Sentimental Clutter is a real thing.
I want to be clear that I haven’t yet had to deal with it in the way so many of you have. My parents and in-laws are all still living and I haven’t been called upon personally to find a place for huge amounts of stuff.
But as I’ve gone through the large amounts of clutter in my own home, I’ve run across so many things that have tugged at my heart and caused physical pain as I’ve placed them in a Donate Box. So I’m going to share what I’ve learned and I hope you’ll share your own experiences in the comments. I loved the encouragement given in the comments on this recent post (which totally inspired this post!).
1. Don’t start with the sentimental stuff.
One of my most important and life-changing decluttering strategies is to do the easy stuff first. This means the obvious stuff. The non-emotional stuff. The DUH stuff.
Here’s the problem. Knowing I’m sentimental can make me doubt my own decluttering abilities before I even begin. They can make me look at that closet full of boxes full of baby clothes and not even try.
And somehow, while I’m fixated on that closet full of baby clothes, I’m ignoring the fact that I have broken toys in the playroom or piles of newspapers in the garage or an entire set of dishes that we never use and I don’t even like.
Walk away from the heart-wrenching stuff and work on the stuff that’s easy. Declutter things you don’t actually care about that have become invisible to you. Experiencing empty space and re-gaining lost square footage in your home will start to give you decluttering momentum.
Decluttering momentum will eventually bring you to a point where you’re ready to tackle the baby-clothes-closet.
2. Keep one.
When I found out that our most-likely-last child was a girl, I put ALL our boy clothes on eBay. Every last wearable piece. This was pre-blog, and I was in such a Stuff Overload phase that I thought it was what I had to do. I told myself it was the only way to get past my irrational attachment to stuff. The day after I started those auctions, I visited my Mother in Law in the hospital and my own mother came along. I was telling them about getting rid of the stuff and they both assured me it was okay to keep one thing.
One thing.
It made so much sense, but had never occurred to me before. ONE thing. I almost hyperventilated as I drove home, desperate to cancel the auction for a certain little outfit I wanted to keep. I ended up keeping one or two outfits per child that held special memories, and I’m so glad I did.
The one thing allows me to have ALL those memories come rushing back. See the cowboy boots in the picture above? Every time I dust around them, I recall each child’s once-tiny little feet. I don’t need every pair of socks or sandals or tennis shoes to experience those memories.
And it’s way more fun to run across one little baby outfit in my closet than it is to trip over boxes marked “Baby Clothes” piled in the garage.
I know that one baby outfit (with the cutest little hat you ever did see) doesn’t compare to large pieces of furniture, but it always helps me to reverse my thinking and choose my favorite thing first. Then I start looking at everything else differently.
3. Use it.
If it’s your great-grandmother’s chair, can you sit on it? If it’s fine china, can you display it? Or . . . eat off it???
This has helped me through many painful decluttering moments. No. I have no need for burp cloths anymore. But I do need dusting cloths and cloth-diaper-burp-cloths make good ones.
My sister-in-law recovered a chair that was purchased by her parents in their first year of marriage. Recovered, it looked gorgeous with her decor in her home. She had the memories AND it was useful.
Of course, with this, it’s important to follow the one-in-one-out rule. (Sorry.) But really, if you only have room for one couch and you’re not willing to give up yours for the sentimental one, the sentimental one probably needs to go.
Same goes with cups and saucers and lamps and such.
4. Cry.
Grab a tissue, wear some waterproof mascara, and boo hoo your eyes out while you go through the bag of baby onesies or the box filled with grandma’s doilies.
It’s okay to feel sad.
Holding onto sentimental clutter can be my way of procrastinating in the grief process. But the stages of grief are a very real thing and the people who make it to the other side are the ones who go through each stage. Allowing myself to fully experience the feelings of pain and loss allows me to let go of things.
Honestly, it’s not the single left shoe that makes me cry, it is the acknowledgement of a forever-gone stage of life.
But acknowledging and honoring the reality of grief has a magical way of helping me move past grief.
And honestly, you might need counseling. If professional counseling is cost-prohibitive, look for grief support groups at local hospitals, community centers or churches. Look for various types of groups here.
