Essay Stepping in to a Compulsive Hoarders House - 811 Words

If you walked in the fifth flat on Philmore Avenue, the last thing you’d find is legroom. Stacks of boxes, books, bags and any other entity known to man can be found just in the hallway of this bizarrely looking apartment. You think it couldn’t get any worse? Just as you thought that was a clutter, squeezing in through the front room couldn’t possibly be the most awful experience of entering someone’s residence. Abruptly to your left, right and centre is perhaps more than your naked eye can absorb. Masses of boxes, piled possessions, shelves brimming with things you didn’t even know existed. It then hits you. You’re right in the middle of a hoarder’s house. You didn’t think setting foot inside a house was ever going to be this hard.†¦show more content†¦Stereotypically, many people would class hoarded items as meaningless or rubbish. Define it as garbage but to some, it’s much much more than that. Common items to hoard may include: newspapers, magazines, bags, boxes, photos, food and clothing. It is common to mistake compulsive hoarding with collecting. Researchers have studied that implications of compulsive hoarding can develop from an early age of 11 onwards. Children have a tendency to collect stamps, marbles or stickers however they don’t usually interfere with day to day activities. Until a person enters adulthood, compulsive hoarding isn’t as problematic during younger years. Recent studies indicate that hoarding problems are detected in at least 1 in 50 people aged 21-30. A person who hoards may show signs such as the following: weakness in being able to throw away belongings, oppressive anxiety when striving to discard possessions, having a vast amounts of clutter in places such as the office or in the car, finding it difficult to move freely around the home due to mounding of items, being in extreme doubt when placing things, being sceptical of others coming in contact with their property, avoid having family or friends over as a result of embarrassment, suffering from social isolation. One of the residents living on Philmore Avenue has known Ralph Gosling for the past 23years, he states, â€Å"Mr. Gosling has always been like this, it’s his life