I'm a terrible housekeeper!

I have a problem.

Really, I have a lot of problems, but I also have a time limit at the moment, plus over analyzing freaks me out.  One thing at a time.  So, right now I have one problem.

It's always been there, but only recently, has it been given a name.  When I was a kid, my room was always a disaster.  I developed unhealthy bonds with inanimate objects, and those things, my lovely little treasure, my favorite friends, piled up around me.  Every toy had it's own personality, even if I was the only one who could see it.  Eating was a huge struggle, too.  I'd look at my food and picture it crying out, "Don't eat me!  Don't!"  Of course, once I got to eating it, I always cleaned my plate--I just couldn't handle the thought of eating half of it, while the rest missed it's companions from the depths of the kitchen trashcan.  Snack time at Pee Wee's Playhouse always made me especially uncomfortable.

My mom wrote me off as weird and lazy.  My dad wrote me off as truly being his offspring.  And lazy.  To some extent, I am lazy.  No point in denying it.  But that wasn't what was going on.  I really needed those things.  Once in a while, my mom would threaten to clean my room.  I pick up enough to pacify her.  She'd be happy for a week, storm in, dump everything in the middle of the floor, then demand that I clean it.  I wanted to, I really did, but I didn't know how.  I'd putter around all day, picking through this and that, trying to make sense of it, only infuriating her more.  Most of the time it ended with both of us in tears, while I watched her heap my beloved things into an oversized trashbag.

It spilled over into school, too.  My homework was seldom done, and even when it was, I couldn't turn it in because it was mine and I wanted to keep it.  Forever.  In the 4th grade, my desk was dumped out and taped shut over my inability to keep it clean.  That teacher was a bitch who thoroughly enjoyed bullying me, mind you, but I highly doubt she was the first one I frustrated so badly.

(SIDE BAR: This is the teacher that tries to talk to me in the locker room at the pool.  If there's anybody I want to see naked less than her, I haven't met them.  Having a childhood tormentor approach you like you're friends is bad.  Having them laugh at the torture they put you through when you were only nine is worse.  Having all this happen while they're stark naked is some special level of hell.  If there's a more what the fuck moment, I haven't experienced it.  This isn't really relevant, but it seemed necessary, just the same.)

So, where was I?  Oh, okay.  In my teens, I started to realize there was something wrong with me.  My friends' rooms looked nothing like me.  Neither did their lockers, or eventually, cars.  Sure, some were messier than others, but not like mine, and not because every paper was a crucial memory or every tiny alien figure from the bubble machine was something special.  The things piled up.  When I met my first serious boyfriend, I cleaned, furiously stashing my prizes and making the room as normal looking as possible.  It was still insanely cluttered, but the chaos was a little more organized.  By organized, I mean packed into boxes and stashed as out of sight as I could make it.  I kept it up for a bit, not wanting him to see how awful I really was.  Then my parents started getting nervous and banned him from my room.  That was actually pretty dumb on their parts--there really wasn't anything going on and having him there forced me to at least contain all my little collections.  Things went back to normal.

A few years later, I met and moved in with the man I'm married to.  Because of the circumstances, he had no idea what he was getting into until he was already madly in love with me.  I moved out on a whim, taking only what was absolutely necessary and could fit into two trash bags.  Since my parents didn't speak to me for months after I moved, I was unable to get the rest.  I think I sorted through it two years later.  In any case, we were pretty poor, so I really couldn't start much in the way of new collections.  I was still sort of messy, but so was he, so this was largely unnoticed.  I should also add that I am messy, not dirty.  I wash my dishes and scrub my toilets, I just leave an endless trail of junk behind me.  And I know it's junk, but it's my junk.  My special junk.

I tried to change when we bought our house.  I did better, but only marginally.  I had to change when the child was born.  It was a struggle--still is--but I have improved by at least 1000%. 

Sometime last year, my mom called me.

"I know what's wrong with you!"

