hoarding

[Jena]

hi everybody!

hope everyone had a good day. this is something i never really talk about yet drives me nuts for years now, difficult child's hoarding.

This has gone on since she was 2 years old. it's not just "messy" it's hoarding. When she was younger it used to be o.j. containers, milk containers in her closet. she'd say she was doing a project with-them yet it would never happen. nowadays it can be anything at all, no specifics. tags from clothes she saves. toys, garbage, cups she drinks out of while out and about.

her room is a constant disaster. it's actually grose. i go in there often i police her, i make her clean up her toys, etc. yet nothing i do helps. if she has 5 min alone damage will be done.

her room looks like a garage sale. closet you can't even get into. i cleaned it out twice already past two mos. spent hours in her room. we've done the whole sit together try to throw garbage out, talk about how letting go is good, reasons for holding onto it, etc.

we've organized, gotten bins, etc. put extra toys in garage. nothing works. nothing. ever. last therapist we had was going to try to fit in the time to work on the hoarding as well.

yet to be very honest there are just soo many issues, she'd need therapy each day of her life to address each issue she has. it is overwhelming to me and i'm sure to her to say the least. also alot of behavioral issues as well.

just went into her room and smelled pee. i go into her top drawer to find soaking wet pee pajamas and underwear from when she wet the bed. taught her since age 2 take them off strip bed, etc. put in garbage bag. nothing works. she just doesnt' listen.

where do all these illnesses come from? i just dont' know. i went thru my side with fine tooth comb, even me had work ups done. just curious to find out where oh where did it all come from?

 

[Jena]

no one has experience with-this? i know so many topics i'm posting about i'm sorry. i think maybe heading to library again and starting at square one is the way to go. get a book out on each disorder she has, read them all again, than find some commonality in the disorders, how to treat, deal with-at home, etc. than move forward again.

hospital said yes bad place said residential for her. i said what no way she's 11 never going to happen. yet they said she requires more than our facility has. hence medicating and sedatating because they didnt' know what else to do morons

 

[smallworld]

Jen, hoarding is a form of anxiety related to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). If you treat her underlying anxiety, I suspect the hoarding will get better. in my humble opinion, you need to focus on the eating issues first, and then worry about the rest. The eating issues are life-threatening and the rest aren't.

 

[Josie]

My daughter is a hoarder, too. It can go along with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and the same methods can be used to treat it. There's a good book for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) called "What to Do When Your Child has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)" by Aureen Pinto Wagner.

For some reason, my daughter's hoarding is getting somewhat better. I threw away something recently that she would have preferred to keep and she didn't fall apart. I don't dare get rid of any of her hundreds of stuffed animals, though. She did recently allow me to put more of them up, so we now have a manageable amount in her room.

We recently got her Lexapro up to 10 mg so that might be what is helping her.

You might be able to find an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) intensive day treatment place nearby. There is one by us that people come to from all over but it is only during the day. Even adult patients are encouraged to bring their family since the family needs to know how to help them. The patients go home or to a hotel at night. I think they might stay for a few weeks if they are from out of town. Since we were local, our daughter did 3 hour sessions, 3 times a week. Her therapist came to our house since her issues were here.

I don't think it is a matter of not listening. I think she knows the right thing to do, but somehow that Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) has a hold of her and she just feels compelled to save her peed on clothes.

In Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) therapy for kids, they teach them to think of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) as a bully. They have to learn to talk back to the bully and not let it boss them around.

There is a yahoo group for parents of kids with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) that you might find helpful.

Smallworld posted while I was typing. I agree with letting the hoarding go for now, while you work on the eating. I don't think it will do any good to increase her anxiety by making her get rid of things.

 

[Jena]

yes i get that. and i have researched it before. i know the relation to the Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) she is in it. we have addressed the anxiety for years and the hoarding never ever stopped. there is a huge pyschological component to it though. that is what i was looking for feedback on.

i am putting eating first. have been for past 2 months. yet all her other issues are kicking up badly so i need to try to touch on all of them while i refeed her. there is a way just thru functioning together each day that i can touch upon those just in interacting, routines, etc. i was looking more for that piece of it. and the anxiety is being addressed she is on 75mg of seroquel right now, which by the way just sedates her. i can not titrate up any quicker right now doing medications alone.

 

[Jena]

hope thanks i'll look for that book.

i'm not making her get rid of stuff. she can't find her bed at night right now and we're stepping on junk food etc. it's quite bad. so when i try to throw anything away she melts down. yet garbage cant' stay. it's funny entire rest of house is organized except for our room tons of her papers in piles right now. diagnosis's etc. and than comes difficult child's room. oh man it's scarey in there. just went in and lysold it threw out bottles of stuff she had on the floor etc.

she's facing food, it's scaring her so ofcourse all her other issues will worsen. you have to treat the person as a whole in my belief not just pieces of them. impossible, probably but i'm going to give it a shot as long as she doesn't get what i'm doing and freak her out

 

[idohope]

Hi Jena,

I have also dealt with the hoarding. Finally, when we started difficult child on abilify she was able to pack everything in her room into totes. She was able to actually give away some clothes that she no longer wears and sell some furniture at a yard sale. The furniture had sat in our garage for a year. She did not want it in her room but had so many conditions on how we could get rid of it that it just sat there. We are in the process of redecorating her room and she agrees that we will only put back in what she has a place for. She is no longer on the abilify and is still sticking with the plan, sort of. Even with just clothes in her room it is a disaster and so we have not been moving anything back in. For years she slept on the floor of her room (by choice; when I was able to convince not her be on the floor of my room) and the whole floor was covered with stuff and she would be there in the middle of in wrapped in a blanket. I know it would have horrified people with typical kids but this was not the major behavior that we needed to tackle in the past few years.

I agree with the others that you need to address the eating first. What I found with difficult child is that when her anxiety and behaviors were at a high point it was near impossible to deal with the hoarding. I think you should address just the safetly issue of it (getting out really gross food stuff) for now and after the eating is dealt with and other aspects of her anxiety are being dealt with to start addressing the hoarding.

Maybe you could take a small step with her now of not allowing anything new into the room without something coming out. I used to try getting difficult child to agree that if we went clothes shopping that she had to remove one item of clothing for each new item. There were a couple of times when she agreed that I could clean up her room. I had to save all the garbage in a bag so she could look at it and make sure I was not throwing out something good. So I do know where you are coming from! But it is amazing how quickly the room goes back to total disaster.

husband just always wants to throw her stuff out. Take it when she if not home etc. All the professionals advise against that, as I am sure you know.

Anyway I would just take it slow on the hoarding for now. Good luck with it all