How Hoarding Works

You may be familiar with compulsive hoarding from TV, but something that’s often missing from those shows and the news is the deep and overwhelming shame that this disorder creates in its victims who are neurologically incapable of parting with their stuff.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff Works
dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark.
There's childs to have you, Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry over there,
and here we are doing Stuff you Should Know about hoarding. Yeah,

(00:23):
Jerry's over there under a stack of pizza boxes and newspapers. Yes,
but Jerry proudly displays them to anybody who comes into
the office and makes eye contact with her, which makes
her a collector of those things. A big difference. Well, yeah,
I didn't save your hoarder. She's a pizza box collector,
I got you. She likes those greasy after stains. Yes,

(00:44):
supposedly that prevents you from recycling pizza boxes. I think
we talked about it in one of our episodes before,
but I think that that's a p s A that
bears repeating. Yeah, I've never got a final answer on that,
So I throw mine in the recycling anyway. I don't
know if that comes up the works or not. Is
there a spectrum or anything like that, or you're like, oh,
this one is just so obviously loaded with cheese um

(01:08):
that I I can't possibly recycle this. Well, mine are
always loaded because I specifically request that the pizza be
delivered face down in the box. It's a little weird,
but I like it that way. It's the way to
do it, for sure, upside down pizza. Actually, you know
what I should do is just tear the box in
in half and at least recycle the top. That I

(01:29):
think you may have just solved the real problem. Yeah, alright,
I think we do need to do a follow up
recycling episode because I would imagine it's probably advanced by
leaps and bounds since we last discussed it. Yeah, and
here in my area of Atlanta, they quit um taking
glass really a few months ago. Too heavy, not enough payoff.

(01:52):
I think it was just yeah, and and or word
got out that they weren't even recycling it, so um sin.
Then they have set up places around Atlanta, one specifically
at the Edgewood Target parking You know, there's a bunch
stuff there, But in the Target parking lot, they have
these huge glass recyclers there. And I meet up with

(02:12):
the fellow Whinos about once every two weeks. We all
shamefully toss in, you know, dozens of bottles of empty wine,
so much dead yellow tail. Yeah, and we now I
don't think that stuff. Uh, but we just we It's nice.
It's sort of like a wine meeting so much dead
Paul Masson, like a wine clatch. I'm like, oh, what

(02:35):
are you throwing away there? How have you gotten any
recommendations from those chance encounters? It's literally happened where we're
you know, I would meet a fellow whine. Now we're
thrown away tons of bottles, and then we decide to
own our shame and be like, hey, this one was
pretty good by the way, and started a conversation, and
then I get maced. Yeah you take you take the

(02:55):
bollow and go huh night train? Haven't heard of this one? Right? Okay,
that try? And I like the handy grip of the bottle.
I never tried night train. Did you have that, dude?
It's it's a nightmare, is what it is. Yeah. I
would drink the like you don't even sober up before
you get a crushing headache from it. It comes with
a headache, That's what says. Um. What would I drink? Um?

(03:18):
Mad dog mm hmm, Which I mean there's a reason
they are sold right next to each other. Yeah, can
you even call those wine? No it's not wine. It's
wine like Prudo gets wine like malt liquor is beer.
It's related, but it's drinking. Sure. Remember the Nikey's big mouths. Yeah,

(03:39):
and cold forty five came in like gigantic like bottles.
That was one of the biggest attractions of it. You know, Yeah,
it was expensive, man, that would that was our jam
for a little while. I never got into this, I
know what you're talking about. Didn't they have like the
like a question or a trivia thing or something on
the underside of it, the bottle, the lid, I don't know. Well,

(04:00):
there were a little green hand grenade bottles, little barrels
and uh, I don't know which came first or after
it was either. I guess they switched to just the
regular like uh, Coca Cola style twist off cap metal
twist off, and I think they might. I think they
did have something underneath it. Act there was something under there.

(04:22):
Maybe it was like a poker game or a card
game or you've just won Liberal Disease. But before that
then I think they had these really unique poll tabs
because it was a big fat mouth Mickey's. That's why
they called it that Mickey's big mouth, so they had
to have a very unique UM bottle cap poll cap
that was just sort of interesting. Nice Back in the day, man,

(04:46):
back in the day when I was I'm not gonna
wrap now, and we're now refined with our beverage consumption. Yeah, yeah,
we are. I only drink cold forty five out of
a chill glass. Now. I got a nice whiskey bar
set up at UM that's separate from the regular bar.
Oh wow, with just like rise and bourbons and scotches

(05:08):
and Irish and little additional I've gotten out to where
I will put in little drops of little tinctures and
shrubs and things. Oh yeah, occasionally. Shrubs are great. I
made my own ones, and it's actually worth the effort. Yeah.
My buddy Eddie, you know Eddie, he makes his own.

(05:29):
He actually does it in the in the bottle, but
he will he'll do like a cherry bourbon or an
apple like confused bourbon. Yeah. Those shrubs though, man, uh,
it's actually not very hard and they last forever because
what you're doing is basically I don't know if it's
fermenting or pickling or something, but you're doing something to
the fruit that you're mastrating with the sugar and it

(05:51):
just lasts forever, and it's just such a nice little
tangy pop. It's like kim she you gotta bury it
in your yard for kind of it's close to that. Actually,
it's it's like the Yankee version of kim chi, but
with fruit and you put it in your booze. Well,
this is all very hoardy, like, well, hold on, even
before we get into hoarding, we still have another tangent

(06:13):
to go on our earl buds. Yeah, yeah, let's let's
announce it. Okay, So Caroline Irvin and Kristen Conger seriously, well,
I know it was it was Conger, but she's been
since gotten married. She took her husband's last name, remember, No,
of course, Kristen Conger, No, I don't know. Something tells

(06:36):
me Conger did not take his last name, right right.
I could see that, because then I would no longer
be able to call her Congs, which I know she loved.
That's true, And she was probably there the SO Security
administrations and thinking I can't do this, What about Chuck?
She thought of that? At any rate, Caroline and Kristen,
the former host of um Stuff, Mom never told You,
which is now hosted by our pals um Emily and Bridget.