"Hey, Mom!  Howyabeen?  Fantastic!  Me too.  Yeah, I jus--"

"No, really.  I know what's wrong with you.  With all your clutter and stuff.  I was watching this show yesterday and you're a hoarder!"  She was really proud of herself.  She kept babbling about this, but I don't remember what else she said.  I was too busy letting this word--hoarder--sink in.

Later that evening, I googled it.  She was right.  All this time we just thought it was more of me being strange, but it really, truly wasn't just me.  Other people do this too!  I had a swelling sense of elation at the fact that I wasn't (at least in this case) just a complete failure at life.  I may have even teared up.

Then my balloon my popped.  I realized what this disorder meant for so many other people who have it.  Oh no!  Visions of divorce and abandonment and having my adult child hate me danced before my eyes.  I looked around the room.  It was tidy, impressively so, but without even trying, I could still spot at least ten things a normal person would throw away.  I flew into a rage, going through the house filling four bags of garbage.  In retrospect, I shouldn't have done that.  I should have talked to my husband first.  Instead I woke up in a sea of regret.  I still regret the loss of some of those irreplaceable items, and to be honest, I don't know if it's because I'm me or because I really shouldn't have thrown them out.  Or if there's really even a difference.

It needs to be said:  I'm not a hoarder like you see on the show Hoarders.  I think part of this is because I'm pretty sure they pick the worst of the worst.  My mostly neat house just doesn't make for a good TV experience, regardless of the eyebrow raisingly interesting personification of my belongings.  The other thing is that I'm only 28 and I do make as much effort as possible for my family.  Yeah, there have been some young hoarders featured, but I've really only had eight years to collect, plus my husband would (rightfully) kick my ass.  And I give myself some credit--I try really hard.  So, it's nothing like that.  Most of my struggle with this is internal.

In any case, I do my best.  I wish I could hire a professional organizer.  I can't even begin to wrap my mind around the meaning of that word.  Organized.  Sometimes I say it over and over again in my mind, thinking that if I say it just right I'll be able to reach out and grab it and make it mine.  I love the thought of being organized.  The thought of getting organized fills me with so much cold fear that I can feel it on my skin.

My house is, for the most part, tidy.  I've found that if I keep up on it, cleaning one thing before we move on to the next, it's much easier and more manageable.  If my first thought in a rational frame of mind is to throw something away, I do it.  If I hold on and think about it, I never will.  I don't throw anything out when I'm upset.  I've found that doing that makes me agitated and neurotic even when it was the right decision.  I have to stay on top of things.  If I miss cleaning for a day or two, it turns into a week and by the time I get back to it, I drown.  I get so completely overwhelmed that I can't even find a place to start, and instead I chase myself in circles, trying to make sense of it.  If I clean the living room before I head into the kitchen, I'm okay.  Every three months, I go through the house and force myself to throw away everything I don't use or don't need.  I still have heaps more odds and ends than a normal person, but I throw away a lot of things.  It also helps that my problem was finally given a name.

I am absolutely terrified over what this potentially means for my child.  The way she acts with her toys, stuffed animals in particular, scares me.  So, I do the only thing I know how to do.  I make jokes about it.  That's how I deal with things.  I cleaned her room last week.  It literally took me all week, partly because I'm me and partly because she has so much shit.  I hauled off three bags of toys.  She broke into one yesterday and cried for hours.  Her room is still full of toys, so many that for every new one, she'll literally have to make space for it by getting rid of something else.  I'll continue picking things off when she's not looking.  I think my husband does that to me. 

So yeah, there's one of my deep dark secrets, out there for all of the internet to know.  I grew up feeling bad and dirty and wrong.  Now I know that it just is what it is and I do the best I can with it.  I think I've got things pretty well figured out, at least as far as the house is concerned.  My mind, though...  Wanna see a freakshow?  My mind is what my house would look like if I never ever threw anything away.  But that's mine and it's awesome.  Besides, isn't this sort of like throwing things out?  Just a thought.