Past posts I’ve written about sentimental clutter:
Letting Go of Someone Else’s Memories
My newest book, Decluttering at the Speed of Life is now available wherever books are sold!
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--Nony
This is tough. We are going through empty nest this summer. My oldest is moving to his own apartment with his buddy and my youngest is leaving for the military. We are downsizing to a house about 1/2 the size of our current house. With 25+ years of memories, I’ve decided to keep only a few baby items… Each of their coming-home-from-the-hospital outfits, their first walking shoes, their made-by-me crib blanket and the white suit they were both baptised in. AND THAT’S IT! You are right. It is just enough to flood in those wonderful memories but not so much that it overwhelms me.
Great post! I have a whole closet of “memoriabilia” as my mother likes to call it and I’m only in my early 20’s! If I keep going at this rate I’ll have nothing but “memoribilia” in my house when I reach my 70s or 80s. I know I have to go through all that crap and narrow it down, but right now I’m doing the easy stuff 🙂
Also, a good tip I once heard: take a picture of something and then get rid of the thing and keep the picture for sentimental purposes!
That tip is a really good one! I have done it a couple times.. It helped me to get rid of some things I was holding onto for sentimental reasons but had nowhere to put them or they just collected dust…
Love, Love, Love this post!!! My toughest one is sentimental paper: old journals, massive numbers of cards, newspaper articles… you get the point. Your container idea helped me a lot: I bought a couple pretty boxes, and put it all into the boxes. I had to decide what to keep, and what didn’t fit into the boxes had to be tossed.
It worked great until my mother sent me the sentimental stuff she had that she didn’t just want to toss. Now to grit my teeth and go through it all again. Sigh.
Love this advice! It’s true that we tend to put off grief by holding onto things. It’s probably a process if we allow it to get there. Like you’ve always said, Get rid of what you can now, and then the second round is easier (or 3rd or 4th).
Hi Nony- what size are those cowboy boots?……………………just kidding!.( No really what size?)
Will trade you some burp cloths and old diapers……
Good post!
I had a bunch of old LP’s( records– big round things that played music for those of you under 30) that a beloved late Uncle gave me in 1964- when I was about 8… I listened to them for years and still can recall every Jimmy Rodgers and Everly Brothers song,.. My Uncle passed a few years back and I miss him so much. No way I was letting go of those records.
Even though I havent had a turntable ( something that plays the LPs- for those of you under 30) for years,
Saw an episode of some decluttering show and they saved and framed ONE record for a person who was in a similar situation. I thought that was brilliant.
So I made a list of all the music I wanted to be able to keep listening to- and a friend who is more techinally savvy than me will make me a mixed CD- and then- I gave the LP’s to a lucky craigslister ( yes I know I could have gone to a Vinyl store and sold them but I didnt trust myself not to chicken out or bring some other Lps home!)
I kept one album and will frame it with a pic of my Uncle.
It didnt hurt much after the records were gone. I agree about needing to grieve- but everytime I got those albums out – it made me cry. It didnt help me get over my grief- just made me relive it over and over.
This for me– has wound up being much needed closure and now- will be celebration of his life.
( Now — about those cowboy boots……)
My mother died in 1969 and I inherited her and her mother’s wedding rings. In 1989 I separated from my husband and took my wedding ring off. Plus, I had a ring with a large stone which I no longer wore because I didn’t like the setting but I liked the stone. The four gold rings didn’t take up much space in my jewellery box but they were just sitting there, never to be worn again.
I had the stone professionally removed from the gold setting and sold the four gold rings to a company which buys gold. The proceeds covered the cost of a new gold setting to make the stone into a pendant. Now, when I wear the pendant, I know that those rings, and therefore my mother and her mother, made it possible.
I have to say that the idea to use the rings in that way came from a friend and I was initially shocked at the proposal to sell rings of such sentimental value. It took a while to get my head around it but I’ve never regretted it. In a way, it’s no different to recovering an inherited chair.
Good for you! I love the fact that you were able to make something that was hidden away collecting dust in a jewelry box into something that you can wear and enjoy and cherish!
