Anybody watch Hoarding Buried Alive last night, the hoarder could not be helped.

[TexasBushwhacker]

24. Both grandparents and my mother lived through the Great Depression

I definitely think that living through a time when there wasn't enough food, there wasn't money for clothes or shoes, etc. can make them hang onto things that are essentially worthless. I already mentioned my dad's mother who never threw away her liquor bottles. As much as she drank, it would have made sense for her to buy liquor by the gallon, but she was the type of drinker where whatever size bottle it was, she would drink until the bottle was empty. So she only bought pint and half pint bottles.

My mother's mother saved all her empty pill bottles/ She was a hypochondriac, so that meant hundreds of pill bottles. She had been a seamstress and professional milliner for years, so she wouldn't get rid of old clothes without cutting off the buttons and lace.

I had a problem with hanging onto pieces of furniture that had been in the family for a long time, but after a while I just kept telling myself that the "stuff" wasn't the loved one. Eventually you just have to accept that it's just a piece of wood. I gave a lamp that had belonged to my great grandmother to a cousin, but otherwise I sold most of the furniture in late 2011 to prepare to move temporarily into my brother's house. I freecycled a lot of stuff. I gave a big box of classic movies on VHS to some film students at University of Texas. I gave away my mother's soup tureen and punch bowl because I don't make soup or serve punch. Yeah, I could have had a garage sale and make a few bucks, but I'd rather just find a good home for things and keep my weekend free.

It's funny. My mother was a pack rat. She accumulated enough "stuff" to fill the walk on closets, cabinets and drawers of a 4 bedroom house. When I was living with her when she was dying, she wouldn't let start going through her 20 years worth of clothes because that reminded her she was dying. Her sister had been a bit of a pack rat, but her family had a fire. The upper floor of her house and attic were destroyed. She lost some collectibles like Gone With the Wind paper dolls and a genuine Shirley Temple doll. BUT no one in the family or their pets were hurt. After that she wasn't much of a saver any more, because she knew that "stuff" doesn't matter.