Is It Hoarding If Your Shit Is Cool??

         Hello vintage lovers!! This is a bit of a different post than I usually put on here and I am thinking about putting this post on all three of my blogs. It is also a long one and a very interesting chose since I haven't posted on here in almost a month but here we are. I am asking the retorical question, am I a hoarder? Of course I say retorical because yes, in fact I am a hoarder. Now I am not a level 5 can't throw away trash or having my house piled up to where I am putting my self or my family in danger (that is where most peoples minds go when they think hoarder). But I am a hoarder of things I love (or so I think it is love) I saw a quote that said "Is it hoarding if your shit is cool" which is funny but still it is hoarding. I have most of my closets full of my treasures and some outside in a storage building but all the rooms in the house are clear I never want to be that bad. I did get to a point where when my youngest son was a baby and he slept in the room with me for about a year, I did fill his room up and I felt awful about that. But when it came time I did what was right and cleaned it out to put his bed back in and his room has never had anything but his stuff in it since. That scared me a little cause I let it get that bad for a little bit, so left to my own devices if I didn't have a family would my house be a level 5?? 

        I used to hoard a lot because of reselling, I would buy things I knew had value to resell on ebay for a little extra money and also my kids old clothes, shoes and toys would go to consignment sales to make money for my thirfting. So I held onto things because I thought "well that can make me $2" which now looking at it makes me feel silly. Does $2 really matter that much? Why hang onto that toy or pair of shoes for only that little bit of money? I started watching a youtube channel about 2 years ago, her channel is called a hoarder's heart. It was in my recommended videos list, god has such a since of humor doesn't he?? It's like youtube was like yes ma'am this lady is a hoarder let's recommend this channel to her. I watched one video and I subscribed because she spoke to me unlike any other youtuber that deals with hoarding. She understands that hoarding isn't just about getting rid of the items it is about being ready to let them go. After watching her for a while I started to let go of things I never thought would be possible for me to be ok with letting go. Don't get me wrong there are still things that I can not let go of but I am getting there. Now her hoarding is emotional she puts emotions and memories into her items that makes it hard for her to let go, I put monitary and hard to get back to mine. 

       What I mean by hard to get back is as you can tell my this blog I buy a lot of vintage items thrifting which I find it hard to get rid of these items because of the fact that they are vintage hard to find items. Of course a lot of them are worth some money so the monitary issue comes into play with that as well. Also I have an issue letting go because I have let go of items in the past and regretted it. With my kids items it is easy for me because they can not wear or use them any more so it really is a no brainer. I also think well I am only going to make $5 at the most, why keep this? Let it go to someone else can use it but when it comes to my vintage items that goes out the window. I also think man, I have so much money in these items I can't just let them be donated I need to sell them or something if I bring myself to let go. Which does not help because then I have to store them till I can sell them it is a vicious cycle but that is how my hoarder brain works. Like I said I have worked out some of my issues but there are plenty still there. 

          Now as to why I hoard I'm not sure, Ms Heart as she is called on her channel says she was bullied as a child which led to her turning to her items for comfort but I never had an issue like that, I was a quiet kid how blended into the wall so no one bothered me. I think mine may have been inherited which can happen, my grandmother was a collector of plenty as well and never wanted to let go of her stuff. Like me she was not so bad you couldn't go in her house but she had a lot of stuff, and I grew up around it. I also feel like my mom is a bit of a hoarder too cause she has problems letting go of things too. So it may just be in my genetics.  So if this is true I am trying to set an example for my boys especially my older son he was going down the hoarder path the bad one he didn't want to throw away trash..... As discussed on my mommy blog he has high funcuntioning autism so it may have been that but I worked with him and now he declutters with ease so I am glad for that. Of course I need to keep an eye on him he could relapse when older but I won't worry about that now. 

          Of course I had to focus a bit on my vintage collecting as you have seen there are many different collections but my biggest vintage one is probably my Christmas items. I can not help it I love vintage Christmas and do not plan to change that anytime soon. As you have seen over the past three years or so is that I was buying anything vintage there for a while. That has been curbed a little bit, I only buy what I love so that is why there hasn't been a lot of post this past 10 months or so. I have not been picking up a lot of vintage items cause I was just packing them in boxes and putting them in closets or out in my building. That is no way to be I am trying to reverse my hoarding, I know it is going to take a long time to do that but I am taking small steps in the right direction. I will never stop thrifting or looking for vintage items it brings me joy and I love to spend time with my mom and grandmother (once this virus goes away). Maybe some day I can have my own little booth in an antique place and sell some of my treasures but for now I will keep them on display and have a good time finding them while making good decisions on what to bring into my home and letting go of things that don't bring me joy. Sorry the post was so long but this has been heavy on my heart for a while. It's good to get it off my chest and out into the open, now maybe I can really reverse my hoarding.....