Susan, I inherited my parents plain gold wedding bands. I had them made into a pendant with my mom’s ring inside my dad’s ring and a pearl hanging down in the center. I wish I could show you a picture of the finished piece of jewelry. Whenever I wear that necklace, I feel Mom and Dad close to my heart. I have gotten some wonderful compliments on that piece of jewelry.
Hi Dana- in the spirit of me putting things “not exactly where they go”, I wanted to share something you inspired me to do, not in this post (which I’m excited to read) but one I saw yesterday, about the pens. A few of my kids are home sick, so I took out an embarrassingly big and full drawer of markers, a large %age of which do not work, and gave them a paper. They got busy testing and chucking (almost half!!), and then organized the others into ziplocs by color, and gave each child a full set of working colors to keep in their backpacks. The rest went back in the drawer with one full set of fat and one full set of skinny ones in bags on top. They are so happy to now have markers that work, looking pretty, and taking up less room; it was sooo gratifying, and thanks to u!
A friend is moving and we discussed this yesterday. I told her to keep the memory and get rid of the evidence, lol. If the things you’ve kept are dusty, you’re probably not “seeing” them anyhow. Things I kept of my son’s and daughter’s, now that they’re 32 and 34, if they don’t care enough to want them, I’ve gotten rid of. Except for the bringing home outfits, I’ve kept them for me.
At 40ish and +, my sister and I each inherited boxes of “memorabilia” from our youth when my parents moved. We both managed to live without this “stuff” for 35+ years, but I am having a hard time throwing some items away, especially the boxes of birthday cards from long gone family members and newspaper clippings.. Scanning the items was a thought but even that is overwhelming. Your posts remind me that I need to get a grip and let it go but that is easier said than done.
I’m having to do this same thing right now too! The concept of keeping one thing has helped me to let go of some of the less important stuff. I’ve allowed myself to keep a few precious cards, and letters from people I love, because their handwriting and messages brought back good thoughts feelings that I needed. I was able to let go of letters/cards/news clippings from people who I only vaguely remembered, or didn’t bring up the best of memories. The items I’ve kept have a specific storage spot with a limited space, which helps keep me in check. I’m not done yet, but being able to hold onto the most precious of these sentimental papers has helped me let go of a lot of things that I’ve “lived without” (but really want now that I have them!) for the last too-many years. Best of luck to you! Sentimental clutter is the hardest!
It also helps to think about the people who will benefit from the items you donate. Think of the new mom who would love a cute outfit for her baby but can’t afford to spend the full-price amount on an outfit that will get outgrown in a few months, or the newlyweds who are setting up their first home. Those items will be used and cherised by someone who will be so grateful to have them!
Wish I could part with closet and china cabinet full of old crystal , glass and other mismatched serving pieces I haven’t used in many years. Collected from family and thrift stores . It is taking up space. Could be I think I may use some day. I doubt it.
Keep the pieces you’ve collected from family if you must, but start with the thrift store finds first. Donate them back to a thrift store for someone else to treasure. If you ever find yourself in need of more when you have more space, you can always shop the thrift store again. Treasures can be found everywhere.
haaaahhhhh – Big Sigh – this is still a difficult area for me. Getting easier, but still hard. You share wise words and great encouragement. Thank you so much!
I especially appreciate what you say about the joy of seeing those one or two special things compared to tripping over the big box in storage.
Now, I think I can do it. I just “Liked” you FB page, and I think I can do it. Thank you so much!
I look at it that I better start getting rid of the “memorabilia” before I die- cause my girls will be cursing me a blue streak if they are left to get rid of everything!!!!
Just retired and will be moving to warmer locale, went thru my closets and pulled out 6 bags full of woolen suits, jackets, and other professional outfits for ‘Dress For Success’, a charity that helps women entering the work force, needing a nice outfit for job interviews, etc. Felt good!!
That’s wonderful, Carolyn!
