Why does the WWII generation hoard?

OMG is exactly right! I spent some time helping my Dad, Parkinsons, mini-strokes, Lewy Body Dementia, very bad cataracts. His house was great in the public areas, but he was using his room as...a holding place until he "could get to it". He 'misplaced' money and it stressed him a lot. We generally found it, but you know people were under suspicion until then, etc.

I have OCD and Hoarder's problems myself, so I went through every piece of paper I could for him. I found two letters he had started when he knew he was deteriorating, one to me, one to my youngest brother, in amongst receipts 20+ years old, and letters and cards we had sent him, going back 40+ yrs. There are probably 4 other letters started, but no one else has the patience or OCD to look through every piece of paper to find them, and things were swept away fast after I left.

I took a lot of grief for not accomplishing much during my time there. OK, fair enough.

To get to my point, and I have one, I'm only 61. I don't hide $$$, but I have trouble concentrating, things get jumbled into piles. I was starting in on the piles because I don't want to burden my kids more than I have to (!), and in fact I found $200 cash in an envelope, unlabeled, in the middle of a pile of papers.

It shook me up, and makes me even more reluctant than I already am to just sweep things off piles into garbage bags. I was getting ready to do just that, and I'm inclined to say "What, God? Was that a test? Were you playing with me, as in Just Kidding!!! ;-)" ???

So, there you have it. It won't stop me, but that money found will slow me down some. I can't imagine how awful it'd be to try to dig out from Hoarders at an even older, more vulnerable time, which is usually just when others get involved, right?

FF, I've got you beat! My frig is from 1979!

If appliances and desires keep changing, perhaps in a few years we'll be able to sell our relics as antiques!

I agree with the pressure for always new things - I can't believe how much is wasted b/c someone wants to "upgrade" to granite counter tops, add a firepit (what's wrong with the old barbeque and grill?) complete with fancy decorating and designer couches and chairs surrounding (but where are the guitar players to serenade the gathering of friends?).

Of course the GNP benefits, but that doesn't necessarily benefit me. And as an aside, I've just read the SS is not going to increase by even $.01 for me in 2016. Someone must be playing games with the CPI again. Egg prices have doubled, hamburger is $4.49 a pound usually....guess it's time to add some cattle and chickens to the old garden.

I was thinking today that I need to learn how to fish again to save money on the whopping cost of fish.

How do you keep you 20 year old Jeep running. Every time my cars have hit 18, they've had so many problems my repair shop manager just took me aside as if he were telling me someone had died. And he told me that my car just wasn't worth saving.

I'd save the food that goes for the squirrels or they might become so used to the food that they move in!

My mom can still be reduced to tears when talking about the Depression and her childhood. Like Scarlett Ohara my mom swore she would never go without again. Mom put herself through college, taking a year off in the middle to work to get the money to finish - no student loans in in 1945. I totally agree with GardenArtist (yet again) that in general people today haven't a clue as to the hardship the Great Depression was. When I took over my parents finances they had squirreled their assets over a dozen+ institutions because they didn't trust having it in just a few. In a different post I mentioned being resentful growing up of my moms frugal ways - one blue box and a single can of tuna feed a family of five, I never had store bought cloths - either it was second hand or mom sewed it, powdered milk with 1/2 the recommended amount of powder...I could go on and on. BUT now she has enough money to live in the nicest of NH and until recently had a full time care giver to assist her in AL no less. There is enough money for her to live comfortably for the rest of her life. Having this money to meet/exceed her needs has made things much easier for me to look after her which is tough enough as it is. So if it meant we filled an industrial size dumpster when we moved my parents out of a house they lived in 50 years...looking at the bigger picture I would not change a thing and am thankful for every glass of watery, lumpy powered milk!

Lisac, I think you'll find that others here have trouble concentrating, especially during stressful periods with our elders. And it's easy to attribute this to caregiving, but I recall when I first tried to learn algebra in college and was so frustrated that it was as if a blender was gathering all my thoughts, mixing them up and spitting them out in a soup of nonsense. However, when I had a different algebra instructor, it was a totally different situation.

Rainmom, yours is an emotional, heartfelt and well written response. I respect and admire your gratitude; your post has reminded me to always remember what my parents sacrificed to raise my siblings and I.

I thought the scene from Gone with the Wind when Scarlett is standing in the field affirming that she'll never be hungry again was one of the most powerful in the firm. Sometimes I've tried to imagine myself in that situation, and I honestly don't know what I would do.

