Hoarding: A guide for family & friends

By J.L. Bratton

If you have lived with a hoarder or know a hoarder, then you are living with the impacts and effects of the hoarding behavior. You are not alone. Part self-help, part informational, this book contains information to help you live, interact and cope with a compulsive hoarder. It will provide you the tools for better understanding, empathy and self-care.

• Language: English
• Publisher: J.L. Bratton
• Release date: Mar 19, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301969517

Book preview

Hoarding: A Guide for Friends & Family

Copyright 2013 J.L. Bratton

Smashwords Edition

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Table of Contents

Foreword: Why this Book?

Chapter 1: Who are Hoarders?

Chapter 2: The What & Why of Hoarding

Chapter 3: How to Begin Healing

Chapter 4: Confronting, Compassion and Change

Chapter 5: Mind Before Matter

Chapter 6: Now to the Matter

Chapter 7: Practice Self Love

Appendix: Self-Help Groups

Foreword: Why This Book?

In the United States, you only have to turn on the television and watch an episode of Hoarders: Buried Alive to know that hoarders are our neighbors, our relatives, our coworkers, and they are living among us.

Estimates vary on just how many hoarders there are in the United States. While it is difficult to get exact numbers on how many people suffer from compulsive hoarding syndrome, an estimated 700,000 to 1.4 million in the United States are thought to have compulsive hoarding syndrome, according to the Obsessive Compulsive Foundation (http://www.ocfoundation.org). What you should get from these figures is that hoarding is becoming a growing community health problem.

A Growing Community Health Problem

A recent survey of elderly hoarders found that hoarding constituted a physical health threat including: threat of fire hazard, falling, unsanitary conditions, inability to prepare food. Some even reported about couples or women with children living in self-neglecting conditions. An increasing number of news reports and media attention are now drawing attention to this eminent community health problem.

Recently, there have been quite a large amount of anecdotal reports in the news, further corroborated by reports in veterinary journals, about persons, who hoard animals. The majority of these are females, and some have been reported to keeping up to a hundred animals of all kinds, mostly in neglected conditions. In one case, one elderly couple kept over seven hundred dogs in their mobile home. Most of these reports seem to be more concern about the animals’ conditions than the hoarders, so no further information on the hoarders’ mental status was given.

Also, these people may face heavy fines or even jail-time for animal neglect or cruelty, and one wonders if they are getting any medical or mental services. Perhaps a more rehabilitative approach for these offenders would be another option in addressing the problem rather than just dealing with the symptom. It has been noted that threat of eviction or legal action by the city government in urban areas is what forces compulsive hoarders to change their behavior.

This is another possible direction for future research: examining the role of the law and the implications for people who suffer from compulsive hoarding.

Since the hoarding situation is not always clear and public and private rights must be properly balanced, it is important to have collaboration, where possible, among relevant agencies for interventions to be comprehensive and successful. In some cases, such as those at human service agencies where confidentiality of the individual’s private information is protected, collaboration may be limited. However, finding a way to intervene before a significant hazard is created is the aim of all the agencies involved and important to the hoarder’s family and citizens in the surrounding community.

Unfortunately, in many anecdotal cases in the media, the only intervention that curtailed hoarding behavior was social pressure and legal process. So, the first recommendation would be for local government agencies to be involved and create a task force to address the situation, since it has been documented that threat of legal action by the city and/or eviction is what usually forces hoarders to change their behavior. There are State codes and county ordinances which various agencies work under that dictate how they can respond to and investigate reports of hoarding, and what actions they can take all the while balancing the public and private rights of citizens.

Currently, local and state agencies and laws may differ on how they deal with compulsive hoarding. At times where there is the concern that individuals are unable to care for themselves or that children are involved, the conditions may present an abuse or neglect. In these situations, human service agencies are often contacted. Adult Protective Service agencies can provide assessments and court reports for guardianship and protective placements for older and vulnerable adults. However, having an unsanitary house does not automatically justify a need for guardianship. States also have statutory standards regarding dangerousness to self or others, where, if treatment is assessed to be necessary and refused, can result in a person being involuntarily hospitalized. However, a hoarder who may have created a fire hazard for the entire apartment building would not necessarily meet the criteria for involuntary hospitalization, as the danger does not represent a homicidal or suicidal threat. Threat of eviction may be the only recourse by the landlord or city, in that case.

Since the hoarding situation is not always clear, and public and private rights must be properly balanced, it is important to have collaboration, where possible, among relevant agencies for interventions to be comprehensive and successful. If the person refuses to acknowledge a problem or accept help, efforts may be made to get a local government agency involved to leverage intervention through allegations that the conditions are a health and safety violation or that the person is unable to care for themselves or the animals in their possession. However, finding a way to intervene before a significant hazard is created is the aim of all the agencies involved and important to the hoarder’s family and citizens in the surrounding community.

So, the first recommendation would be for local government agencies to be involved and create a task force to address the situation, since it has been documented that the threat of legal action by the city and/or eviction is what usually forces hoarders to change their behavior. There are state codes and county ordinances which various agencies work under that dictate how they can respond to and investigate reports of hoarding, and what actions they can take all the while balancing the public and private rights of citizens.

One thing is clear: Compulsive hoarding is a complex and challenging scientific, medical, mental-health, sociological, and societal issue that calls for various approaches in order to address it. The magnitude of compulsive hoarding and the prevalence of its symptoms and demonstrated co-morbidity with different diseases discourage attempts to categorize it. For all these reasons, compulsive hoarding is topic that begs for more discussion, research and debate.

Author’s Note

The book you are reading has undergone several reincarnations. It started off as my master’s thesis. Then it was tweaked into a self-help book delivered and promptly rejected by a publisher, albeit with a kind note from the editor encouraging me to rewrite it since it contained useful advice but in the same vein with the implication that it was too academic and therefore wasn’t very reader friendly. The editor also recommended that I use a ‘folksy’ and ‘friendly’ tone instead of my heavily pedantic