Not everyone who has household clutter is a pack rat. One key difference, says Southwest Florida-based professional organizer, Roxy Hambleton, is that a pack rat keeps especially unnecessary items – whereas someone whose home is cluttered may simply be too busy or exhausted to tidy up and toss unused stuff.
“Pack rats are ‘I might need it someday’ people,” says Hambleton, who has worked with many over the years. One client kept hundreds of empty milk jugs, in the event she’d have to fill them with water before a hurricane struck. Another client, with a hard-to-fit foot size, bought every pair of shoes she found in that size and never wore most of them.
Why does it matter if you’re a pack rat? Mental health experts say that pack rats often fill their physical spaces to overcome feelings of emptiness in their personal lives. And all that clutter doesn’t actually help fill the void; it often leads to even more stress.
Hambleton helped develop this quiz to help you figure out if you’re just a little messy – or if you’re a bona fide pack rat.
You haven’t gotten around to tidying up and:
a. If company is coming, you can whip it into shape in 20 minutes.
b. You can’t find some important documents you had last week, but you know with an hour or two of cleaning they’ll turn up.
c. Having guests over would mean you’d have to clear some places for them to sit.
You can’t find the roll of Scotch tape you bought just last week, so you:
a. Assume one of the kids moved it and enlist their help finding it.
b. Borrow some from the neighbor.
c. Go out and buy another roll.
Everyone has a collection of mementos. Yours includes:
a. Your child’s baby booties.
b. The ugly Christmas ornament that Grandma made before she died.
c. The last container of dry Cheerios your grown child ate from before outgrowing the toddler stage.
You know you’ll make good money when you sell your collection of:
a. Original, antique Delftware and Majolica.
b. Jewelry handed down to you by family members.
c. Beanie Babies.
When you go clothes shopping and find a great top, you:
a. Pass it by, since you already have plenty of great tops.
b. Buy it and then put it away until you get around to finding the right bottoms to go with it.
c. Buy it and leave the shopping bag on the kitchen counter for a few weeks until you find a spot for it in your closet.
How to rate your packrat tendencies:
Give yourself 0 points for each A answer, 1 point for each B and 2 points for each C.
0 to 3: You don’t let your stuff rule your life.
4 to 7: You are delaying decisions that could help simplify your life.
8 to 10: You are probably a pack rat. Take control: Get help from family, a life coach, organizer or therapist to help you get to the root of your senseless collections, and then, to start purging them.
