Tales of downsizing

December 26, 2023 8:24 AM

I’m in my 50s. My dad passed away several years ago and my mom is in her 80s. My mom has ended up as kind of the repository for a lot of family stuff over the years - various people’s favorite sweaters or jackets, blankets, books, bibles, furniture, calendars, letters, journals, photos, etc. She is very sentimental and rather a packrat, though not to the point of being a hoarder. I am also a bit of both, though less of either than she is.

My mom is starting to downsize and in the course of this I will have to decide what, if any, of her stuff I want. And of what she keeps (which will probably be a lot), I will have to deal with it after she passes. This is not imminent, but - well - she is not going to live forever. And it’s on my mind now because it’s on her mind now.

I’m ok with sorting through the less personal stuff like furniture and kitchenware, but not so good at items that are more emotionally tied to specific individuals in my family, even if, as with some of these items, I don’t have personal connections to or memories of those individuals. For some items, I don’t even know exactly who they came from.

Can you point me to tales (books, articles, podcasts, movies, blog/reddit posts) or guidelines for dealing with these more personal materials when downsizing? I’m familiar with Marie Kondo but this stuff has the added layer of family history which makes it more complex - for me, at least - than items that are purely “mine.” I’d also be interested in hearing how you or people you know have handled this type of downsizing.

posted by argyle sock to Grab Bag (14 answers total)

Best answer: The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning may be up your alley. There is also a TV show produced by Amy Poehler of the same name - there's one episode where a woman cleans out her stuff because she is dying of cancer, another family that clears out all the grown kid's stuff because they want to enjoy their retirement, etc. It is a very gentle, sweet show and you may find it helpful to watch it after reading about it.
posted by toastyk at 9:03 AM on December 26, 2023 [13 favorites]

Some professional organizers do this, though you'll want to get personal recommendations from a family who's been through the process. Photographing sentimental items and gathering photos of people wearing certain memorable clothes to put into a captioned scrapbook, photo book, photo tray, shadow box either as a gift to your mom or with your mom will help you both hold onto the memories of these pieces without having to keep them. A lovely book by Ilene Beckerman (and Nora & Delia Ephron play) called Love, Loss, and What I Wore used illustrations of clothing as prompts for written memories. You don't need the objects just the memories of them.
posted by Elsie at 9:17 AM on December 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I'm currently helping my mother sort through my late stepfather's immense collection of things, and what's been helpful for me to think and say is, "This _____ doesn't owe us anything." Did the clothing give warmth or him feel good about himself? Did he enjoy listening to the music or reading the book? Did he smile at the tchotchke on the shelf? Great. It served its purpose.

Does the thing mean anything to me, beyond the connection to him? No? Then it's done here, and I can let it go in whatever way makes sense to for me and for that thing. We're selling some things, giving away others, and throwing away a lot. Just because a thing was of sentimental value to another person, doesn't mean it needs to be important to me. Giving myself permission to not pick up the mantle of caring about someone else's things has been very freeing.

To reinforce: Sometimes a thing just need to be thrown away, and that's ok.

My mother is unsentimental about my stepdad's things, which is making the process easier. She's more sentimental about things that came down through her family, and I will probably have to wait to deal with most of those until she dies. You may have to wait on some of that too. Can you or your mother afford to rent a storage unit if she moves to a smaller home? It's a bit of can-kicking, but could help you accomplish the necessary and practical aspects of downsizing. The process of deciding what to move to storage + the reality of paying to store someone else's crap + out of sight, out of mind is often a breakthrough for people who struggle with keeping too much.
posted by Sweetie Darling at 9:22 AM on December 26, 2023 [4 favorites]

Best answer: This book! Keep the Memories, Lose the Stuff: Declutter, Downsize, and Move Forward with Your Life by Matt Paxton
posted by spamandkimchi at 9:32 AM on December 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

I too have become a repository for a LOT of family stuff, and I probably have to move in the next couple of years.

I read a comment in some article somewhere that was weirdly helpful to me - something about how keeping absolutely everything does keep the past with you, but it also keeps you trapped in the past. Remembering is good, but it can't be your whole life.
posted by Frowner at 9:42 AM on December 26, 2023 [3 favorites]

I don’t have a book for you, but I can share that after watching my hoarder parents get buried (almost but not quite literally) in all the family stuff from both sides of the family, I resolved that I would keep one item* in memory of anyone. (I have some useful hand me downs, but for sentiment - it’s a single item.) I personally believe this approach lets me honour that connection better, because I have those items placed where I can enjoy them and not in boxes piled up somewhere. Some examples are: my grandfather’s vanity license plate/ham radio call sign; my grandmother’s watch; my aunt’s copy of Little Women.

