Oprah on Hoarding

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Review of the Hoarder's Show on the Oprah Winfrey Show

Oprah Winfrey allowed a distraught family to share a deep, dark secret about their quality of life. Inside of their seemingly typical 3,000 square-foot home, a couple named Sharyn and Martin were prisoners amongst a labyrinth of over 75 tons of trash and garbage. Sharyn and Martin were hoarders. Oprah’s article Inside a Hoarders Home allowed viewers a sneak peek inside a life filled with clutter and chaos.

Address Our Mess, a growing presence in the hoarding cleaning industry with locations in all fifty states, have been helping families like Sharyn and Martin’s for over twenty years. Hoarding disorder has just recently become common knowledge, featured in mainstream media outlets, and even featured in a series of its own, Hoarding: Buried Alive, which came out in 2010. However, “the concept of hoarding was defined in 1996 as a behavioral phenomenon of acquisition of objects and failure to discard objects” (NCBI). Oprah states that some experts estimate that over six million Americans suffer from terrible conditions caused by hoarding behavior daily.  Experts like us at Address Our Mess, not only agree that this figure is accurate but estimate that it could be as many as 16 million people. Although many Americans suffer from hoarding behavior, many hoarding questions have gone unanswered until now. Learn more about where to find answers below!

 

Where can hoarders and their loved ones go for answers?

Hoarders, or those trying to help them, should refer to tools like: 

These articles will help answer questions people may have about hoarding and determine which course of action is the safest and most efficient for their unique situation. In the case of Sharyn and Martin, the 75 tons of garbage and unusable items in their home needed over 15 large dumpsters to be hauled away. Also, a personal professional organizer and therapist was needed to help Sharyn deal with her inability to decipher garbage from keepsakes.

While the scenario on Oprah’s hoarding special may vary from other hoarding situations, it is important to remember that success can be achieved no matter how dire the situation may be.  Whether simple clutter cleaning is needed, or more in-depth biohazard and sanitation cleaning is needed in animal hoarding cases, specialists like Address Our Mess can help families like Sharyn and Martin get back on track.

Oprah says, “Wherever there is clutter, wherever there is chaos, wherever there is confusion in your own life, the message of this ... is that there's always hope and that there is a way, no matter who you are.”

 

Call 410-589-2747, email info@addressourmess.com, or use our contact us page to reach out to us for more information on our Hoarding Cleanup Service. We are here to help!

 

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Tue, 12/03/2013 - 13:56 by Kenneth Donnelly