Dirty Secret

Many people watch the show, "Hoarding: Buried Alive," on TLC. They get the rare opportunity to see the secret life of people who live in filth, junk, and trash buried practically to the ceiling. I know that way of life not only from watching the show, but living it myself for 15 years.

My mother began hoarding when I was 2 1/2 years old and my brother was just recently born. I could remember the house being spotless. You could practically eat off the floors because she cleaned almost every day, but after my brother's birth and suffering some marital turmoil..it was as if my mother snapped and became this different person. As time progressed, things began to pile up and she had a hard time parting with them. The floor was filthy and the house was a wreck. We were never allowed to have friends over for fear their parents would call CPS if they found out. When we moved out of the trailer park and into a double wide in the country...it only got worse. We were trying to sort through stuff from the move to see what could be thrown away and my nana found bills from 1993 and magazines from 1993-1995 (it was 2001). Mom freaked and went through the trash bag to get them out. It was hard to understand her madness. She would break out the wooden spoon when we tried to wash dishes because she felt it was important to bleach plastic containers. The inside of her cabinets were immaculate, but outside of the cabinets (the house) was a train wreck. It was like her way of showing us how she was feeling on the inside. It was hard to handle and got pretty overwhelming sometime. My closest friends knew and had seen the mess. They were amazed! They had never seen anything like it before. I was so embarrassed because I didn't want them to think I was like that or my mom was crazy. In fact, my room was the cleanist room in the house. I always made sure to keep it spotless UNTIL I moved to college. She got into it and began piling her junk in there.

From the outside, you would never guess my mother was a hoarder. She wears clean clothes, has nice jewelry, wears makeup, has her hair done just right, and smells good, but it has always been her secret...her secret life. Only people who are close to her know or understand. Mom has been a hoarder for 22 years and counting...

She came across a book that she really wanted me to read. It is called " Dirty Secret" by Jessie Sholl. Jessie's mother is a hoarder, too, and it gives the reader a glimpse into the world of hoarding and how the consequences affect a hoarder's child. I am SO glad that she shared her story and I would recommend the book to anyone because it sheds some light on what seems like a growing epidemic.