(06:59):
That's right, right, So Kristen and Caroline went off on
their own and they have now started a new podcast
and this is the this is the great announcement here
on stuff you should know. That's right. It's called Unladylike
and uh I have I've heard the trailer, so it
sounds great and anything they're gonna do is gonna be great.
They're just they're pros. They really like. Uh. I know,

(07:22):
stuff Mom Never Told You was started with Molly and Conger,
but when Caroline came along, it really just found its
true voice. No offense Molly and U. She just trashed
her home office. Uh, it's just a great show. And
Unladylike is is gonna be awesome and and I believe
it's got a bit of a different flavor with interviews
and stuff like that, but it is definitely going to

(07:44):
be dealing with uh feminism and women's issues and oh yeah,
advocacy and uh, their their logo is great. It's a
big middle finger, which is just so them. Yep. So
they have a site up, but I think you can
get their guest anywhere you get podcasts. That's kind of
how it works. But they have a site as well
called un lady like dot ceo super British not dot

(08:09):
com dot ceo. Okay, that's right, so best of luck, ladies.
I'm sure it'll be great. And uh, you were always
on our minds and in our hearts, so nice of you.
Good luck Caroline and Kristen. It's gonna be great. Now,
can we hoard? Yes? Long last, well, let's take a
commercial break show. Can you imagine Mollywood trash her home

(08:30):
office again? So we're talking hoarding today. Believe it or not, everybody,
um and I basically everyone is fairly well aware of
hoarding thanks to a couple of high profile UM reality
TV shows about hoarders and hoarding UM. And then there

(08:52):
have also been appearances of hoarders in literature. So even
before it kind of became like part of the cultural
aware us, it was also already kind of there, like
everybody thought, you know, there's some guy out there who
has a house full of something that he picked up
on the side of the road and his it's just
accumulated and he can barely get around his house. Like

(09:13):
that was there before. But thanks to those TV shows,
which is actually which actually sprung out of the first
real research on hoarding as its own disorder um from
the early nineteen nineties by a Smith College psychology professor
named David o'frost and then two of his students, Rachel

(09:34):
Gross and Tamara hardel Um. Those three people together actually
form the basis of our knowledge about hoarding the disorder.
They took it out of the cultural reference, they took
it out of the realm of Freud and and they
got it ultimately all the way up into the d
s M. Five and two thousand thirteen, which is about

(09:55):
the best you can hope for, is an undergrad psychology student. Yeah,
you get your d SIM tattoo mm to two yep uh.
And I believe those shows. One was called Hoarders and
one was called Jerry's Pizza Box Collection. No, Jerry's a collector.
Well it was Jerry's Pizza Box Collection, Colin, I'm not
a hoarder, al right. It was a little a little mouthy,

(10:18):
little wordy. The log line was, if you're looking for
a show about a hoarder, keep looking. But if you
like pizza boxes and he doesn't speak eight seven, central'd
be very David Lyncheon. Just this mute woman walking around,
blackout bar over most of her face everywhere. She would

(10:40):
be great. Um, all right, so we'll go ahead and
get it going with a stat here. Back in the day,
I was statman, remember that, of course, So I'm gonna
reprise that role. Okay, do you have a cape still? Oh? Yeah,
it's on see. Oh yeah, I see it. Probably I
couldn't see it. You weren't turning the right way. Yeah.

(11:01):
Uh well, it's a it's a thin cape for broadfella.
Uh So estimates, no one really knows, because, like you said,
it's very recently that it's being recognized as its own
disease um and not a symptom of another thing, even
though it is, as we will see later, very much
co morbid with other other issues and mental illnesses. But

(11:23):
despite the fact that we don't know a ton about
the stats, there are estimates to say anywhere from point
four percent two as many as five percent of high
Is this humans or humans? Americans? Humans? Ah yeah, I
think the general population, which that would make its prevalence
higher than schizophrenia. Oh wow, yeah, which I actually kind

(11:47):
of believe if I stop and think about it. Well,
the thing is, though you don't this is and we're
going to talk about all this stuff, but it's not
often the kind of thing that presents itself out in
public because the people are hiding in their houses full
of stuff. No. No, And one of the things, one
of the early misconceptions about hoarders that we'll see is
that it was mostly older people who were hoarding. But um,

(12:11):
it turns out that they're the ones who get thrust
into the limelight because it's a progressive chronic disease exactly.
So by the time the news media becomes aware of
this and drags these pour people out into the limelight, um,
their their hoard has gotten very big and they have aged.
So that's why we initially thought that just older people

(12:36):
were hoarders. It turns out it actually starts far earlier
in life. Typically. Yeah, like a show about a twelve
year old with one corner of their room too messy. Yeah,
just looking at it like this is gonna be huge
one day, and we're joking here, but this is a
serious mental illness. But we we joke about all kinds
of things. So I don't want anyone to get upset

(12:57):
about things like that. No, no. If you're new to
the podcast, go listen to the comas episode. Alright, so
some of the symptoms of hoarding. Um, and we're we're
gonna get into also in a bit to the I
guess myths and separating those two is really important because
it's very easy for someone to very dismissively say, oh,

(13:19):
they're a hoarder because they have a lot of stuff. Um,
and my family, my in laws, well, let me let
Steve off the hook, specifically my mother in law, my
grandmother in law, Mary, the eldest general of the stuff
you should know Army and uh, my aunt Sue, Sharon,

(13:42):
Sue and Mary. They have a lot of stuff and
we call it the disease sort of as a joke. Um,
but they're well, they're not hoarders at all, but they
got a lot of stuff they have a hard time
throwing away, you know, the stuff that they had that
they think someone in the family might want. I think
that stuff. That's that's pretty typical. A lot of people

(14:03):
are like that. And a lot of people have a
basement room with a lot of junk in it out
of being too busy or lazy, or maybe just a
bit of the disease where you just like I can't
bear to part with it even though I really should,
But that is not hoarding. Well, so my question would be,
then have you ever seen them and do you feel

(14:26):
like they have the ability to clear out like the
attic or donate some of the stuff like you can't
they have the ability to part with the stuff. There
have been pushes at various times, like when they're moving
and stuff like that. Of course it's a good time
to do that. Um, it is always a bit of

(14:46):
a painful experience. But I think, like I said, everyone's
got a little not everyone. Some people are so unsentimental
that they'll just back the dumpster up and just empty
their house into it and say I'll get a new
drunk But um, it's a good way to move, yeah, exactly,
but they it is a little bit of a hard time.

