First published 2010
Randy Frost and Gail Steketee began studying hoarding a decade ago expecting to find a handful of cases. Instead they treated hundreds of patients and received thousands of calls from desperate families. The authors present their findings through detailed case studies that reveal the psychology behind compulsive saving. They profile individuals like Irene, whose collecting behavior ended her marriage, and Ralph, who nearly lost his home because he could not discard broken items like leaky buckets. The book examines the physical markers of hoarding: furniture buried under possessions, narrow walkways called goat trails threading through homes, towering stacks of papers that hoarders constantly shuffle but never throw away, and sometimes collections of animals or garbage. Frost and Steketee argue that the impulses driving hoarders exist in most people, whether we identify as savers, collectors, or compulsive cleaners. The book explores what happens when our relationship with possessions becomes destructive.
Genres: psychology, mental-health, self-help, non-fiction
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: case-studies, real-life-stories
290 pages · Hardcover · Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Content warnings: mental-illness