I have twin girls who are leaving for college next spring and as my husband and I try to reclaim our den that has been used as a homeschool room, I am finding it extremely sad to throw away papers and pack up rewards. I have decided to pack their trophies, medals and ribbons in a box covered by old birthday cards and Christmas cards to be given to them upon their marriage. As for old baby clothes I will keep the one out fit I like most and have the others made into a quilt for them when they have their first babies. As for everything else I am taking pictures, labeling them, and giving everything else away.taking pictures lets me and the girls revisit their old treasures anytime.
This isn’t usually hard for me because I’m not very sentimental. I loved your suggestion about starting with easy stuff and the idea of keeping one thing. That’s a great compromise. It’s not necessary to get rid of EVERYTHING but you also can’t keep EVERYTHING. You have to keep the things that mean the most and let go of the rest.
I wish I wasn’t the sentimental type. I lost my mother 2 weeks before the birth of my third son. This has turned me into a memory hoarder or something. I purchased a 10×16 storage building that year and somehow managed to fill it full of our clothes, baby clothes, toys furniture and lots of family pictures. I have a daughter now who just turned three and I keep everything she makes for me. How do I part with the little things? I take a lot of pictures, but seldom print them so my computer has at least 7000 at my last count so it needs a declutter as well. Thank for taking the time to put all of this together for folks like me. I will keep reading in hopes I will muster up the courage to throw it all out. Well, all but one thing or three. 🙂
it is wonderful to cut things down to one or three. but cutting them down by half is also good. don’t try to muster up the courage to throw it all out except one to three items. just schedule. one and half to two hours every so often to get rid of the easy stuff. sometimes a friend make sure its a non judgmental type who isn’t going to try and push you into getting rid of stuff. when ever I deal with people like that my hording emotions flare up and I am less likely to let go. but it can be helpful to carve out a chunk of time and have a friend who will just ask you. yes, no, or maybe. I have been on both ends of this the person who decides and the person who holds things up and puts them in the right box and makes sure the get rid of box gets gone. I have found two hours to truly be the max. I took care of a lady who couldn’t keep her house clean people had tried and tried to help her with no success. she was grieving her mom too which was a significant reason her apartment was the way it was. I meet with her twice a week for 2 and half hours twice a week we went through everything cupboard every box and every surface. twice I think and sometimes three times. never pushed her it was always her decision. my favorite question to ask was if a magic fairy waved its wound and made your house clean what would look different and then we would start there. after a year her house was clean. and everything had a place. she was still a hoarder but she could tidy up in five minutes or less and it would look clean. if you need to go over every single thing 10 or 15 times before its the appropriately small amount that is ok. every time you will be able to let go of a little more.
I agree, the more you go through things, what you couldn’t part with one time, you can the next, or maybe three times from now. My problem now is my parents passed away about 7 years ago. We had an auction for the majority of the stuff, but there’s things like their photo albums. And my mom liked to paint. She was an ok painter, but of the 30 or so ones she left there’s only 3 I’d ever do anything with. But how can I part with them: My brother said he’d take them, but he died last week. It seems wrong to get rid of them. I’m chipping away at all the rest. Yesterday I got rid of very old business files and cleared an entire large file cabinet drawer. Pat on back!
Do you have any ideas over how to grieve for sentimental items that have been stolen? 🙁
I had 4 items of clothing stolen out of my friend’s car a few months ago. One of them was a skirt, that was a nice skirt, but was just a skirt. I can let than one go easily enough. But the other 3 items were probably among the most sentimental items I had: the pink jacket I wore to my sister’s graduation and her leaving party when she went to Australia, the one that elicited the only time as an adult that my Dad told me I look nice (“stunning” was the word he used). The biscuit-coloured jacket I wore when I bought my fiancé’s engagement ring, and for our anniversary brunch and dinner. And the black skirt with the pink and biscuit-coloured flowers that I wore for our anniversary dinner and for dinner when we went to Vegas, and had been planning on wearing to our rehearsal dinner at our wedding. Out of everything I own(ed), probably only my grandmother’s ring (that was used as my engagement ring too, although I also have a ring my fiancé bought for the occasion) means more to me. Not to mention that they were the fanciest clothes I’ve ever had. I don’t even have any photos of me wearing either the biscuit-coloured jacket or the black/pink/biscuit-coloured skirt! (I just never think to take photos, I’m too busy living in the moment!)
