How do you declutter when your spouse can't let go of things?

[Molly]

I have another de-cluttering stumbling block. My husband can't part with things. Some things I can safely pitch. Like when he cuts tags off of clothing and instead of throwing them out, he leaves them on his dresser. He will clean out the glove box in his car, then store the discarded items in the basement. He keeps broken appliances. Textbooks from college (40+ years ago) that he hasn't touched since he graduated.

Periodically, I go through things and pitch what I don't think he'll ever want again. Most of the time I'm right, but occasionally, he'll look for something I've discarded. I feel really guilty when that happens, but we have so much stuff around the house, that we can't fit it in drawers and closets anymore. There is clutter on every counter, desk and shelf, and most of it is his.

What's worse, because there is so much clutter, when he can't find something, he will go out and buy another. Eventually we will find what he was looking for, but now we have two, adding to more clutter.

We plan to downsize to a smaller house soon. At this point my only hope is that the real estate agent will tell him we need to declutter in order to sell. Because he sure won't hear it from me.

Any suggestions until then?

[Gardenarian]

Molly, I am in exactly the same position. Looking forward to hearing some replies on this.

[goldensmom]

I made a deal with my husband. His computer room and shop is his space that I will not invade, complain about or clean. The rest of the house has to be current and presentable as if company is coming any moment. He can keep his collection of 1980's Hot Rod magazines and ancient computer stuff as long as it is in his computer room or shop. Also, the bathroom is not a library (a pet peeve). Any reading material sighted in the bathroom gets tossed.......no questions, no second chances, it's a house rule.

[Zoebird]

What works is having a contained space for his stuff, with no allowance for over-flow, so he has to decide what is important enough to keep.

I know this seems "controlling." But right now, he is "controlling" the environment with his "stuff." And as such, you feel the distress of all of that stuff.

In our case, DH was used to stuff. His family loves piles. They have piles and piles and piles EVERYWHERE. so for him, that's all he knows and is comfortable. But the reality is that stuff is uncomfortable. that much stuff is -- even though you may be used to it. It's like being acclimated to desert heat. :)

So, since I was experiencing distress, we decided to give DH one room in the house that was "his." I put *all* of the stuff in there that he didn't want to get rid of.

What we discovered is that he was actually happier, and so was I. Our common areas were clean and clutter free. Our bedroom was clean and clutter free. I had a very minimalist yoga room (quite literally, nothing in it) where I could go and do my work or just be. And then there was his "office" which was basically a junk room.

Then, one day, DH decided to go through his stuff and got it into the closet, book shelves. He was able to use the room. He could store things in there and know where to find them.

And it really made a huge difference.

Now, he's essentially contained to a basket for his pile, and some shelves for his books. We got rid of everything coming over here, so what we kept is important and useful. And, he knows, now, that he doesn't need a lot of what he thought he needed before. He doesn't "need" piles of paper or lots of random receipts or junk mail (he used to hold onto that like nothing else. no clue why -- i think because his mom used to clip coupons, so she kept those things in massive piles until Wednesday when she did her clipping).

He even figured out that most of what he needs for his writing and other 'paper' habits, he can organize into his computer. It's amazing!

We don't live quite as minimally as I would like right at the moment, but . . . we're doing another declutter in a couple of days . . . and he's actually excited about it! So, things can turn around. :)

[iris lily]

When you learn the answer to this, let me know! I've got a hoarder/collector husband

A couple of things:

1) Ask for an Un-Present for you birthday: point out a couple of BIG things to get rid of, this is in place of him buy8ing something

For some reason probably having to do with basic reluctance to spend money, my collector DH doesn't mind getting rid of things if it is a present to me for a birthday.

2) Assign "his space" and "not his space"
We built a double plus garage a few years ago. The entire thing is DH's space. It is packed to the brim. Also, one of our little houses holds a bunch of his construction stuff (such as 5 toilets!) haha.

3) Don't nag, but just point out the practical, that THIS is the space you have. There will be no more space. How's that going to work eventually without developing a plan to toss stuff?

My DH is from a farm where they had scads of big buildings, and they kept everything because they might need it someday, and they often did need it. Now he lives in an urban place where instead of multiple acres, he's got a few 25' wide city lots. Hello! That's bit different.

[happystuff]

Have the same thing going on here! We have alotted spaces for each of our own items. The inequity is starting to show, though. For example, we have a huge built-in bookcase - 6 shelves. Easy enough to split and share. However, now that I've been decluttering, I'm down to two shelves and he is up to 4. My only consoling thought is that when it does come time to move, I'll have an easier time of it than he will! (I've shared this with him and he knows I will not be dealing this his stuff!)

[Spoony]

For example, we have a huge built-in bookcase - 6 shelves. Easy enough to split and share. However, now that I've been decluttering, I'm down to two shelves and he is up to 4.


My thought is this: why not have one beautiful item that you love on one of your three shelves so that it shows as a piece of art?

As I declutter, I'm finding that I like one beautiful single item sitting in the space that used to be filled with a bunch of items.

You could have all three of your shelves empty if that's what you want. Why relinquish a shelf just because you don't have a bunch of items to fill it with?

[happystuff]

It wasn't "relinquished" per se... it was absconded - lol. As my items came off, his started appearing. Kind of a "pick your battles" type thing. This is not worth even a discussion. As I can't control anyone else, I'm content to continue working on myself.