* I do have a smallish box of photos and a single bank box of letters/papers.
posted by warriorqueen at 10:22 AM on December 26, 2023 [8 favorites]

I have a goal of shrinking down the items that I think are important for the next generation to where they'll fit into a single plastic storage box. Now, I do intend to have it stuffed pretty tight. I'm also aware that there aren't guarantees that they'll act on all my intentions after I'm gone.

Anyway, setting that goal, a goal that seems kind of tangible, that I can visualize, helps me think about it a bit. And helps me throw stuff in the trash, or in some cases donate, to clean out the house in advance.

I had to have a lot of HVAC work done on the house last year, in the middle of which I had to clean out the basement so the work could be done. That urgency helped kickstart the overall process of triage and decluttering.

I am not throwing away everything, though. There is a very small, key set of items that I've told my descendants that they will maintain or else I will come back to haunt them in the most annoying manner I can think of.
posted by gimonca at 11:37 AM on December 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

Best answer: There is a very small, key set of items that I've told my descendants that they will maintain or else I will come back to haunt them in the most annoying manner I can think of.

For the love of God don't do this. I am watching a close friend drown in guilt trying and failing, in her mind, to honour the goods of dead relatives, layering thick obligation on top is not going to help. This isn't a dig at gimonca, the quantity of a single box is admirable and would really help my friend, but we don't have the right or ability to dictate our legacy, in goods or otherwise.
posted by deadwax at 1:01 PM on December 26, 2023 [6 favorites]

Best answer: Who Gets Grandma's Yellow Pie Plate? Workbook: A Guide to Passing on Personal Possessions might be helpful.

And if your mother knows who the people in photographs are, or the connection of books, albums, letters, and similar materials, ask her about them and write it in pencil or on an index card.

Sometimes old photos will say "Aunt Susie and Uncle Harry, 1908" or the like. If you or she know the connection either of you have, lightly and in pencil write that on the photo, adding something like "grandparents of [person living today]" -- if you decide to keep the materials.
posted by jgirl at 1:47 PM on December 26, 2023 [5 favorites]

Best answer: It's a significant task. At one point, I lost about 1/3 of my books, including several favorite authors and all of the art books. It was sad, but even wonderful books are things and do not have to be kept, esp. if someone can use them. I have too much stuff because I envision doing projects and I hate waste. Favorite sweaters can be photographed, I keep most letters, calendars and stuff can be discarded, because I'm not famous, there will not be a biography. Of the stuff you let go, there will occasionally be items you regret. That regret passes, is tolerable, is much easier than having to store too much stuff.

If at all possible, take some time to look at stuff with your Mom, hear stories, let her extract the last bit of love an item holds; that's what's worth keeping.
posted by theora55 at 1:55 PM on December 26, 2023 [2 favorites]

I lost a bunch of stuff in a basement flood years ago. At this point in time I don’t miss it and I couldn’t tell you what it was. For stuff you don’t actively want, my advice is to put everything in unlabeled boxes, wait 1-3 years, then without opening the boxes, throw the boxes away. I’m terrified of having my house cluttered up with maw-maw’s old sewing machine or Auntie’s rickety tables.
I agree with theora55 that the regret of letting things go is less than the regret of losing control of your house and what’s in it.
posted by Vatnesine at 2:49 PM on December 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Came here to say that my mantra is "just because it mattered to [person], that doesn't mean it has to matter to me." It's hard to get to that point; you know that if the person was there, they'd want to keep the thing, they'd have a story to tell about it, etc. But if the only story you have to tell about something is "Someone I loved would have had a story about this thing", that's not much of a story. It's just something that someone else loved, taking up space that could be used for things you love, and have stories to tell about.

My family runs to the packrat side of things in spades, and I had to remind myself about that a lot when I was cleaning out some of their houses. But the first time I had to do something like that I made the mistake of wanting to keep as much as I could, and wound up in an apartment that literally looked like a hoarder lived there. You just can't take on someone else's entire life's worth of stuff and still have room for yourself.
posted by current resident at 6:54 PM on December 26, 2023 [4 favorites]

Response by poster: Thanks all! I’ve marked a few best answers but everyone’s comments and stories were useful. I especially appreciated the variations on the idea that just because an item has meaning to my mom (or even to me) doesn’t mean I have to keep it, and the suggestions to talk with my mom about her memories and stories that go with the items. And I’m already halfway through the Matt Paxton book (yay for library ebooks) which is an easy read and talks about some of these same ideas.
posted by argyle sock at 7:02 AM on December 28, 2023 [1 favorite]

Another good author is Dana K. White. (Not the MMA guy.) She's got a few books on decluttering which have lots of helpful ways to think about getting rid of Stuff.
posted by bink at 4:04 PM on December 28, 2023