Sorry, this has turned into the All About Katie Show. Still, any ideas for grieving stolen sentimental items? I haven’t found anything that “sticks”, yet.
Stolen items produce a special kind of sorrow. And frustration. And total helplessness.
Since there’s really nothing that can be done, I’d say it goes with the “feel sad” part. It also might help you to write about it. You could start with a c/p of your comment!
Thanks for your reply. I hadn’t thought about writing about it more thoroughly, but I’ll do that, thanks!
Perhaps you can re-create the outfit that was stolen? If you can describe it to a personal shopper, they might well be able to stir up a beautiful outfit that you can wear for years to come, and make new memories too!
Ask around…maybe someone else took pictures of you that you weren’t aware of at the time. If not, write about the outfits and the memories that go with them in a special book that can be taken out at any time. It will help you preserve those memories and make the loss easier at some point in the future.
maybe its because my mom never really kept our clothes (there were and still are so many kids in our family, everything is handed down almost as soon as it’s grown out of), but i don’t have an issue with getting rid of baby clothes. on the “keep one” side of that, though, the tradition in my family is to keep the first pair of walking-shoes and have them bronzed.
My son is 6 years old. I have been keeping all his baby things for when have another one. So far it hasn’t happened. I cannot let go of those things. It is cluttering up so much space that could be used for something else, but I feel that if I let it all go I am giving up hope. And I also have boxes of sentimental stuff in my dad’s ceiling in my home country. Majority of that is too fragile to travel the distance to get it to my place. Once again, I am finding it hard to just tell him to get rid of it. So, not only am I cluttering up my own place, I am also cluttering up my father’s place.
I’m sorry that you haven’t had another baby yet. 🙁 I think it’s a different kind of struggle when you want to use something but haven’t had the opportunity yet. If the clothes are taking up space, but it’s not space you need, I could see waiting a bit more, and of course that’s what you should do if you want to. If the clothes are in the way and you *don’t* have the space you need because of them, maybe try going through them and getting rid of half? Sometimes baby clothes come out of storage with stains that I couldn’t see when I put them in storage. Also, some clothes were just a lot more useful and cute than others. Those “not so useful” clothes sometimes get downsized when I get them out to use again because we don’t have as much space for kids’ clothing now that we have more than one kid. Lastly, tell yourself the new baby, when he or she comes, can certainly get new clothes! It can be fun to shop and know that what you buy will be new and special just for that baby.
so true. I think I have done pretty good over all. I have a few things from my father that if I would have got them at the store I would have passed them to charity by now. My Dad is not an active person in my life so it holds a special value. when I was thirteen I hit my head and had to go to the hospital. I got more presents than at Christmas. I truly felt loved and I really liked everything ok I kept three things but they were small and from different people my sister got me a pink pearl bracelet I loved it enough to were it on my wedding day other than my ring its the only jewelry I care about. of the seven teddy bears I kept the smallest with the shortest “fur” its as fluffy as velvet and the size of a beany baby it was from my closest friend at the time. I got a lot of butterfly stuff most of it broke to be honest I kept a small wind chime that reminds of all the butterfly stuff as a whole. all three are ecstatically pleasing and take up very little space. Not that my house is clean or decluttered all the way but its in a place where I feel like I am doing good. it took me years to get where I am at. I found the same thing you start with the easy stuff and let yourself hold on to the sentimental stuff until you can say good bye. so many times did I go through pick up the laundry and the trash and start putting stuff away and tossing what I didn’t care about in the give away bag and just lump all that other stuff I am not ready to get rid of yet pile. eventually I was able to move on to say if I want this where would I put it. sometimes that helped me decided if I really wanted it. but it worked best for me to not pressure myself to get rid of anything before I was ready or even push to hard to find place to put things I made it a goal to find homes for five things some times it was the free pile or the junk drawer and sometimes I didn’t hit five. I got to a place almost everything had a place and everything was in its place and then it was time to move and that is not the case right now. moving again in a few months hoping to have that place set up nice. not going to bother here. sometimes you go through and purge stuff and then life happens and you look at what you didn’t get rid of and you see massive amounts of clutter and you can just get rid of huge amounts of stuff especially if space is an issue. I have known people who think you should just get rid of as much as possible up front and be done. until you widdle away the extras you can’t really know what you truly like best. and I have to say my deslobification process has really changed how I view gift giving. generosity is a beautiful thing don’t get me wrong but gift giving in our culture is no longer a favor but a novelty yet one that is in abundance and can be held as very important. people can get themselves what they want. me and my husband have went so far as to decide we wont be celebrating the gift giving aspect of Christmas or Birthdays in raising our children. not that they wont have toys but they wont get them based on the calendar but on the appropriateness of the gift for the development and the space. I feel like not tying buying products with Christmas and birthdays allows me to be more intentional. and I am super excited my husband has agreed to let us make steps toward having a zero waste home by 2020. very idealistic I need the five years to adjust even though it was my idea.