(15:07):
And very famously either um, Charlie there Emily's grandpa who
who left us on our wedding day. Um, he famously
passed away with like you know, buckets have bent rusty nails.
But he was not a hoarder. He was legitimately one
of those guys who was like I can straighten these

(15:28):
and reuse them one day. And he believed in the
value of just not throwing everything away, which is great.
So let me ask you this though he would he
would say kind of with pride, like, look at all
these awesome nails that I'm not wasting, you chump, No,
not at all. It was just um, was he ashamed
of his bucket of nails? No, he would. He would
occasionally get out a nail and straighten it and use it,

(15:50):
and it was just everyone in the family knew, Like
you know, Charlie, he did grow up in the Great Depression.
And as we will see that as one of the
myths that oh, all these people just grow up in
the Depression so they value things more. That is not
the case. There's no tie to that. But he is
one of those gentlemen who grow up in the Great Depression,

(16:10):
and and I love that attitude. We're in such a
disposable frame of mind. I think that that the depression
thing has kind of come back for the generation behind us,
where they value things a bit more. Good. Yeah, you know,
because the disposability of products and just everything. Just pulling
a dump strip to your back door and pushing your

(16:31):
stuff out as a means of moving. Yeah, we're like,
I'll just that thing didn't work. Well, I could probably
get repaired, but screw it, I'll get another one. It's
only twenty bucks. Things like that, Like it kind of
drives me nuts. So I'm or, oh, wait, my phone
has has a new version of my phone has just
come out. So now the company that made my phone
is remotely slowing my phone down, so I have to

(16:53):
throw it away and go buy another one. That's definitely
part of the problem as well. You know, it's funny.
I can tell really see Grandpa Charlie saying everybody gather
around getting a nail out of his rusty nail buckets,
straightening it and just driving it right through the webbing
of his hand as a party trick. That's what I
thought of when when you said, yeah, yeah, every once

(17:16):
a while he'd get a nail out and straighten it
and use it. That's what we think they know, what
were the people that he's a pinhead, people that would
drive the nail the blockhead that's what it was. Blockheads. Yeah,
I can't believe we did a whole podcast on that.
That shows a good one too. Um alright, so number
one on the symptoms though, uh is you literally have

(17:37):
an inability two to get rid of things and to
stop acquiring things. So you may if you go into
a hoarder's home, you may go into their closet and
see a wrack of clothes with tags on them because
they're like, oh, just this is on sale. It's such
a good deal. I feel like I just have to
get it, and then it's unworn a decade later. Yes. So,

(18:00):
so the early researchers, David frosten is two students, um
Tamra Hartle and Rachel Gross. They initially I think it
was specifically Rachel Gross and David frost Sorry, but they
that first study that they did on hoarders, they assumed that, um,
it would be all just junk like stuff nobody could
possibly want, and they were really surprised when they toured

(18:22):
some of their their study participants homes and found like
stuff still in the package, like clothes, perfectly fine clothes
that had never been worn, but piles up to the
ceiling that we're now had now taken over the kitchen.
You know what I'm saying. That's the difference between being like, oh,
this is actually a pretty good deal. I could use
this someday and hoarding. And another aspect of that too

(18:44):
is if you're buying these clothes, sure it might be
a good bargain, but these are women's genes and you're
a man and they are there, they're they're like half
of your size. Yeah, you know, they'll buy clothes that
don't even fit them just just because we're gonna wear
what they want. So sure, sure, but I'm saying, like,
don't even fit you, right, um, And they they have

(19:06):
good point, Chuck, thank you for that, but they they
basically won't pass up a bargain. It's one of the
ways that they might acquire something. My mom has a
little bit of that. Yeah, if you're a man and
you're dressed in women's clothing, that is not a symptom
of hoarding. No, no, no, And my mom doesn't have that.
She has a little bit of the like, oh, it's
such a good deal, I feel like you have to
get it. You mean, I went through an open house

(19:27):
once and I've never seen more clothing owned not just
by one person, by several families put together. But it
was just one lady's clothes and like they had built
on like an addition to their attic and their garage
top and that was just filled with clothes more close
than anyone could possibly wear. And we noticed that like

(19:49):
some of them still had the tags on. Were like, God,
this lady has so many clothes. Now, looking back after
researching this, I'm like she definitely had a touch of
the hoarders disorder. I guess she had a little bit
of the hordes. Yeah, it didn't spill out into the
rest of her house, so either she it was just
a touch of it or her family was keeping it

(20:11):
in check. But there was definitely you you wouldn't believe
me if I if I told you have many just
sweaters and shirts and dresses this lady had. Give me
a number how many sweaters? Sweaters? I know you're one
of your superpowers of sweater guestimating right, sweaters and chili beans.

(20:33):
I would say, just from what we saw, she easily
had two hundreds something sweaters easily. And those were just
the sweaters. Man, that's not including like tops, blouses, dresses.
She had so many clothes. Yeah, my friend Ryan, I
won't say his last name, he uh, his dad very

(20:54):
famously had ah and I don't know, you know what
I asked him last time I saw him, and I
can't remember the answer now, but at one point his
dad had like warehouses with stuff, because he's like a
dream hoarder. Yeah, but I don't know if it was
hoarding either, because as you will see there as we
go on, there are very specific definitions, and just because

(21:16):
you want warehouses full of stuff doesn't necessarily mean you're
a hoarder, you know. Yeah, what was his stuff? I
don't know, huh. I'll find out and follow up. But
getting back to the inability to stop acquiring, one of
the key points about not getting rid of stuff is
they're holding onto things with no value at all, like

(21:37):
even sentimental value, Like when you have stacks and stacks
of newspapers and magazines for for decades and decades. Those
don't hold sentiment about sentimental value, any monetary value unless
you happen to have like the moon landing stuff in
there or something. Um, you know, it's just just like
literally it's junk, right, It can be and also be

