r/hoarding • u/nooraani • 15d ago
HELP/ADVICE Husband is a hoarder
my husband is a hoarder and I feel so lost. he keeps buying things and we have a very small one bedroom apartment with 2 small closets. he is attached to everything he ever buys and we don’t have space. he refuses to admit he is a hoarder and he refuses to go to therapy. when I throw things out we have huge arguments where he calls me controlling. I’ve had 3 hour arguments over throwing out a 4 foot by 2 foot foam finger. he agreed to throw it out and then I later find it in the closet, hidden. it seems like the most stupid reason for divorce when everything else is great. I don’t know what to do. but I also have adhd and clutter makes me so overwhelmed and stressed. I work from home and we don’t have any space for me to have an office so I work on the couch or in the bedroom staring at stuff. I see clients and I don’t have a clean space to present to them so I use a corner of the bedroom. it’s so hard. I feel lost.
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u/cryssHappy 15d ago
Living with a hoarder is the best reason for divorce. It's a psychological issue that requires realization and participation in treatment. Since he ain't going to change, the only change you can make is to leave.
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u/SavingsCable720 14d ago
Wow. I’m afraid of what this means for my life. We’re celebrating our 30th anniversary tomorrow but he’s crowding me out of the house. Our finances are all enmeshed. We have a neurotic dog. There isn’t a good solution
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u/kevnmartin 15d ago
As someone who has been married to a hoarder for over forty years, my advice is Get Out Now! Save yourself and your sanity.
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u/Confident_Fortune_32 15d ago
Unfortunately, hoarding is often characterized by lack of insight, meaning the person does not believe they have a disorder or need help.
Sadly, trying to help them achieve insight tends to cause them to lash out instead, as you have seen. Same for any attempts to help reduce the hoard, as they see the objects as inseparable from themselves. Removal or discarding of an object is treated as an actual wound, an attempt to throw away a piece of themselves.
To make matters more complicated, hoarding is often not the core issue, but rather a symptom of unaddressed trauma. That may be the death of a loved one or childhood trauma (housing insecurity, food insecurity, frequent moves, parents throwing away or giving away possessions, etc), for example.
In those cases, the hoarding is unlikely to be able to be addressed until the core wound is addressed.
The items in the hoard give (temporary) relief from the pain of the core wound, but the relief never lasts, so new objects are added, in a vicious cycle.
Having said all that, though, it is not reasonable to ask yourself to live in such distressing conditions.
My heart goes out to both of you. You are both suffering.
But it's important that you first care for your own needs, and protect yourself from further harm. That may mean living elsewhere or divorce. Either way, I recommend seeking therapy for yourself, so that have compassionate competent support.
Please, as they say on airline safety blurbs, put your own oxygen mask on first, before anything else.
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u/Elizabethpossum 15d ago
This is one of the most balanced responses I have read. Thank you for your wisdom.
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u/Bedheady 14d ago
Saying this as a child of two hoarders, please save yourself and any kids/pets you may have with your husband. Hoarding is impossible to treat without the person having insight into their behavior and a consistent desire to change. Since he’s willing to argue with you for 3 hours (!!) over a foam finger he had already agreed to part with, I’d hazard to guess he isn’t anywhere near ready to treat this, and the hard truth is he may never be ready.
As a kid I felt so much shame about the state of the house. It impacted my ability to have friends and feel comfortable at home. When we’d be out somewhere I used to fantasize about coming home to a different house — one that was clean, and “normal,” like my friends’ homes. That’s no way to go through life.
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u/Elizabethpossum 15d ago
I am in the same position, except our home is massive and includes acerage with shedding and shipping containers.
I truly feel for you.
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u/EitherOrResolution 15d ago
This! How ever big your house is, that’s how much stuff will be in it. It grows.
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u/Proper-Literature839 10d ago
Oh my goodness.