That's one of the reasons the current crop of "reality" shows when people compete in preplanned exercises or so-called survival modes is so hilarious. With cameras just out of sight, it's impossible to believe these people really are as hard up as they pretend to be. But some of them are good actors, and that's just what many of them are, even if they do practice survivalism in real life.

My People!!! (arms thrown wide for an embrace)

Well, thank you, and it's a pleasure to tell everyone here that you're all God-sends, and you're all how I survived those months.

BTW, my Dad was a peach, but everybody seemed to have a different idea of how things should be done, etc...fair enough. That's why I needed to be able to come and read here. They're getting to do it their way now.

I'm lucky I had that time with him. He kept trying to place this little old lady who called him Daddy, but I got to meet him as the man he was in the workplace, as the chief of surgery forced to retire before he was ready; as the mid-career surgeon hiring an old lady who called him Daddy but didn't know how to take dictation; as the new Resident who wanted to go home to his wife and young kids, but not until he put the little old lady who called him Daddy on report for vacuuming and keeping the patients awake; as the student practicing his surgical knots.

These diseases, dementias, and dilemmas are heartbreaking.

Throw everything away, except the carbon copy paper. You might want to write a note in triplicate someday.

Remember when washing machines would last 40 years? Not anymore. The newer He models spin so fast they rip the buttons right off the shirts :P

Up until a couple months ago, my Mom use to put her clothes in the dryer for a few minutes, take them out, carry the basket of damp clothes down to the basement to hang the clothes to finish drying... she did this until she was 97. The basement also had my Dad's workshop. No wonder their clothes always had that spray paint and oil smell to them :P

FF, do you remember using the old wringer washers? It never occurred to us that there could be a more time saving way. I think there's still an old washboard someplace in the basement!

Your mother had amazing strength; carrying clothes up or downstairs is tricky when someone is older. I used to wash downstairs and hang all my clothes up outdoors on the clotheslines...until the neighbor got a dog, and well, didn't clean up as she should have. From then on I decided to let the clothes dry inside.

But paint and oil smell.....ummm...don't think I'd care for that too much!


I remember asking my father one day why he had so much of a food reserve. He said, in all earnest, that one day something might happen and an interruption in the food distribution system could occur (especially with the trucking industry) that prevented food from getting to stores. Then at least he'd have a supply of food.

And gardeners regularly plan for several months ahead, but that's not hoarding; it's just common sense and being prepared, as well as eating healthier and saving money.

I do recall the trucking strikes of earlier years, but that's been a long time ago.

My mother cooks the clothes in the dryer.. everything is in for at least an hour. My scrubs and undies and tee shirts take about 20 min to dry.. then they are 3 sizes smaller. I thing I may have her trained now that I have had to rebuy alot!
My father saved the dangest stuff... my fav find was coffee cans full of pistachio shells... and tons of the styrofoam coolers that thier meds came in.. in case you wanted to keep ONE soda cold

When I see the Lord, all of the WHY questions throughout eternity will be answered. In the meantime, where did I put all those working twinkle lights for holiday decorations, or, not wanting to become hoarders, did we forget and throw them out last year?

GardenArtist, yes the old wringer washers.... and a pair of large deep concrete sinks next to the washer where my Dad had hooked up so that the old soapy wash water would go into the sink, and when Mom would put a new load of clothes into the wringer washer, the soapy water would be sucked up back into the washer for the new load of clothes. Now that was extreme recycling !!

Back when I was a child if Mom couldn't hang the clothes outside on the clothes line, then she would carry them up two flights of stairs then up the stairs into the large attic where she had clothes lines [Dad had a electrical workshop up there, so there was the combination of old attic smell with burnt electrically wiring].

I remember Mom ironing the sheets and pillow cases. She did that while watching her soap opera "As the World Turns".

Does anyone remember the old "mangles" that were used to iron large things like sheets and runners for tables or dressers? Those things were HUGE!

Pam, one hour?? You're right - they must have been well done by that time!

A relative used to save string; I used to save and reuse aluminum foil for baking potatoes. I could get a few potatoes before it was too browned to use. Now I just use the microwave.

But coffee cans were valuable - I filled them with morning glory seeds!

GA and FF: At the parents house I will have to haul out 2 wringer washers out of the basement. (one working and one for parts) Mom did not give in to a modern washer until she was 75. I did all dad's laundry after she passed. I tryed to get rid of those wringer washers but they wouldnt let me. Anyone want one for their June Cleaver museum???? :) Ps; can I interest you in about 30 pounds of dried up ball point pens.....

