Best tips for decluttering?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here - not sure asking spouse to toss 12 empty used cardboard boxes in my living room,piles of greeting cards and magazines from 2007, and 37 empty plastic ice cream/food cartons around is emasculating... I even broke my ankle a few years ago tripping on his shoe pile at the bottom of the basement stairs...

Literally I can't cook dinner cause he covers our kitchen counters with random stuff (he likes 1 use only kitchen tools that he says "we don't have space for in the cabinets").

I'll try zones.

OP. This is what hoarding looks like. Your DH has a mental illness. Start researching...I have seen long term hoarding, and I have seen it in a marriage.

It is not something you want to live with long term...please seek therapy for yourself and don't have kids until you have a better handle on what is going on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just throw it all out. If your house is cluttered, it means you can't really use or access any of the junk -- so it's effectively the same thing as as if you already threw it all out. Like, you may have all your Pepco bills from 2005, but who would know? And how would you find it if you needed it? Ergo, just throw it out. My husband and I have each kept a large tuperware bin of our own junk (high school yearbooks, fraternity shirt, funny knick nack from middle school). We have a couple bins of photos. And a well stocked kitchen (because we cook a lot). A cupboard with actively used electronic things (wires, cables, chargers, batteries) and about 4 small filing boxes with paperwork (taxes, immigration papers, and records). Pint sized cans of all the paint in our house. A shelf of tools. A cupboard of office supplies. Other than that, we really don't have much stuff in our house. We love it. I like to think that if we died tomorrow, we wouldn't be leaving a disaster zone for someone to clear out.....

If your husband suffers from hoarding, this won't work for the long haul.

If your husband suffers from hoarding, no amount of decluttering will work.

[Anonymous]

OP, you (and your husband) may want to read this piece from 2010 by the Post's Michael Rosenwald about his trying to stop being a slob (though it's pretty clear he's a hoarder):

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/07/AR2010060703807.html

Maybe because he's young-ish and a DC professional type, it might resonate a little more than watching some of the more, ahem, backwoods types on the Hoarders-type TV shows.