I’m not sure if this may encourage any one, but I am dreading the day my parents are no longer with us. My dad is a hoarder…proper hoarder (I’ve got the gene, but I’m fighting it every day) and the thought of going through all his stuff makes me cry even now. I have sometimes thought that to have the entire house go up in smoke would be the best option! Obviously I wouldn’t do this, but realistically I would need to take several months off work to sort out the few bits of value (either financial or emotional) and I just couldn’t afford to do that. My parents are only in their 70’s and I’m already stressed about this… I really can’t and won’t do that to my children (I hope). Off to do some washing up now!
You have great suggestions. I had my own sentimental clutter problem after my husband died suddenly almost 12 years ago. Then 7 years sgo we moved out if that house. Tough all around. For me the balancing act was – what might be meaningful to the children later on? That helped. Giving away clothing that would bless others – that helped. Respecting documents and his writings and work by storing it nicely – that helped. But mostly, focusing on the young children, raising them and making sure we were a happy little family – that was the biggest priority and the problem of his, well, clutter became a lower priority. Things don’t matter. People do.
My husband also passed away 12 years ago. It took me 3 years to downsize so my daughter and I could move into an apartment. As my life has changed, I continue to downsize but it is always hard for the sentimental stuff. Luckily (?) there is a storage closet down the hall from my apartment for my stuff. I keep seasonal things and the sentimental things in the closet. When the closet is full, I have to stop keeping things. It’s working well so far.
I’m trying to get rid of most of my stuff. I don’t want for my girls to have to worry about getting rid of stuff. I also told them that if it becomes a burden to keep something that I gave them, they should get rid of it with my blessings.
I have taken pictures of things before getting rid of because pictures can be scrapped with the story and stored much easier and nicer than a bunch of items. This can be done with kids artwork as well.
I have recently become a resident in an Asst. Living facility. My husband of 51 years is in another facility for memory loss/dementia. Having worked on the family genealogy for over 40 years, I accumulated many notebooks full of research, not to mention notes that never got put into those notebooks and may duplicate information that is in the notebooks. Would love to have research in those 40 notebooks scanned and put on CD..I am not computer savy but my daughter said she will scan the contents this summer when school is out and then donate the originals to the Historical society library where the families lived.
Any other suggestions? She can use the empty notebooks after she has scanned at her school where she teaches.
I think that’s a wonderful idea! My husband’s aunt did something similar, and she made copies of the CDs for all of the siblings.
I have a small box of keepsakes for each of my 4 kids. It contains their hospital outfit, first pacey, first baby hairbrush, first b day cards. The outfit they were wearing when they took their first steps, several baby and toddlerhood ppictures. Now if I could just let go of my maternity clothes. ( I paid so much for those lol)
Maybe donating some of them to a pregnancy center or consignment store? If it’s the money, the latter will help recover some of the anxiety! LOL
This one is a hard one for me. I agree the grief process is a hard one. My baby brother was 26 and passed alone in his apartment. No autopsy was preformed because 3 days prior he had gone to the dr. They told him he had a cold the end. Every time I open a box I just can’t do it. I had to pack up his apartment. Move everything into my house. In the same year, I finally was able to divorce my abusive quadraplegic husband. Yes, that sentence is correct. He would ram me with his wheelchair. He injured both of us when he picked me up from work drunk. Also, my grandfather went into the hospital… so life was completely put on hold. He spent over 6 months in the hospital. And now my 89 yr old grandmaw is bouncing from my house to my mom’s house. Driving us both bonkers. I have decluttered a lot.. but can’t seem to even go through my brothers things or even display them. I think the grieving process was put completely on hold. And is really just now hitting. Love reading your pieces.