Hope you get some offers for your pens, Mincemeat. Five years ago I couldn't find anyone interested in 30 pounds of rubberbands and used twist ties.

Perhaps we should start up a museum for old saved stuff from the Depression and WWII.

Mincemeat, I think those old wringer washers might be candidates for museums. The Henry Ford Museum (attached to the Greenfield Village) in Dearborn, Michigan focuses on old things - fascinating old train engines, old autos, old restaurants and old appliances.

AK, I've found old dried up rubberbands and twist'ems as well - did you ever find someone who wanted them? I expect I may have a supply eventually!

As I go through various areas trying to downsize, I'm often surprised at what I've found - lots of buttons, enough fabric to start a fabric store (hmmm, that's an idea for making money), old lipsticks and eye shadows and remnants from working)....and lots of dress shoes with which I'm loath to part. They really are nice shoes, even if I'll probably never be able to wear them again.

Makes me feel really, really old when I think back on how life has changed so much. I'm wondering now if I really was as young as I remember, or was it all just a dream?!

As I

I thought this morning of some things that I'm glad were saved. A few years ago my brother brought down from the attic a box of letters Dad and Mom had written to each other just after I was born, when he was stationed in Texas. I could only read one - my mother's excitement on my birth and presence were so emotional I just broke down in tears. I will always save those letters.

Every plastic spoon, fork and knife from carry out food... condiments in their little plastic containers, napkins, rubberbands and twist ties, paper bags, and food that can only go in the compost pile. I walk in that kitchen and go on sensory overload. All the saved plastic margarine bowls, the little ones with lids that tartar sauce comes in..... pots and pans that have not been used in YEARS. and the list goes on..... cleaning out the fridge is so traumatic for H that I wait until he is gone... he never remembers what was in there, but if he was there, I would have to put that tablespoon of scrambled eggs back in there..
Both my parents were of the depression era, but neither of them were hoarders... they both kept things to be passed down in the family, but no way would my mom have allowed a cluttered house and my dads work shop was organized and tidy.... so who knows... I always feel bad for family members who will have to go in and get things straightened out..... they have a mother in law room built outside the breezeway, that is piled high with clothes.... their closets are so jam packed things have to be hung on the doors....but if it makes them feel safe, guess it only really matters to who has to clean it up...

I had a different insight on this issue yesterday when I started sorting and filing some business papers that I had accumulated over the more intensively active caregiving years. If it wasn't urgent but needed saving, it was generally put in a manila or redrope folder. There was always something else more urgent, like ER visits, doctor appointments, getting food, and of course happy therapy events.

These dox included things like credit agency reports (which I'd quickly check then file and compare when I got the next one), hospital discharge papers, etc.

When I started on sorting and filing yesterday, it just seemed so overwhelming...so MUCH paper. Do I really need to keep the discharge papers and/or hospital reports from all the hospitalizations? Actually, yes, because now I'm finding that I can't remember the reason for the first 2 hospitalizations of this year. Seriously - some real short term memory loss.

But the sense of just soooo much to go through made me decide I'd put it off for a nice rainy day when the garden wasn't beckoning....maybe the first snow storm of the season. So, back it all went into the redrope.

Expanding that to a home filled with things from WWII....well, I can now see why our parents feel overwhelmed.

One of our neighbors has a saying which she repeats regularly: "inch by inch is a cinch." Cute, and sometimes it does help. This is a woman who takes on more than anyone I know of. She has 3 houses and her own business. I can't even mange my own house!

So, folks, it's one inch at a time for me from now on!

It's funny how certain things saved seem universal. Rubber bands, plastic tubs that things came in - my mom had a disproportionate number of lids to tubs; dozens of lids only - to go containers, plastic utensils and dads all seemed to have baby food jars filled with nails and screws! But I think this type of frugalness is different from a true hoarder. My bothers poor wife had to put her mom in AL recently and is now working to get rid of a garage filled with dolls - literally hundreds and hundreds of Barbies and china dolls purchased from QVC and the like. Her mom was convinced her savings was safely invested in dolls that later would be collectors items. Her mom had probably every car cologne bottle Avon ever made! At first my SIL tried to look up every doll/car on line to access their value only to learn that with the now world wide availability of items like these through sites like EBay -well, Christmas Barbie wasn't worth much more than what was paid upon her original purchase!

RainMom, I think you've made an important distinction. I recall a time when even the thick paper milk caps were apparently considered an item. I've seen programs of collectors who have hundreds of the first coke bottles produced. Beanie Babies were also an item at one time. So were stamps.

