Hoarding is very odd habit. Despite recent media attention (had you even heard of a hoarder before it was popularized by television?) it seems to be somewhat of a mystery too. It has been called a disease, a condition, a side-effect, and simply a habit.
Most of what we know about hoarding comes from seeing horrifying pictures and videos of homes that are filled with all manner of garbage, as well as an overabundance of everyday items, and sometimes even dead animals!
But hoarding can be on a much smaller scale too.
Lets talk about those everyday items. The elderly are very prone to the hoarding habit, and many will hoard a select type of item at first. So you don't really see television worthy messes in their homes, but you are still dealing with a problem. These little quirks could be signs of something bigger to come.
In my observations, almost all hoarding begins with some seemingly harmless "saving", some of which never spirals out of control. Caregivers should be watchful, since something that starts out as basic thrift could lead to an obsession which can undermine the health and safety of their elderly loved one.
Here are some of the things I have seen the elderly hoard. Some are fairly common, but many are unusual, and might not send up any red flags at first;
- Plastic tabs--the little hangers that come on packages of dish towels and such. At one count, a lady I knew had over 3,000 of these.
- Food--This is common and reasonable. Do watch for expired foods, foods your loved one doesn't like, and other signs they are impulsively buying any food and stashing it for too long.
- Outdated medications--I've seen many cases where the elderly would not only save old medicine (both prescription and OTC, but store several types of pills in an old medication bottle together.
- Soap slivers--I saw a home once where the elderly owner had saved soap slivers over a period of many years. These were all kept in open containers, and had become dusty, dried and grimy with time.
- Envelopes--although harmless in itself, saving used envelopes is a little strange, and can be a sign that there is more hoarding going on in other areas.
- Saving worthless items in lieu of their more useful counterparts (for example, saving plastic food containers to use as storage, and throwing away or hiding items made for that purpose.)
Hoarding or Dementia?
Sometimes it can be difficult to tell whether or not a hoarding behavior is a sign of dementia. Technically, just saving "stuff" is harmless, but messy. When dementia comes into play, things may look a bit more unusual.
An example of this would be when we cleaned my grandmother's house. Notorious for saving EVERYTHING, she had almost every inch of a three bedroom/two bath home covered. And most of the vertical space as well.
We were quite used to her saving many odd items, a habit she had done for decades. However, the signs of dementia were apparent once we dug a bit deeper. In one of the bedrooms, an armoire was filled with spare linens. Tucked between the sheets and curtains ever so often, we would find a plastic bag filled with peanuts. Many of the bags, as well as the surrounding linens, had been soiled and chewed by mice.
Today, with the dementia progressing (slowly, thanks to early intervention and care), she still insists on hiding food in between her clothing in her dressers. We also found a surplus of coke can tabs and very old shoes that were not in her size. At some point, she had started to obsessively purchase single pieces of old flatware from thrift stores, and in spite of having several nice sets of matched flatware, (which she had stored away) insisted on using the bent, broken, rusted, forks and spoons from the second hand stores.
When you are close to the elderly person, you may have that gut feeling that something is not right. Don't ignore it and hope it will go away. It could be just a hoarding habit, or it could be something more serious that needs attention. Even in cases of "just hoarding", it would be wise to investigate, just in case the lifestyle is endangering your loved one's health or quality of life.
©Jayme Kinsey 2014 (Elder Care Issues Blog)
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