(22:00):
stuff that, like as is actually useful and somebody would
want this unopened, unworn dress or something like that, right,
So it can go either way. But the point is
they can't stop acquiring stuff. They can't help themselves. That's
that's part one. Part two, and these things are part
and parcel with one another. Is they can't bear to
give any of it up, like you said, even if

(22:22):
it's totally useless, even if it doesn't have any actual,
real emotional value. But that is a big one that
a lot of them point to, is like they say, well, no,
this means a lot to me or um. Another another
explanation or another rationalization among hoarders is that like they're
they're they're just kind of stockpiling. They might need all
these clothes one day. They that never happens, right exactly,

(22:47):
and um. The other one I think is that they
use it as a reminder. Apparently there's a um there's
a correlation between faulty recall or um an inaccurate memory
or a lack of trust in one's own memory and hoarding.
And so some hoarders will say, well, I keep this

(23:08):
to remind me that I have to do this in
the future, remind me to get in touch with this person.
So they imbue importance into all these objects that from
the outside are junk. And apparently the stuff that they
imbue these objects with is just rationalization. It's not necessarily
really valuable in the way that they feel like it

(23:28):
is to them. Another symptom is that in this one
I'm kind of curious about we should talk about it
is is the stuff is disorganized and very disorganized. Um, However,
I would think that you could be a hoarder and
also be very and maybe be anal retentive and have

(23:50):
everything organized. But does that immediately disqualify you, From what
I understand it does. Yeah, you can have a lot
of stuff and even very odd stuff, and if you
organize it, that's a huge symptom of hoarding that you're not.
That's a box is not being checked and would probably
preclude you from a diagnosis of hoarding because they think

(24:12):
that it has to do with your ability and the
brain to make decisions. It's supposedly stems from perfectionism, which
we'll talk about. But this this inability to make decisions
about you know, what to keep and what to throw
away and being so paralyzed by it that you just
don't make the decision at all, and all this stuff accumulates.
That also extends to organizing and sorting. You can't make

(24:36):
the decision about what you go where or what goes
with what? You just can't just you can't make decisions
when it comes to your material possessions. That's a huge
hallmark of and I think a cornerstone of hoarding. The diagnosis.
I'm gonna take issue with that one officially. Then on
the cord, like you could hauld literally have every single

(24:56):
symptom and you just might be like, no, all the
new papers go here and all the stuff goes here,
and it's literally caving in on me, and i can't
get rid of any of it, and I'm ashamed of it,
and i have no quality of life. Um, but I'm
anal retentive. Like, so I'm officially taking issue. No one
cares well you, I mean, you make you paint a
pretty good picture on in that. In that sense, I

(25:20):
think if you if you have stuff organized, it's probably
not having it's probably not taking over your life, maybe financially,
maybe time wise, but like you could still have people over. Um,
your husband or wife isn't leaving you as a result,
your kids aren't ashamed to bring friends over to play.
Who knows, but yeah, I don't think from what I

(25:43):
understand though, as far as the psychological community is concerned.
If you can organize, you're probably not a hoarder. I
think all those things you just mentioned could still happen
if you're organized. Yeah, and this is just my dumb opinion.
It's it's possible them. I might sort a show called
Chuck Stump Opinions just to follow up each week to this. Yeah,

(26:07):
I get it all out. Uh number three did you
get a little justin Number three is the hoarder feels ashamed.
And we talked a little bit about this here and there,
but that is definitely one of them. It's not like
you walk into a hoarder's house and they're like, have
you seen my collection of dead goldfish floating in bowls? Um,

(26:30):
Although that'd be a weird thing. Although animal hoarding will
get to this definitely thing that's like trapesing along the
line of performance. Are right, But this is the thing,
is you feel ashamed, and that can feed the beasts.
So you gather all this stuff, you accumulate it, you
feel really guilty about it, and then one of the
things that hoarders do is it makes them feel better

(26:51):
to collect the stuff, So then you start hoarding more
and they and the grabster wrote this one, right, So
the grabster is said, it's you know, it's really not.
Unlike an alcoholic. You drink, you get ashamed. Do you
feel those feelings of shame, so you drink to sort
of feel better or forget right. So like alcohol is
to an alcoholic or um like somebody who eats for comfort,

(27:16):
these these people acquire stuff for comfort or like their
material possessions are like food to somebody who eats um
as comfort. Right, yeah, and but they do feel ashamed
of the whole thing, Like that's a huge thing. And
that's also, like I was saying, what differentiates them from collectors.
Even if you have a collection of some really weird stuff,

(27:39):
if you, you know, want to show it off to
people and you really value it, you you're a collector.
If you are ashamed of your collection, your hoarde um,
and you don't want people to see it, and you
know that it's weird, but you just can't do anything
about it, that's a symptom of hoarding. That's one of

(28:01):
the reasons also why it makes it such a terrible
mental disorder, because the people who are hoarders, they're not
they're not like off their rocker or something like that
they're not mentally impaired. They're not like out of touch
with reality. They they are they have enough perspective to
feel shame about the state that their life is in

(28:22):
because of these material possessions that they can't get rid
of and can't stop accumulating. They can't do anything about it,
and that's what makes it just such a sad disorders.
They're aware of this and then feel shame as a result. Yeah,
they're incapable of change. Well, I think that I don't
know if incapable is the right word. But with the

(28:44):
right help, they're capable. But I think on their own
they're generally incapable. Yes, well that's what I mean. I'm
not saying you seek treatment and you still can't stop. Uh.
And then finally, another symptom is that you are it
is really impacting your life. So um, you may have
rooms in your house that you can't even use anymore,

(29:04):
Like I can't take a bath because that's where I
keep the backing peanuts, or I can't use the stove
because it has seven microwaves that I bought that are
still in boxes stacked on it. Um. And you will
a lot of times they will like like a snow plow,
just dig a path through their home just so they
can get around where they can get around. Yeah, apparently

(29:27):
among hoarders or among psychologists who study hoarding, it's called
they call them goat paths, and they can be dangerous too.
Hoarders have been known to have died sure from there.
They're walking along the goat paths and this stuff on
either side just coming down on top of them and
pinning them and suffocating them. Yeah, and this and this
is the point to where you talked about where uh

(29:48):
they impacting your life. They don't get out much, maybe
because they don't want to leave their stuff because they're
afraid of family member might come over and and take
things they are hold up. They don't have anyone over
because of the shame. So it's just um they are.
They're literally trapped by their things, yeah, figuratively and and literally.

