Julie Jay: We moved house, but I lost the decluttering battle

I am mortified at the amount of sheer stuff we have accumulated over these last three years, most of which has been gathering dust

When you slow down and be considerate while decluttering, you find so many treasures. Picture: iStock 

We've moved house and, even though everyone warned me how stressful it would be, I grossly underestimated just how overwhelming moving the contents of one house to another would be. Especially when 80% of that content consists of Hot Wheels cars. I, for one, can’t wait for them to go electric.

I have known about our move for about two months now. And yet, for some reason, my ADHD brain did not fully compute that it was actually happening, so I found myself scrubbing marker scribbles off the wall at the 11th hour as if our security deposit depended on it, which it did.

Among the many problems associated with moving with kids is finding someone to mind them while you dive in, because their tiny spines are useless for carrying televisions, making them more of a hindrance than a help.

As I sweated my way through shifting the flat-screen TV into the car, I momentarily considered becoming a non-TV family and dumping it on the side of the road rather than lugging it across town. But then I thought about those long west Kerry November Saturdays and persevered in somehow squeezing it into the boot of my Avensis, because the only thing worse than sweating in a heatwave is weeping in a rainstorm. Which is generally how I spend my winters now, since my two kids have discovered the joys of jumping from one bed to another, usually breaking a lamp or two in the process.

Indeed, we have lost so many lamps in the WWF antics that, in our new house, we will most likely be sitting in darkness for the next five years. In case you think I’m referring to the wrestling organisation, I am, in fact, referring to the wildlife federation, because my two rapscallions are at their happiest swinging from tree to tree. Or, in our case, bedpost to bedpost.

I am mortified by the amount of clutter we have dispensed with over the last week. Every trip to the recycling centre with a stuffed boot filled me with so much shame that I seriously contemplated throwing myself in with the discarded duvet, because the amount of stuff we threw down that shaft was enough to have even Donald Trump say, ‘For the love of God, please think of the Arctic Circle.’

A lot of our problems have been rooted in people giving us bags upon bags of clothes for the kids. At first, I thought this was pure generosity of spirit on their part but, after being confronted with a clothing mountain this week, I now know they were probably just saving themselves a trip to a clothing bank or the dump. As I trawled through a collection of inter-county jerseys that would get my child tackled on the streets of Dingle — the Tyrone jersey being particularly controversial for the week that’s in it — I swore to start practising saying the word ‘No’ in front of a mirror, to prepare for the next time somebody arrived with a bin bag of corporate casual clothing for my toddler.

Wetsuits for 12-year-olds were pawned off to the Vincent de Paul because, based on the way the data centres are exploiting our natural resources, there will be no oceans to swim in by the time our eldest gets around to using his in 2033.

Another problem has been the toys. In the process of moving, my eldest has decided that every ball has a meaning, every yo-yo has a special memory, and every notebook must not only be transported but also placed in the perfect position. Everyone told me to get rid of toys they haven’t played with in months but that is easy to do if you have a boot big enough to hide the evidence. My repeated attempts to rid my life of a dusty old mini workstation were foiled at every opportunity as Number One insisted that, even though he didn’t play with it, he liked looking at it and storing things on top of it. So awkward was this yoke that there can be no denying the magical powers of Santy in delivering it all those months ago — because this thing defies physics. And so it is that the unused workbench has made its way to our new home, despite my best intentions, because I am weak. Very, very weak.

Finally, the biggest culprit when it comes to unwanted clutter has been trying to empty a house when my husband invests in every trinket with sentimental value. Leaflets from Edinburgh Fringe runs in 2009, Michael Jackson posters from 2004, a shot glass from Malaga in 2011, nothing can be thrown out, and I’ve reached my limit with it all.

I had to draw the line when I saw my husband pack away not one but two copies of Flann O’Brien’s  The Third Policeman. The book is, of course, extremely funny but even Flann himself probably didn’t have two copies of it in his house, I told my husband, before disposing of one edition to a Vincent de Paul bag. He removed it moments later while insisting it was always good to have a spare for emergencies.

Still, sometimes in our haste to declutter, it is easy to miss something, which is why I sometimes need to slow it down, take a beat, and assume a more considered decluttering approach. In doing so, I find so many treasures: Birthday cards from my dad, who is no longer with us; pictures scribbled by my five-year-old on his first day at school; my toddler’s first Christmas slipper.

As I write this, I am also reminded that things, unlike people, can almost always be repurposed. I am currently writing this on the workbench my five-year-old insisted on keeping. Sometimes we don’t need more stuff; we just need to take a minute and think about what we already have. Now, if anyone wants to win a copy of The Third Policeman, just enter the competition below.