Do You Hoard More Than You Should? A Revealing Qui

You probably have a junk drawer or a few collections of special things, or have fantasized about renting a unit at one of those U-Store-It villages. But when do you say “Enough!” to your stuff? When does life’s comfortable jumble spill over into serious disorder?

The fear of throwing things out is called disposophobia, literally, the fear of disposal. And the Obsessive Compulsive Foundation (which, incidentally, has a really well-organized Web site) recently recognized it as an actual psychological syndrome. It’s called “pathological hoarding,” and it’s defined as “the acquisition of and inability to discard worthless items even though they appear (to others) to have no value.” An estimated 700,000 to 1.4 million Americans have it.

Are you one of them? Here’s a short quiz adapted from ocfoundation.org/hoarding.
>Do you have stacks of old magazines, newspapers, and mail?
>Do you still have clothes that you haven’t worn in years?
>Are there chairs, beds, sofas, or entire rooms in your house that are so full of stuff you can’t use them?
>Do you hesitate to invite people over because of the clutter?
>Do you get upset when someone throws away your stuff?
>Do you personally have trouble throwing things out?
>Do you believe this stuff will be useful to you some day?
>Do you have a continuing urge to buy or acquire more things?
>Does hoarding run in your family?

If you answered yes to most of these questions and, even now, have the urge to print out and save this article, you may have a problem. Although this quiz isn’t scientific, it does touch on some key hoarding tendencies. Often what begins as simple frugality (“This is too good to throw away”) escalates into a significant source of personal and family stress, not to mention a fire hazard.

If you suspect you have a problem, visit the OCF’s Web site (ocfoundation.org). There you’ll find additional information about the disorder, plus advice on getting help. Or take matters into your own hands and organize a yard sale. You just might find that collecting money is even more satisfying than collecting stuff.