(30:12):
And they also um their Their houses will also very
frequently be in disrepair, not just from the the collections
of stuff taking over rooms and just totally changing their meaning,
but also like if you have a hot water heater
and it breaks, you're not gonna let some repair man
come over. You don't know him. You don't. He might
touch your stuff, he might take something, or you feel

(30:35):
so much shame that you just won't even invite a
stranger to come in and and and fix your hot
water heater, so they'll just live without hot water forever. Um.
They may also it's it's super sad, man. It were
like because of documentary television, because the reality television. I
think quarters have kind of gotten reputation as people like,
go look at those freaks, you know. Um, But if

(30:58):
you really start to dig into it, and I'm sure
some of these shows do this from time to time too,
it is an extremely sad condition. It just makes you
want to help them when you come across him, you know.
And then one other thing is they're also very frequently
in debt. Say Ed gives the example of, um, if

(31:19):
their kitchen is just totally covered and stuff and they
can't get to the oven any longer, they have to
order take out, which is much more expensive than grocery shopping.
So their finances are very likely impacted by the their
hoarding behavior. Good point. Should we take a break, Yeah,
all right, let's do it, and we'll come back and
talk about some of the myths right after this all right,

(32:11):
So we talked about some of the truths UM, and
some of the myths are as follows, and you mentioned, um,
well you mentioned the first one that it affects only
older people. UM. Another one is the hoarders are are lazy,
and that is just not true. Um. They in fact,
they may be very busy in there with while they

(32:35):
may not be organizing, they may be moving things around
and obsessing about it and ore. You know, they also
might be on the recliner just hoping they don't get
caved in on. But the stuff point is, stuff isn't
there because they're lazy. It's a mental illness. That's a
big one. UM. Another another early idea about hoarders is

(32:58):
that the reason a horde is because they had some
experience previously in their lives where they came face to
face with deprivation or scarcity. And so now, yeah, the
Great Depression, or their dad lost his job when they
were a kid, and like their family really went through
a hard time. So now as a as a UM,

(33:20):
in response to that experience, they're just trying to get
their hands on everything they can and they don't want
to throw anything away. Apparently, that is absolutely not the
case that that the UM science doesn't bear that out
at all, and then they do think that they are
connected to some sort of difficult event previous in life,
but it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with deprivation

(33:43):
UM at any point. Like they they may they may
have been wealthy. I read it and Nautilus, I think
a Nautilus article on hoarding, and they profiled this guy
who was quite well off and he hoarded UM and
I don't think he had ever or gone through any
financial hardship, and that's apparently par for the course. Well,

(34:04):
one of the things that says one of the traumas
could be excessive discipline, which I thought was interesting because
Freud and I know, we said, it's been mentioned. It's
not a new thing, like it's been in everything from
Dante's Inferno to Silas Marner in eighteen sixty one, UH,
and Freud talked about it UH in his day. But
here's the thing is, everyone says Freud was way off UM,

(34:28):
but he thought it could be as a result of
overly harsh toilet training, which I thought was interesting because
while that is not true, if it came from excessive
discipline and you were excessively disciplined while toilet training. You know,
maybe he wasn't that far off. Yeah, you're right, he
probably wasn't. Like I said before, the guy was one

(34:50):
of the history's great thinkers. It's just you shouldn't use
the phrase anal character when you're describing what the problem
was with hoarding, which he did. He did. But yeah,
you make a really good point actually that he he
maybe he wasn't that far off. But if it is discipline,
overly harsh discipline and adolescence, I think that's a big one. UM.

(35:13):
I think the loss of a significant other, of a
close family member, UM, some sort of loss of UM
love is it can trigger hoarding behavior and some people
or has been known to bring bring the disorder on
as well. I can see that like I lost that thing,
but I can keep all this like that I can control, right,

(35:36):
And that also would explain why they tend to imbue
emotional attachment into their possessions, you know, like these things
are these things equal love to me and now I
can hang on to them and they're never going to
leave me. Yeah, I'm telling you it's a very sad disorder.
What another myth is that it's a symptom of O
c D obsessive compulsive disorder. For many, many, many years

(35:59):
were just now starting to understand more about it, But
for many years they thought it was either just straight
up was O c D or was just an offshoot
of it. UM. But like you said, with the D
s M, it is its own distinct disease, but it
can be co morbid with O c D and other
things like anxiety. So it's UM, I see why people

(36:22):
get that confused. You know that some study took away
the criteria for UM, took away the hoarding criteria from
O c D, right, So it just gave these people
a checklist to determine whether they had O c D
or not, but took hoarding out of the equation, and
hoarders tended to to not qualify for O c D

(36:45):
only like six percent of them do or something like that.
So it's connected in some cases, but definitely not in
all cases. And it's certainly not just an offshoot of
O c D itself, like you're saying, right, Uh, And
then finally, and of course, because this is a a disease,
and um, just because you finally get a family member

(37:06):
in there against all LODs to clean everything out of there.
That does not cure you of anything. No, I saw that.
It just is first of all, what a horrible experience
that would be for the poor hoard. The county comes
in or some family members come in with some tough
love and just clear all your stuff out. So it's
number one, but number two apparently they say, Okay, well,

(37:28):
I've got a lot of space to fill. Now I
better get to work. Like that's the result of it. Supposedly,
so it's a chronic disease, chronic condition, and supposedly recurrence
of this is a hundred percent in all cases without treatment. Yeah.
The grabstr emailed this woman named Lisa Hale co Um sorry,

(37:49):
founding director of the Kansas City Center for Anxiety Treatment
and also a junct associate professor at University of Missouri,
Kansas City. So fighting hay seeds the stacks seeds, I
think Haycy. Isn't that a derogatory name for Kanson. It

(38:10):
depends on whether they own it or not. You know,
okay um, I'm sure we'll hear. But yeah, she she
said that it approaches like that. Is that is straight
up proof that that cleaning things out and while the
family member, well a county just says they're directive. But
while a family member might think, oh I've helped them, um,