There might even be a market for these things, but sensationalistic tv focuses on what seems to get a rise out of people more than what's good programming.

Have you ever noticed that the one program with a couple of guys who explore garages and farm outbuildings looking for good stuff have an entirely different approach than the hoarder ones? I understand the distinction, but the attitude is just so much more judgmental. Some of the garages on those HGTV shows are filled with stuff, some of it worthwhile, others not. But the slant is different - look for the gold, don't condemn.

GardenArtist, 1979 refrigerator? Wire racks, right? That is why I am hanging onto my refrig because of the wire racks.

Also have a small collection of dress shoes I haven't worn in years and probably won't in the future... guess I am hanging onto them because my feet were hard to fit being so narrow that these shoes are my hunt trophies :)

Good morning, GardenArtist! I don't watch much "reality" tv but hubby gets a kick out of some of it. Not the shows like Survivor or Big Brother but the looking for gold type. Hubby especially likes the one where people bid blindly on abandoned storage facilities. I'll admit some of that can be interesting - but I loath the shows that exploit mental illness for others entertainment. Give me a rerun of The Munsters any time!

For sure those hoarder shows on TV show the worst and most extreme situations, and there is definitely a difference between hoarding and frugality, but the line in the middle can get pretty blurry. I am frugal as well and have to watch that I don't accumulate more than I can ever use. I think the difference is that true hoarders can't let things go, even when they know they should.

The hundreds of jars in my mother's basement were all filled back in the days everyone did home canning, and we really did need all those pie tins and margarine tubs because it was unthinkable to go out and buy those things when you could just re use what was on hand. And once all those important papers were stored in the attic they were out of sight and mind, so it was easy to just keep adding to the pile and never purging. When all those treasures start to encroach on the living areas of the house its a sign that the line is being crossed.

I wonder why this topic popped up when it hasn't been active for months--but this question has been on my mind as I try (fruitlessly) to cull some of mother's things down so she can have more living area. She keeps EVERYTHING. I see the fear in her eyes when I come to "clean"...she says she's never met anyone who liked to throw stuff away more than I do. Well....it's for her own safety, and good. Things are so dusty and filthy...she cannot clean and so it falls to me. I sneaky pete my way into her place and try to toss what I can that she won't see. She also saves every piece of junk mail, plastic bags, paperclips, pencils....I bought her a wicker basket organizer for her table (my brother said, go ahead, she'll cover that table in days with crap) and culled out about a hundred pads of paper, return labels..just junk..and lo and behold, two weeks later I go see her and she had PACKED that basket with so much junk you can't get a thing out of it, plus the table is once again covered in papers and junk. She can eat on the table if she moves all the crap.
She grew up "weathy" during the depression, and always had a huge home filled to the brim with stuff. It's just in her nature, I guess. You can'r walk from one room to another in her little apt. But she loves it, so I keep my thoughts to myself. When she passes 90% of her stuff will be tossed or given to the Salvation Army.

Not going to read through all the answers but I was born 9 months before the outbreak of WW11 in England so I remember the shortages. Everything was rationed so everything that could be reused was saved. Elastic , buttons, every piece of string. Even sweaters were unravelled and reknited, Woman's skirts were made into little boys short pants, the good fabric from a dress could be made into a pretty apron to give as a gift. brown paper bags could be turned into wrapping paper to wrap parcels. Christmas paper was really prized. The present was carefully unwrapped then the paper ironed and put away for the next year.
This was practical good sense which is very different from hoarding which is usually an actual mental illness.

Veronica, oh my gosh, I forgot about the reusing [recycling] of wrapping paper and how carefully my Mom would open a gift and saying "the paper is too pretty to throw away".

Now a days it was reusing gift bags over and over again until they got too worn to use just one more time. Heavens, I keep the white crinkle paper that is used in gift boxes as I have one cat who just loves to play with it.... I just toss a cat toy under it and let her at it.

Ms V.... sooooo good to see you here !!!! I save all that stuff but it is for art projects... so my house leans toward a hoarding house...

How have you been feeling? Did everything get straightened out and are you eating on your own now? Ahhh, so many questions... going to email you right now.... love and hugs , so happy to see you here.

It's all on a continuum, but I can tell you it's frightening when you can't make good judgments, and your life has spiraled out of your own control, and you're unable to get any of it back. Then if your clutter is projects and tools, and your home, you give that up and you feel like you're giving up hope for who you are and your future.

It's a nightmare. Whatever it is that kicks it from 'Tendencies to collect' to full-on Hoarder's Executive Function failure, it's a disaster.