't miscarry from rancid odors. Even if you could there is no way to prove cause. Miscarriages can happen for a thousand reasons,

Not "fake", here's the entire article. Not sure what caused the woman's miscarriage, but it was likely a combo of the overwhelming constant stench and the stress the woman had to deal with trying to get NYCHA to clean out the guy's apartment.

Cops find man isn't dead, just a slob By JONATHAN LEMIRE and BILL EGBERT | DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS | SEP 08, 2009 | 10:01 AM

The awful stench coming from a Queens apartment on Monday was so bad that cops thought they would find a body inside. But when firefighters busted down the the door, they found tenant Ming Li Sung was very much alive - and living with rotting garbage piled floor to ceiling.

"When they started trying to clear away some of the trash to get in, he popped up inside, yelling, 'Get out! Get out!'" said Ray West, who lives across the hall. Cops first noticed the horrible smell when they were called to the Ravenswood Houses in Long Island City in the early morning for a domestic dispute. "They thought he was DOA," said West.

The apartment looked like a landfill, with trash jammed top to bottom and pressing up against the flat's front door and rear window. A broken fan, an old watering can and scores of sodden plastic grocery bags stuffed with wet garbage could be seen among the detritus. When an FDNY haz-mat team arrived to start excavating the garbage, an army of cockroaches poured out into the second-floor hallway, West said. "The police were throwing up," West said. Sung, 69, was taken to Elmhurst Hospital Center for psychiatric evaluation, police said. He does not face any charges.

Sung's next-door neighbors have moved out because of the smell, which had been a problem for years, West said. He and his wife, Robin McNeil, are still on a long waiting list for a transfer. "We're stuck here," said West, a veteran who returned just over a year ago from 18 months fighting in Afghanistan, only to spend his time fighting city bureaucrats over the rancid stench.

West said he called 311, the city Housing Authority and even the Health Department to complain, but he kept getting bounced from agency to agency. "Everybody kept saying, 'We don't deal with that' and told me I had to call somebody else," he said. Social workers would visit, but Sung wouldn't answer the door. A year ago the city took some action, according to West, but to little effect. "They took him to Bellevue to get evaluated," West said, "but then they sent him back here."

The Housing Authority never made a serious effort to clean out the rotting refuse, said McNeil, who has lived at Ravenswood Houses for six years. Sometimes conditions were so bad that dead flies would accumulate on the hallway floor. "All Housing would do was come and sweep them up," McNeil said. McNeil was pregnant with twins - the couple's first children - but she miscarried in May. West thinks the overwhelming stench and the stress may have played a role.

"We have to follow the law and respect the rights of the tenant," Housing Authority spokeswoman Lynn Godfrey said late yesterday. She added: "We have a crew out there now to tackle the situation."

[quote]Not sure what caused the woman's miscarriage, but it was likely a combo of the overwhelming constant stench and the stress the woman had to deal with trying to get NYCHA to clean out the guy's apartment.

Again, no. Women have given birth in far more stressful situations than having to deal with smelly neighbors. During war, in prison, after suffering severe trauma etc. You don't miscarry because of "stress". Lady is just looking for someone to blame for her loss. No way to prove this one.

R131, are you really this much of a fucking moron?! 🙄🙄🙄

Try keep bags of WET GARBAGE in your apartment for YEARS, then let's see how you can cope with the overwhelming odors. Sorry dude, you're a fucking imbecile.

Did you even read the article? The problem went on for "YEARS". The old man was "living with rotting garbage piled floor to ceiling." ROTTING GARBAGE, do you know what smells like? This wasn't a typical hoarding situation with lots of magazine or a vast collection of action figurines, the man was hoarding wet garbage, as in FOOD SCRAPS etc.

Nowhere in the article did it say the woman was looking to sue NYCHA, but surely the ongoing stress did contribute to her miscarriage. Don't be such a fucking dolt.