Wow, you stirred up a lot with this post! It’s hard to read the comments. My in-laws are awful borders, guilt-trippers, stuff givers. So much stuff! And my parents are too, in an entirely different way. Me? I am half wanting to give it all away and live in an RV or cibdo or tiny home or travel the world with backpacks, and half paralyzed at the thought of downsizing my 18mo massive hand me down wardrobe. Last summer my mother dropped off 15 boxes of my toys and clothes and papers from childhood. It’s still in the garage. It takes so much emotional, mental, and physical energy to deal with that kind of stuff.
I’m dealing with emotional clutter now! I’ve gone through 20 years of stuff and have whittled down my “hoard”. I kept every greeting card that was ever given to me! I’ve tossed a lot now….I can’t seem to get rid of any from my mom or husband or kids….but I found a gal on Etsy that will take a signature and replicate it to be worn as a pendant or keychain or ornament. I am going to do that with my moms cards….so I will always see her “Lots of love and stuff, Mom” whenever I want 🙂
Ooo! I love this idea!
Nony, have you a post or ideas from your followers regarding the minimum that should be kept in order to remind you of memories in case of dementia issues? Both parents are gone; only one had dementia……I’m not sure which parent I’ll copy in old age,though medically I seem to copy my father. Thanks.
Hmmmm, I don’t have anything on that. It would be an interesting question for a dementia expert!
As an SLP who interned with dementia patients, I would keep photobooks of relatives, a wedding album, maybe pictures of their house, and music. I found that a lot of my dementia patients could remember the tunes and words of songs from the 30s and 40s, and I could use those to my advantage in therapy.
I love the “one thing” approach. I have stuff from my boy’s childhood and they are 48 YEARS OLD. I have been going through school papers, etc. and photographing them. Then I ask them if they want any of them, and if not, out they go. It’s working, little by little.
I kept all the babyteeth from my kids. When I handed them over to them when they where way in their 20th; they dumped them in the garbage can because they thought it was gross!
Now one of them has kids and guess what is she keeping…………Yup so mother so daughter.
lol
I am right now decluttering and preparing for a somewhat cross-country move. Because of the distance of the travel we are trying to get rid of as much as possible and sort of start over. That is not easy for someone who gets emotionally attached to things! I have a memory for just about every shirt! Thanks for this post it will be put to use right away!
Thank you for this post. It helped me realize why I’ve been holding onto a bolt of cloth from when I helped my mother clear out a storage unit ten years ago.
You helped me realize that what I’m really grieving is the box of handmade Sunday-best dresses for my sister and me that was also in the storage, that my sister and I sensibly donated since we, grown, couldn’t use them.
I kept the bolt of cloth because I could imagine making something with it. But realistically, that’s not going to happen. And what you helped me realize is that I’m holding onto it so tightly as a surrogate for that box of dresses.
Time to really allow myself to mourn and feel all the complicated emotions that box of dresses raised in me (and bring in for comfort the enjoyment my sister and I got from wearing them, and the lasting things of value we learned during that time of our lives). And release the bolt of cloth for someone else to enjoy making things with.
My husband’s children and myself(admitting)complain that my husband is a hoarder but we have accumulated in 14 years stuff of his previous marriage, both parents, and just stuff! I go thru my own occasionally but we have a 5 bedroom farmhouse with 3 bedrooms packed and it makes me crazy as it’s the house I grew up in. I want so much to have a normal 3-4 bedrooms for the kids to all come but his reluctance to clear the clutter is the issue. We do have an incentive to redo the electrical work and replacing upstairs windows so that’s the motivation! Pray this isn’t put off much longer!! He talks of renting a storage unit but that will only work if we sort as we store!