u/ktempest

I am currently living in house my grandparents bought in the '60s. My grandparents lived here with five of their children, and this house became sort of a central hub for extended family and thus has both a lot of history and a lot of stuff in it. My grandparents have both been gone for a really long time, and for the past 20 years or so it's been my two remaining aunts on that side of the family living here. 

My older aunt passed away in 2024, and my younger aunt passed away in November. When my older aunt passed away we gathered up all of her many, many clothes, shoes, accessories, Etc, and donated them . We also got rid of some other stuff of hers, but it was mostly the clothes and such. 

My younger aunt also had a lot of clothes, but I wasn't truly aware of how many she had until I started pulling them out of the closets, and the bins, and the other spaces, in order to get them ready for donation. Yesterday I took eight moving bags full of clothes to Matthew 25 ministries (which doesn't sell the clothes they get, they give them away to folks in need). I tried to sell her 30 pairs of shoes that were high heels, pumps, and other non-practical shoes , but ended up having to donate 90% of those because the various second hand clothing stores didn't want them. 

I'm now going through the house and packing up all of the various home decor items that do not fit my style. I also keep having to go through boxes, bags, closets, you name it getting at "stuff" that needs to either be donated or thrown out. Most of that will probably just be thrown out. 

I have to haul so many things to so many donation centers to calm my own anxiety about the number of things that I'm getting rid of. I don't want to send it to landfills if I don't have to. I want things to go to other people who can actually use them and so I do my best to ensure that I am donating to places that aren't just going to throw it away. But man, this is really wearing on my heart at my mind. 

This process is reinforcing my stance that I don't want to be a person who leaves behind so much stuff for other people to have to deal with. And that's not a knock on my aunts or my grandparents or cousins or whoever. They weren't wasteful people. they kept a lot of things to continue using even when their original purpose was gone, and they gladly took things when other family members passed on because they were useful and thus didn't go to a landfill. I appreciate that ethic. 

Still, there's so much. Even after I have set aside the things that I know that I can use and want around. 

This is hard, this is so hard. Because even as I am packing away things that I don't want I'm also caught up and all these emotions. I know that my aunt or grandparent loved this type of object or that type of object, but I'm not keeping every single one of these objects in order to remember them. But the things are reminding me of them and I miss them. 

Anyway, I figured you guys would understand. Once I'm done with this process I hope that I continue to just keep the objects in my house to what I really need or I really use or serves a purpose in my heart.