It’s a bit rich you’re insulting r131 considering youre the dolt r132. There is no way of proving what caused the woman’s miscarriage. Certainly not the stench or the stress. That’s not a thing. You’re probably one of those people who believe that women who dye their hair will also miscarry. Please take your idiotic wives tales elsewhere.

omg the show where a man thought rats where his pets and let hundreds run freely in and out of his house....god!

R134 I remember that. He had virtually no furniture or belongings but his hoarded rats. So horrific.

The rat guy was murdered by some guy who broke into his house, thinking he was hiding a ton of cash in there.

I'm one of the many rusted-out vehicle corpses at the back of the house. The ones closer in can be useful as trash armoires, the rest are the equivalent of garden gnomes.

Really r136? Why would anyone think that guy had money? He looked homeless and the rats would have chewed through any cash.

I've only read half the thread and this sounds like a description of my father's house. Yes, I wanted to leave at 15. I left at 18. Yes, me and my siblings are "angry adult children". Urgh

One of my adult hobbies is litter-picking.

What's a pack rat R98?

R105 Thanks for your post.

A former colleague/buddy of mine I suspect is a hoarder or sorts. She once or twice said she never cleaned the house. It sounded like when it got really bad she and her husband just moved. She's a fun, interesting, cool company. She does have a humongous tendency to procrastinate.

I think all hoarders procrastinate and are afraid to make decisions. Worst of all, afraid to take action.

She's a wonderful talker, however.

I've never watched the show but it sounds like they feature only the most extreme cases. My father is more like R98 or the person described in R105, that is I guess a "functional" hoarder.

I agree that what needs to be adressed is the WHY. I imagine behavioural therapy is the way to go.

R98 you are very brave to be doing this and this needs to be done. You need to change whatever is eating you up (or your reaction to it) and solve this problem from the inside out. Growing up in a hoarder's house I can tell you the sense of shame was shared by the children, and it damaged our social skills and sense of intimacy. All three of us siblings worked very hard to overcome this, but obvs our parent is still the same. In my case it's part of what encouraged me NOT to have children, I'm not interested in perpetuating mental illness and misery.

As Doug Stanhope said, "I watch Hoarders and I see shit I NEED."

[quote]What's a pack rat

That's what hoarders used to be called.

Some people in this thread need to read about the NYC eccentric millionaires, the Collyer Brothers.

You're welcome!

That’s one tragic story r147. Considering the amount of medical jars they found in the house perhaps their doctor father was somewhat a hoarder too.

Those fetal twins who keeled over from the smell of rotting garbage would never have survived a month in New York anyway.

R98 here.

Thanks for everybody who extended me the kind words and well wishes. It means a lot.

I have somebody I work with now who told me I am really a closet perfectionist who has too many unfinished projects. Not sure if I really buy that but it makes me feel a little better all the same.

This person comes by weekly to monitor my progress and makes sure I am improving the egress and general cleanliness of my home. I find that putting on disco music from the seventies and the rhythmic beat in my ears really helps me mentally while sorting out my belongings. I have SO much stuff that it is going to take quite awhile but progress is progress. Rome wasn't built in a day.

Kudos to everyone out there who is conquering this issue one pile at a time. And yes, a sense of humor is a definite must in this issue, it gets you through some potentially dark moments.

R147 I read the bio of them. They retreated from life. The junk became their life. I liked how the brother took care of the blind brother.

Most Americans have too much unneeded stuff in their homes.

Why is this thread suddenly on my watch list? I've never clicked on it before.

[quote]Why is this thread suddenly on my watch list? I've never clicked on it before.

Because the DL Psychic Network has detected you're a secret hoarder...or is it, whore?

Oh, whore, Psychic Network detective, r154. I have never denied being a whore.

That's sounds like a great idea for a new show on TLC, "Whores 'n' Hoarders".

Lots of people will watch anything. So many also watch reality show trash because they feel superior to the people on the shows, even the reality shows with wealthy people. So many viewers watch that garbage and think, "These people are wealthy, yet look at how miserable and disturbed they are."

Who was the worst person on Hoarders? I would say Eileen. A&E has been uploading full episodes on YouTube for free.

Topless cardboard box filled with cicada shells.