Hoarding

photo from TLC-Hoarding:Buried Alive

I don't consider myself a hoarder, but I think I'm one large emotional event from hoarding.  Today since  my husband likes to do big cleaning day after the presents are opened every Christmas, we cleaned niches and vacuumed and  scrubbed and all the stuff you do when you clean.  He cleaned my desk off in record time.  Partly because of his lack of emotional attachment to every shred of paper on the desk, he is able to organize a pile of papers in record time.  I also think he possesses a "throw away" gene.  It must be genetic.  I, on the other hand, fret over whether or not I will need said paper.  If I wait about six months, all of the papers are null and void and I can easily throw them away.

I watch those hoarding shows and can't understand how these people end up living in so much stuff, then I pause and realize I, too, might be living in a ton of stuff if it were not for my very neat husband.  As I've grown up and become a mom I am hyper aware of messes.  Cleaning is not something I enjoy and I find NO pleasure in it other than a clean house.  My children do not understand the work involved in making the house clean and therefore leave their messes all over the house.  I remind(nag) them to pick up their stuff and to clean their rooms and all of those good things.

Brett is more neat and organized and attempts to make his bed every morning in hopes we will allow him to play Minecraft in exchange for the time it took him to make his bed.  We usually encourage more than one chore to give him Minecraft minutes.  Chloe is a different story.  I believe it causes her physical pain to clean up after herself.  I am going to encourage her to marry a man like her father who enjoys a clean house otherwise she might become a hoarder.  She finds value in every shred of paper.  Cleaning her room fills multiple trash cans and she never even realizes I did a clean sweep.  Truth be told, my husband "cleans" my stuff out too.  I never realize the stuff is gone but if asked to part with it, I likely frown.  He now understands it is easier to ask forgiveness than permission specifically when it pertains to cleaning out my stuff.

Christmas is actually the best time to clean house.  We need to clean, not only our physical living space, but also all the junk we've accumulated in our hearts all year long.  The quarrels and the frustrations need to find their way to the garbage.  Actually, everything destructive needs to head to the emotional baggage dump.  Some people like to do it at the new year, but I think Christmas time is a better time for cleaning out your closets and your life.  As we celebrate the birth of our Savior we can also lay all of the junk on the altar and cleanse our lives of the toxic stuff we've hoarded all year long.

The truth is, it doesn't matter how clean your house, closets, or drawers are if your heart is a wreck.  I am thankful for time with my family today(Day 31).  Goodnight Friends and Merry Christmas.