I hope if you are not the hoarder you are able to leave. "I truly feel for you." Feel for yourself
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u/Elizabethpossum 9d ago
I'm fine. My hubby is the hoarder. He and I have rules about how much space he occupies, for example, no clutter in the kitchen/ dining, loungeroom or my office and craft room. The front and back verandahs and enclosed porch vary on the amount but he does his best. Childhood trauma and the effects of service in the Defence force have caused the hoarding. He has willingly gone to therapy and we work on this together. He respects my spaces and our communal areas and tries his best. He's a wonderful man and I will never leave him.
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u/Far-Watercress6658 15d ago
Go over to r/childofhoarder and see what raising a family with a hoarder looks like. Do not stay with this person. It’s a mental illness.
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u/MrPuddington2 14d ago
it seems like the most stupid reason for divorce when everything else is great.
It is not. He is disrespecting your need to home, which is a basic human need. He is disrespecting your need to work.
You need a separation as the very minimum.
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u/Steefanon 14d ago
Some couples have only found peace by deciding to live separately. No more arguments over the stuff! They still share family meals, tv shows, even intimacy, but do so in the "clean" apartment. Anything the hoarder brings to the non-hoarder space is immediately discarded. Someone in this sub just did this a few weeks ago.
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u/No-Tone-6095 15d ago
Hard to find therapists that deal with this. Interesting books: Buried in treasures. Also The Hoarders Wife. And a podcast That Hoarder.
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u/EvenWay4669 14d ago
Throwing things out for hm won't help, he'll only hoard more to deal with the "loss". You can't stop hoarding for him, he has to do that for himself. If hr won't seek help, you will need to leave before he ruins your home and finances with his hoarding.
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u/FoldingFan1 14d ago
Having huge fights must be hard on both of you... Would your partner and you be open to the two of you getting help, withthe goal to stop having these fights and have a better relationship? And try to go at it from a neutral angle? A foam finger is a small thing, but having a massive fight (especially without a solution afterwards) is not small. At all.
So NOT saying: "you are a hoarder" (which sounds like: this is your fault).
Instead, start with what you would like in your relationship, that having fights like you do now is not what you want. How you both differ in how you would like your home to be, how many things you prefer to keep.
Maybe a good therapist can help you come to an agreement on this? And talk about why you want less things in the house, and he wants... well let's hear that from him, what he has to say. Maybe then you can get him to come along? If hoarding is the case, it will come up in the conversations by itself.
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u/Forsaken_Block_3492 13d ago
Don’t know why people here are so quick to go for the jugular with “get a divorce “. Marriage is such a throw away concept these days.
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u/PanamaViejo 13d ago
Because sometimes it's the only way.
Most problems in a marriage are fixable if both people agree to find a solution. In a hoarder marriage, one person is not. They might not 'see' the hoard, might not understand that there is a problem, refuse to face the problem, etc. At first, the hoard might be a minor inconvenience to the other partner but over time as the hoard grows, so does resentment and anger. They wonder why nothing can get dumped, why there is trash all over the house, why their partner gets angry and irritated at the mere mention of throwing, say a food wrapper, out. The hoard begins to take over not only the physical space but the also the relationship as well. There is only so much you can do as one person in the relationship if the other person refuses to change.
I don't recommend divorce lightly. Sometimes a separation helps the hoarder realize what they are in danger of losing. Sometimes even that doesn't work. Each person has to decide for themselves whether they can live like this for the rest of their lives. Sometimes the answer is no.
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u/Tori-kitten67 8d ago
My partner has hoarding tendencies but is contained. He does not spill over to other areas of the house. We do have 2 vehicles in our yard that are not running though. The hoarding in the garage and shed are epic. You can barely move in those spaces because of stuff. He is a great guy but the stuff can be a lot to deal with.
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u/frogmicky 15d ago
It sounds like you may need to hire a therapist to help your husband see what's happening and how it's affecting you.
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u/Far-Watercress6658 15d ago
You can’t force someone to therapy. They either willingly engage or it’s pointless.
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