(38:33):
you you really haven't. If that was your solve, no, you,
you're probably the Other part of it, too, is if
you come in there all tough love and you need
to get your act together and you're just being lazy,
what's wrong with you? And clean their stuff out for them?
First of all, that's basically abuse. I don't even know
if you need to qualify with basically I think that's
abuse of a mentally ill person. But secondly, um, all

(38:59):
you're doing is driving that behavior that that's a very
stressful event, and the the um the way they deal
with stress is through hoarding behavior. So all it's going
to do is just turn the notch up on the
hoarding that they're doing anyway, and you can probably say
goodbye to ever seeing them again after that too. Man,
what a terrible situation. Apparently we'll talk about, you know,

(39:21):
treatment in a minute, but one of the key factors
and treatment is that the family and friends and loved
ones of the person who's hoarding and now undergoing treatment,
they have to go through therapy themselves. Because it's I'm
sure quite easy to look at this with disgust, horror,
um anger, like what is wrong with you? Like, I

(39:42):
know that that's a natural reaction, but you have you
can't follow through on that. You have to approach it
from a place of understanding or else all you're going
to do is trigger the hoarding behavior even further. Yeah,
for sure if you go in their guns blazing with
your broom and your and your dumpster, Uh, you just yeah,
it's just gonna get worse. You just crumble that person. So, UM,

(40:05):
what causes this is really interesting because UM, we don't
know for sure, and there are they have been everything
from UM lesions on the brain in certain studies that
they found um could account for it two UH chromosomeal
defects to possibly genetics UM because they found that it's

(40:30):
uh other illnesses or at least that behavior is part
of other illnesses that are definitely genetic, and hoarders are
more likely to have other family members who are also hoarders.
Of hoarders surveys say that they have a family member
who's a hoarder, which is way more than the general population. Yeah,
so we have no idea what the really underlying causes,

(40:51):
but we do know it's what's called and this is
what um. What Hail said who had interviewed, is that
it is a neuropsychiatric can Asian and it is it's
all about like you were talking about earlier, these processing
challenges UM not being able to process visually, organizationally, emotionally
and your brain connections aren't aren't working right. Yeah, I

(41:14):
remember hearing years ago like that they would stick these
these poor people into the wonder machine and talk to
them about getting rid of their possessions, saying like, I
want you to imagine you know this room, and think
about all of your newspapers. Now, which newspaper do you
want to get rid of? And these people would experience
basically physical pain, huge spikes and their levels of stress

(41:36):
just thinking about this. But when you said the same
thing about somebody else's stuff, they had no reaction whatsoever.
It's strictly their stuff and their attachment to it. And
another study by David Frost showed that when you give
somebody who is a hoarder something um and say this
is yours now I think he gave out key chains,

(41:58):
their attachment to it was immediate. It was like right
right when they knew that they owned the thing and
it was theirs, they were now as attested to as
if they'd had it for fifty years, it was as
important to them. So there's a lot of stuff going
on in the brain, and it does have to do
with attachment, decision making, finding um comfort and de escalation
of stress through these material possessions as well. Um, But

(42:23):
they just don't quite know what did it? Was it
a bad experience as a kid? Are are you born
with the chemical balance that doesn't begin to show its
symptoms until adolescence. It's just too new, Like it only
became its own thing in the d s M five,
which came out in two thousand thirteen. But it is
in the d s M now, which means that insurance
companies will pay for treatment for it, which means that

(42:45):
a lot more people are going to be studying it
than they ever were before. Man, I can't imagine anything
more torturous than being strapped in an MRI machine, which
is already stressful and confining, and then having to quick
as people on anxiety inducing mental illness right, like, you know,

(43:06):
we're getting rid of this thing now, and I'm sure
they're they're just like want to like bust out of
that thing, you know. Yeah, it's like it's like torture. Yeah,
just like and it's valuable research. So hats off to
the people that do that and and the people that, like,
the people that administer it, and the people that are
brave enough to go in there and and seek that treatment. Yeah.

(43:28):
Oh yeah, hats off to him for sure. Man, literal
hats off, because you can't wear a hat in an
MRI machine. You can. You can only wear a mesh helmet.
That's right. Um. Well, there was one other kind of
general explaination hypothesis that explains hoarding um floating around, and
that is that we all have this innate evolutionary instinct

(43:53):
to gather stuff. Yeah, I really like this, Like it's
just it's just well, it's part of our mammalian heritage.
And and they think that in people who hoard, this
instinct has basically gone haywire, like some snaps connected with
another synaps that weren't supposed to be connected. Now, all
of a sudden, this thing that's a natural thing where

(44:14):
you know, you go to the grocery store, you buy
some stuff, you keep it in your refrigerator for a
week turns into you can't get enough Sunday circulars to
possibly stave off these feelings of anxiety. Yeah, it's cool.
Little uh story reference was like an animal saving food

(44:36):
for the winter. Do they work extra long to prepare
for a possibly long winter but stay out there and
are are more more vulnerable to getting eaten by the
cheetah while they're collecting stuff? Or do they say, you
know what, I'm gonna go ahead and get in the cave.
I've got enough stuff. Um, eventually there will be that
long winter and those animals will die out, so you know,

(44:59):
over the course of time, the long winter evolutionary trait
will be the one that's passed on. Yeah, it's really interesting.
The guy whose paper he based that on. You should
see this paper. Man. It's got like sigma everywhere and
he's talking about squirrels gathering nuts. But there's all these
really complex math and statistical formula that he's got on

(45:20):
on his paper. But the the overall gist of it
is pretty fascinating and it proves or it definitely lends
credence to the idea that it is a naturally selected
evolutionary trait. To gather a lot of stuff. Most of us, though,
have this cut off point where we know, I don't
need anything more than this, or anything more than this

(45:41):
is irrational, and people who hoarde definitely don't have that
cut off point. Yeah, we have a room in our
house that is full of stuff, and it's not hoarding.
It's we don't have a place for this stuff. We
live in a you know, eighties something year old craftsman

