Hi,

I'm in pretty much the same boat you are with my 24 year old daughter. Except she has a 3year old we are trying to keep safe and healthy. Daughter doesn't really collect things...she saves garbage. Can't do dishes or laundry. Take her dog out to go to bathroom. Severe procrastination!

We are cleaning out her apt this weekend against her will. Not the first time. I have a key to her apartment. We have warned her to let us come help her clean up and shampoo carpets or we would do it anyway. She has put us off for 2 weeks. I don't know what else to do. That little boy cannot go home to that every night. My only other option is to call child protective services. I don't want them to take her kid away and put her in jail! That is what they do here. They only see it as neglect in someone this young..if she were an old person it might be looked at differently.
Now I've met a child protective ser. Lady. We will clean out apt and then call her to come scare the shit out of her. She can offer free assistance at a local mental health facility. We really would like to get her on an anti depressant. She is clearly depressed. From there we might be able to get her to try some online group therapy. That is our plan. Last time we just cleaned up. She couldn't maintain for very long. Got to try something new with each attempt and not give up on her.

Greetings,

I have a bit of a problem that I would like some guidance on. I have been with my boyfriend for three years, and even moved in with him for a few months before I was forced to move back out.

Cody has had a problem with hoarding ever since his grandma died. When I first met him, you couldn't see the counter-tops or stove in the kitchen, the bathroom was so disgusting and cluttered that I refused to shower or use the toilet, and there was only a small path through his living room and to his bed in the bedroom.

After the first time he finally allowed me into his home, I began to clean it up for him. It took me three weeks, but you could actually get into the laundry room to do laundry, you could cook in the kitchen, and you could actually LIVE in the house. I remember he got really upset that I had thrown away some old groceries that had been in the cupboard since 2007 (the year his grandma died) but at the time, I didn't think much of it.

Well, it is now three years later, and I have done this with his home several times now. Each time he has promised to keep it clean, but never does. Now, the house isn't as bad as any I've seen on those hoarding television shows, but honestly if I wasn't going down there and cleaning every now and then, it could easily get that way. For example, the dishes in his sink have been sitting there for three months. It was three months ago that I moved back out of his home because I couldn't take it anymore.

I cry all the time for him because I hate to see him live like this. He has health problems, but refuses to acknowledge that they are due to the filth he is living in. I am preparing myself to go down there and clean yet again, but I'm worried that I may just be enabling him. I don't want to enable the problem, but I don't want him to live like he is either.

Me and his brother have both spoken with him about getting help, but he refuses to acknowledge that he has a problem. It was only recently that I was able to get him to grudgingly accept that his house was dirty. When approached with the subject, he usually gets very defensive and starts yelling, asking me why I always have to bring him down. He starts telling me that I think he's a waste of space, and basically things to make me feel like I'm being the bad guy. I realize that it's a ploy to try and avoid the problem, but I don't know how to get past that wall.

He has agreed to move with me to Lincoln, NE in two years time which I think will be great for him, but he says that he will not give up his current home or anything in it. He doesn't want to move any of his stuff out. Basically, he wants to keep his home how it is and buy new stuff when he moves in with me. That just does not sound practical at all to me, but seems to make perfect sense to him.

I have been in contact with a cleaning company that specializes in hoarding, but we have to get Cody to agree to let them help him.

Today, me and Cody's brother have decided to join forces and talk to him together. We are going to do it at my place, and we are giving ourselves a week or two to plan out how we are going to approach him and what we should say. This is the reason I am posting here.

Does anybody have any suggestions as to how to approach my boyfriend about this problem. We want him to get help...desperately. We can't let him blow up at us and just walk away again. Please, we need help.