I am a "recovering" hoarder. I have PTSD, most hoarders have another diagnosis, that's mine. The woman who was my caretaker as a young child was an abusive alcoholic.
Given all that, for most of my life, I've gotten panic attacks when my space was tidy. For the last ten years or so, that's wake up in the middle of the night cold sweats, crying, screaming panic attacks. For many years, around 40, I had no idea that the reason it was so hard to clean and keep my house clean was that I panicked when I did. Trying to do anything while panicking is d*amned difficult! And because PTSD is an anxiety disorder, for a long time i didn't connect the dots. I didn't "see" the panic attacks were related to a clean house, I just knew I was having another one, now.
A few months ago, I put what I knew about myself together with other data: it takes about 90 days to affect a behavioral change. That's the reason that AA and other programs are all set up to work for 90 days. So I decided to try combining those to see if I couldn't change or eliminate the panic attacks?
I got sidetracked because of DH first being on travel and then hurting himself.
However? It seems to have worked! For the first time in my life I can live in, work on, etc. a tidy space and it doesn't wake me up in a cold sweat. I don't look at the space and start shaking, or I find some reason, any reason (!) to mess up the space again. I don't have nightmares of the house being broken into, being laughed at because of what's here, etc.
I can't tell you how welcome this is. I am officially a senior citizen these days and it's a relief to finally be able to move in this direction without dredging up my kid crap!!!
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