(46:01):
and that you know, those houses just don't have the
closet space and the storage space. We don't have a garage.
We do have an addict that has us some stuff,
and in theory, we could probably move all of this
stuff up there, but most of this stuff we kind
of need access to more often. Um, So we're not hoarding,

(46:22):
but it's it's just like our house is small, and
we could go you know, the other route and be
go a little more minimalist for sure, and get rid
of this stuff, trust me. But um, but if you
don't want to, you don't want to, well, yeah, but
I mean it's um, it's a problem when we have
a guests in the night, which is not often because
that's our quote guest room. I got you you know

(46:44):
I was gonna say, you guys need to get to
the container store now, a lot of the stuffs and containers.
We need a container for your containers. Uh. And what
we do. It's funny when we do have the occasional guests,
they are invariably very very close friend or family member,
and so they understand we clear the cut path to
the bed. They're like, just dive over onto the bed

(47:08):
and then when you when you wake up and you
want to get up, just call us and we'll lower
the crane. Harness. That's right. But were we are adding,
not adding onto our house, but we're we're finishing the basement.
So hopefully that will be the solve because we're gonna
have some lots more good storage down there. There you go,
being bang boom, except we're having to do house construction,

(47:32):
which is the worst for your stuff. Um, all right,
should we take one more break? Yeah, all right, let's
do that, and we'll come back and talk just briefly
about the very famous call your brothers, and then hit
on animal hoarding, which could be the saddest of all hoarding.

(48:20):
All right, we would be remiss if we didn't mention
the Langley Homer and Langley Collier. Uh we you said
you want to do a full show on them. This
will be the second time we've covered them. When did
we talking about him before Bizarre Ways to Die? Oh wow,
which is literally a nine year old episode. Yeah, that

(48:43):
is old. So I would say we could probably still
get away with a full episode because if you listen
to the one in April two tho nine, in the
segment on the call your Brothers within that five minute episode,
then you would probably appreciate a more flashed op version.
I would love it. But just the broad strokes of
it are that Homer Callier Um went blind older in

(49:07):
life or later in life, and his brother Langley took
care of him. Well. Langley was a hoarder and accumulated
more and more stuff and eventually, uh, Langley died. He
was crushed by his stuff and Homer, who was a
percent depended on Langley Um, starved to death in their
brownstone and they were found separately, uh weeks apart. This

(49:31):
in Harlem, New York City. And if you just look
up pictures of this and the cruise and the removing
of things, it's really something else. And there's actually a
little park there named to call your Brother's Park. Then
in early two thousand's, uh, there was a push to
get that changed because they were like, we should not
name a park after these guys. But as far as

(49:55):
I can tell, let's still name that I tried to.
I don't think that went anywhere. They let's definitely do ah.
And in fact, I think it was called call your
Syndrome for a while too. Huh yeah, for a while.
I mean they were pretty famous because all the New
York papers got in there and like printed all sorts
of pictures and they had to like just a fascinating story.

(50:15):
All right, Now, we might as well finish on the
saddest of notes, which is animal hoarding. And um, we're
not talking about Well, it could be Crazy Cat Lady,
but not necessarily. I think she's an archetype of animal hoarders. Right,
So in this case we're talking about and I know
you've seen stories probably on the news here and there. Um,

(50:39):
these are people that that hoard animals to the extent
where it's just like the other stuff. It is. Their
house is often filled with feces and smells of ammonia,
full of maybe fleas and ticks. Can't have people over
uh and and it's one of the saddest because as

(51:00):
it's these people can't bear They think they're doing the
right thing. Yeah, writing these animals, but they're not because
these animals almost time are very much suffering. Yeah. Yeah,
it's it's like hoarding. But you know, your your newspapers
and plastic grocery bags don't suffer with animal hoarding. The

(51:22):
hoarder suffers, and the animals suffer as well because no
matter how great the intentions of the animal hoarder are,
and apparently that is the one of the basis of
animal hoarding, is that they really do have the best
of intentions. They feel like they're rescuing the animals that
US wants. They're taking them into their home. Yeah, they're

(51:42):
they're feeding them, they're caring for him. The problem is
is they can't stop acquiring them, so it reaches a
point where the animals they can't possibly there's not enough
hours in the day to properly care for all the animals.
And even if you had help and you um, you
had the money to buy food and and um veterinary

(52:07):
care for all these animals, there's still a huge factor
in that these animals are living very close together in
ways that they should not be, that's not natural for them,
So they're stressed out all the time. Yeah, and another
one of the hallmarks could be not always, but a
lot of times these are people that are um left

(52:27):
alone in life, either from being widowed or divorced, or
just their their family has gone, or they just may
have a trouble interacting with people. And these animals uh
in this article you sent, and they call it a
conflict free relationship, And they surround themselves with this thing
because it's it's filling them with something that they can't
get oftentimes out of humans, right, which is unconditional love.

(52:53):
The problem is, again it is very sad because there's
that extra component, the extra very important component and of
suffering animals. But and when people hear about this stuff,
you just immediately like like kind of hiss of the
people who who do this when you hear about it
on the news and don't really know what's going on.
But again, when you dive into the psychology behind it,

(53:15):
it's extraordinarily sad because these people have the best intentions
for these animals, and even while they're caring for these animals,
they are they're suffering as well through this indecision like
do is do I love this dog or or is
this one my favorite? Or should I adopt it out?
And they just can't decide, so they just avoid the

(53:36):
decision and just acquire more and more animals, again to
the detriment of all of the animals involved. Yeah, and
just like with regular hoarding, um removing these animals because
by the time you see it on the news, it's
probably because um that the county is in there and
animal control is in there and you see them these sad,
sad stories where they're literally taking out these like dogs

(53:59):
clearly suffering malnutrition or cats or whatever, and um, that
does not solve the problem. You know, they have to
seek therapy. And just like with with object hoarding, UM,
if you're a family member confronting them being angry, even
though this one is probably even tougher to not be angry,
if you're an animal lover, you need to just keep

(54:20):
that in check and try and be compassionate and help
them so you can help the animals as well. So
there are some stats on this animal thing. Where where
did you get this? Where was this from? This is
a good article, man, I wish you hadn't asked, I'll
tell you by the time you're done with the stats,
all right, UM, I'll just tick through a couple of these.
Every year, thirty five hundred hoarders animal hoarders come to

