How do you help a grandmother from hoarding?

dust. dust the stuff she hoards she is at the end of her life and if she wants to hoard let her hoard
i work in a nursing home and beleive me its all she has

I saw a documentary on hoarding and I always thought that these kind of people could just throw the junk away but they can't.It's a mental illness and she really needs professional help!!

Hoarding is a kind of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Just coming in and getting rid of all her possessions isn't going to work. Hoarders collect things as a comfort and then getting rid of those things is very difficult. After you throw something away I bet she's thinking, If my grandson didn't throw ? away I could've used that now.

Spending time with her may help, maybe if she's willing, you could go through her things together and find out why she keeps ?, If it's just 'in case I might need it', that's not a good enough reason and explain to her why cluttering up her life isn't going to make it better. Help her to control her obsession with logic.

This has helped me. I'm a recovering hoarder.

Perhaps get her a storage room of some kind? Either that or have someone build a shed in her backyard for back up stuff. I can't really see any way to keep her from hoarding whatever stuff she likes, but there are ways to keep it organized and contained. Other than hiring someone else to do it for you, I can't really see an 80 year old woman changing her habits now.
What exactly does she collect?

You talk to the mental health professionals in Grandma's town/city. TexasLily is right, it IS a mental illness and 'going through things with her' is not going to help her toss out the garbage. Literally.

They get very, very upset and angry when you try to remove the smallest item. All that "stuff" is their security. As long as they have it they feel like they can't be harmed. It's related to OCD (If I wash my hands 15 times, I'll ace the test).

It takes more knowledge than you have, but you can be there to support them with your love.

I don't know very much about hoarding and people who hoard except that it is related to OCD, but I think that my mother-in-law is possibly showing some small signs of hoarding behavior. She saves empty tissue boxes and refuses to throw them out, and there is now about 20 of them in our spare bedroom that we use for storage. I notice she is now starting to wash out disposable snack pudding cups and saving those in the kitchen. So far there are only 2 of those. She has been saving the plastic bags that loafs of bread come in and we have like 4 or 6 of them! She has other very strange paranoid behaviors and phobias that go to the point of extreme but I dont know if they relate to hoarding or not, but I know that she does have some history of mental health issues from the past, but I dont quite know all the details and she is purposely vague about it all. I just know the woman is grown and has a temper tantrum if you throw away something that is obviously garbage and she all of a sudden claims to want it for her collection...

It's a disorder....try to get her some counseling....if she doesn't see someone about it, especially at her advanced age, it's not likely you'll be able to do anything about it, other than try to organize it for her.

Get her a mental health professional. She may also need some senior service people looking in on her.

Hide her walker

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