[treehugger]

I made a deal with my husband. His computer room and shop is his space that I will not invade, complain about or clean. The rest of the house has to be current and presentable as if company is coming any moment.

This works for us as well. I don't care how messy his office is, since I can just close the door to that room. Our other deal is that I promise not to get rid of things without asking him (and I stick to this), but his side of the bargain is that he needs to be willing to let me show him things and ask, "Can I get rid of this?" Obviously, this wouldn't work for dedicated hoarders, since the answer would always be, "No." But in my DH's case, it's more that he just never wants to deal with things, so the boxes pile up. But if I ask, he has to answer (and still, it's OK for him to decide to keep things).

Kara

[Zoebird]

As it was absconded, you have every right to say "That's my shelf. All objects of yours will be removed from that shelf in X hours/days, one way or another." If he wants control over what happens to those objects, then he needs to take care of it before you do.

We had the exact same thing. We had a total of 15 shelves. That meant we had 7 shelves each, and the 8th shelf was empty (it was a tough corner -- bottom corner behind a table). We then also had our own smaller bookcase in the living room. I used only two of my seven shelves, so DH started to spread out. I said: NO! And then when he moved his stuff, I spread my two shelves of things over 7 shelves. Sometimes, it would be three books and a jar of weeds. LOL but, he got the hint.

I would even go and find a BIG ROCK and put it there just to hold space. And then when we moved, put the rock back outside. (And, no need to 'dust' a rock).

[Fawn]

I decluttered the husband.

Life is much simpler without him. :cool:

[dado potato]

I like this discussion. IrisLily: It was brilliant to assign DH the garagenous zone!

It makes all kind of sense to me that if there is a shared house, there would be specific areas that are "his", "hers", and "shared". The tidier person might have to enforce boundaries vis-a-vis the less tidy person, and by the same token refrain from trying to declutter the space of the less-tidy one.

The amount of space for each does not have to be equal to be fair. Whatever you negotiate, whatever is agreeable to you, is fair.

The "shared" area may always have a potential for conflict. The area of shared space can be progressively reduced, by assigning it to one person or the other, if a problem-solving approach to conflict resolution is not satisfactory.

Rather than obsess about the mess in the other person's space, I think it is more wholesome to find your own dust bunnies in your own space.

[JaneV2.0]

I'm sure my beloved shudders at the thought of sharing a living space with me, as I scatter seeds all over my cage (as an ex-neighbor observed). I do think a duplex would work. His side would be Zen perfection. Mine, not so much.

[frugalone]

What can you do if there were agreed-upon his and hers areas, and his stuff started spreading into her area?

This has been going on a long time, so I don't know if there is any way to stop it. I think I have tried everything.

[iris lily]

What can you do if there were agreed-upon his and hers areas, and his stuff started spreading into her area?

This has been going on a long time, so I don't know if there is any way to stop it. I think I have tried everything.

DH honors his committments. So when I point out "see this pile? it can't be here, this is the agreed upon 'No Piles' zone" he moves it. He moves it to the room where there are piles and piles. But ok--we've agreed to that. It doesn't take him long to get into the habit of No Piles in the pile-free zone.

Were it me, I'd toss his stuff either into a pile room or out in the dumpster.

[fidgiegirl]

Fawn: :laff:

[Fawn]

Fawn: :laff:

Yeah...doesn't work for everyone though......

[creaker]

I decluttered the husband.

Life is much simpler without him. :cool:


Very uncomplicated way of stating a much more complicated issue (at least for me), but did the same with my wife.

She could not deal with her "stuff", most of it trash, but was able to abandon it when she moved out. I could not believe how much stuff I put out on the curb over the next few months.

[Fawn]

Very uncomplicated way of stating a much more complicated issue (at least for me), but did the same with my wife.

She could not deal with her "stuff", most of it trash, but was able to abandon it when she moved out. I could not believe how much stuff I put out on the curb over the next few months.

Yes, of course you are right. It is way more complicated that what I said. My DS#3 has told me that when his dad dies, he will have to hire "one of those companies that does the auctions." And he will.There is 200+ years of family history/junk in the sheds.

Living there and leaving it has given me a really strong sense of what is important and what is burden in the rusting baling wire/combine parts not needed since 1970/polester wedding dress categories. :)

[frugalone]

I just saw this and wanted to comment on it again.
I let it go way too long when I saw stuff creeping into "my areas." And then more and more stuff came...and it's out of control. And now there's nowhere to put it. I used to just say, "Take this stuff to the basement." Well, I had not been in the basement for several months. I went down there tonight. It's terrible. It looks like s/thing out of hoarders. A while back, I took all the empty cardboard down there and recycled it. He gets more boxes every time he goes to the supermarket.

And then I found a box with some books in it. They were my books, that I put in the car to donate to the annual library sale. He said he would take them to the library. I knew some of them made it there b/c I saw them at the sale. But he kept some for himself. They're not even books he would use. One is on PMS, for gawd's sake. I can't even trust him to get rid of stuff that isn't his.

Is there anything I can do? I mean, it looks like he sabotages MY efforts to declutter my OWN stuff.

EDIT: One trick I have tried is taking stuff to work and throwing it out there, or in a public trash can. Obviously this won't work for bigger things, though.