(54:40):
the attention to the authorities, two fifty animals affected each year.
This one is really sad. Of animal hoarders have disease, dying,
or dead animals on the premises at the time. UM
that can be code more of it. Up to four
actually is about of the time. UM. Object hoarders are
also hoarding animals. UM. And like I was talking about

(55:03):
being being lonely or widowed perhaps or divorce, seventy percent
of animal hoarders UM who the authorities know about are
females or single, widowed, or divorce. So the thing is
is that's skewed differently for some reason. Apparently, if you
just go out and sample the community, hoarding is pretty

(55:24):
much evenly divided among men and women. I'm not sure
why we typically think of them as women, but apparently
for animals are in general in general, well this is
animals specifically, so okay, I guess there may be some
sort of deeper compassion from women. I don't know who knows,
but I don't want to, uh to undermine the efforts

(55:45):
of the Anxiety and Depression Association of Americas. Of course,
whose sight this came from. Yeah, thanks very much. Uh
those great stats, good website. Yeah. So let's talk real
quick about treatment of all kinds of hoarding. Um, that's
a big one, is they Family intervention and loving support

(56:07):
is a huge part of it because hoarders apparently don't
initiate treatment themselves even though they know that they're suffering. Typically, Um,
but apparently talk therapy is proving to be the best
treatment for hoarding. And that's where, uh say, a cognitive
behavioral therapist talks you through your own beliefs about things like, well,

(56:29):
you know what will happen exactly if you have to
give away your your plastic grocery bags, and that they
make you say it out loud, and when you say
it out loud, maybe there's a little part of your
brain that's like, wait a minute, that does sound a
little cookie And maybe they said, well, really, what you
just said, even if they did happen, even if that
negative outcome did happen, is that really as as bad

(56:50):
as it sounds? In reality, and they just kind of
talk you through your beliefs while at the same time
basically dragging them out into the open so that they're
not just to your head anymore. They're out there and
you kind of have to evaluate them in a different
way speaking with this trained professional. Yeah, and I would
imagine they, uh, it's probably a ghost slow thing, like

(57:13):
maybe next week you bring in something that you care
about and we're gonna we're gonna get rid of it together. Um.
I doubt if it's like they have some talk therapy
and then they just go through and clear the house out.
It's probably very gradual thing to heal someone of this. Yeah,
but I think it is gradual, like you said, and
against family has to support it because you know, they

(57:33):
may give the person. They say, like your therapist knows
exactly how you feel. Every Thursday at two o'clock, you know,
I mean you're there for an hour, Um, probably more
than that if you are a diagnosed toward er and
you're undergoing treatment. But the point is it's not an
impatient treatment. You go back home afterward and they give
you homework. And if you're a chronic hoarder, you're probably

(57:56):
not going to do the homework. So you need to
have family saying, well, didn't doctors, so and so say
you needed to start to clear this room out this
week and just just kind of be there and know
what's going on and support the treatment as well, and
not just leave them to their own devices. Yeah. And
the hoarders that have no family and support system, those
are the ones that are just so tragic because they're

(58:18):
the least likely to get help and seek help and uh,
you know, potentially die very kind of sad, lonely life
surrounded by their stuff. Yeah. I think those are the
ones that are the ones you see on the news,
the ones that don't have family and friends anymore. Yeah.
So I guess the upshot of all this, chuck is
that if you know a hoarder, um, maybe go be

(58:39):
nice to them and see if you can help them out,
because they are most likely suffering calm passion. Yeah, there
you go. If you want to know more about hoarding,
you can type that word in the search bar bring
up this excellent article by Ed Grabanowski on how stuff
works dot common. Since I said that it's time for
a listener mail, short and sweet is warning called this

(59:00):
because cracks me up occasionally when someone is just cracked
up by some dumb thing, we said, I know this one. Hey, guys,
you made my day once again. I spent December listening
to Christmas music. Me too, by the way, Oh man,
I was done in week one. Yeah I can. I
can muscle through generally for the most part, because eventually

(59:22):
and we can go. It wasn't the Christmas spirit, just
Christmas music this year. I was like, I can't take
this at all. Yeah. Yeah, Eventually I have to say,
all right, and we need to like turn Radiohead or something.
And that's why I go to because she'll go she
can listen to radio Head. Yes, He's like, I love
Radioheads Christmas album. Oh my god, can you imagine? Um Now,

(59:43):
I'm just hearing various versions of that in my head.
Very nice. Um. So I spent December listening to Christmas music,
so I got behind on my podcast. I'm currently listening
in reverse to December. I was just striving to work
listening to Cake and I almost had to pull over
because I was laughing so hard at the conversation about
oven doors. Uh, Josh or I'm sorry, Chuck, do you

(01:00:07):
have a window in your oven door? Josh, of course
what am I communist? Between that and Chuck baking in
this dishwasher, you two made this a perfect day. I
gotta say I cannot wait to see you next week
again in Portland. My stuff, you shnow bingo board is
ready travel safe and that is Jin Hunt Jin. By
the time this comes out, we will have just been

(01:00:28):
in Portland and um, maybe we have even met you. Yeah.
I hope you enjoyed the show. I hope everybody in
Portland enjoyed show. And as a follow up, I don't
know if I officially said, oh, I'm glad you're saying this.
I think I posted on Facebook, but I definitely do
not have an oven uh window. No, Chuck is officially
a communist. He has an oven without a window, and

(01:00:48):
I've never seen anything like it before. It's like a tank.
It's great. Yeah, it's a good look an oven. I
don't want to see that jump cooking. Okay, Well, if
you want to get in touch with us to let
us know how we correct you up. We love hearing
about that. You can tweet to us. I'm at Josh
um Clark and s Y s K podcast. I also
have a website called are you series Clark dot com.

(01:01:11):
You can hang out with Chuck on Facebook dot com,
slash Charles W. Chuck Bryant, or at slash stuff you
Should Know. You can send us an email the Stuff
podcast at how stuff Works dot com, and, as always,
join us at our home on the web, stuff you
Should Know dot com. For more on this and thousands

(01:01:31):
of other topics, is that how stuff works dot com.