Have You Cleaned Out Your Childhood Bedroom?
This summer, my divorced parents both happen to be downsizing at the same time, and while neither of them lives in the apartment I grew up in, I’ve sneakily/luckily managed to keep stuff squirreled away in their homes. When they asked me to go through my old things, I was surprised by my reaction…
I didn’t want to keep all that stuff, but I definitely didn’t want them to get rid of it. Closing the Museum of Me?!?! I don’t think so. I dragged my feet, complained, and expressed pretty much zero gratitude to the people who had allowed their homes to be storage units for things that didn’t mean much to them, like the letters I got at sleep-away camp a thousand years ago.
Still, there were some real gems in the mix. Although I’m not very handy, I took shop class from kindergarten through middle school. In the archives was a hinged box I made at age five and then lined with purple velvet.
Still proud of this.
“You don’t want this wooden doll I made?” I asked my dad, later. “Even though she has movable arms, braids made of yellow wire attached to a nail driven into her head, and a matching bed with painted roses?” I was serious. He smiled but did not say yes.
Lots of my early art was very, very large. My mom had a 3×5 foot framed painting I did of Demeter and Persephone from when we studied Greek mythology, and my dad had my similarly sized self-portrait from elementary school, notable for the fact that I accidentally put the eyebrows under the eyes.
School photos from when I was three (left) and four. The turtleneck has the words “big enough” printed around the torso, and I wish my parents had kept that!
Even though I’d already whittled down my collection of please-don’t-throw-aways at various points since graduating from high school, the current process was exhausting. I tossed the school yearbooks but kept the school photos. I held onto books I’d loved as a kid and shoved a few boxes of paper ephemera in the back of my closet. Somewhere in that mess is my ticket to see the Spice Girls at Madison Square Garden in 1998 and the diary I tried to disguise as a school notebook by writing INGLISH on the front cover. (Spelling has never been my strong suit.)
Bye, chairs :/
Heading back to Brooklyn, I brought two old kid-sized wooden chairs home with me. But after moving them around my apartment for a few weeks, I realized I didn’t have room. I worked up my courage for days, then put them out on the street and walked away with a real pang of sadness.
When I went to the bodega later, the chairs still hadn’t been snagged, and I almost brought them home again. I somehow resisted the urge, and by the next morning, they were gone. I still miss them, but I like to think that they’re getting more use in a Brooklyn kid’s bedroom.
I took home the velvet lined box (of course!!!) and a goofy paper maché vase that our brilliant art teacher had us build around a tennis ball canister so it could hold water and flowers. I declined to keep my gigantic self-portrait with the under-eye eyebrows, but I still have the memory of my brothers laughing at it over the years. I neither took nor tossed the wooden doll. She is sleeping peacefully in her custom wooden bed with roses painted on it in a closet at my dad’s house. I’m still trying to convince him it’s a collector’s item.
Now, you tell me: if you’ve excavated your childhood bedroom, what did you find? Was anything strangely hard to part with? What did you do with the things you wanted to keep?
P.S. Where did you grow up, and what’s the age gap between your kids?
(Top photo of Gisela Gueiros’s apartment by Alpha Smoot, styling by Kate Jordan.)
Comments
146 commentsOmg. I could be a hoarder if I let myself. I am so sentimental about objects and could hang on to everything ever. I make myself get rid of stuff but I also hang on to some things. I mean… these things just become part of your history!
When my husband and I downsized to go ff travelling, I decided to return all the hand written letters I had received from close friends over the years. I thought they would be nice memories for them to have, as most of them contained details of their teenage lives. Unfortunately none of my friends seemed very happy with this gift, and they certainly didn’t offer to return any of the letters I had sent them over the years (which they had probably already trashed 😂). The urge to purge remains strong, even though we don’t travel as much anymore. It’s just too easy to accumulate stuff and then forget about it…
Actual text conversation with my (37f) mom (77f) today, from across the country, about my beloved childhood doll, Marianne: MOM: Continuing clearing the house. A bit of a weird ? Do you want Marianne? There is a woman who collects dolls, so she would go to someone who would take good care of her. ME: Hmm let me think. This kind of feels like you’re telling me my dog is going to live on a farm. MOM: I hear it’s a very nice farm and Marianne would have lots of new friends ME: Wait is there actually someone who collects dolls though?
I love this and your mom sounds awesome!
This warmed my morning, and so relatable, thank you!
after my dad died, my mom sold the house within 1 week of listing (!!!!). while it felt REALLY fast, and I felt like I had already gone through my room multiple times, it was good to have a 2 day time limit to go through EVERYTHING before the movers came (I’m down to 2 boxes in my mom’s storage unit for NOW [she’s redoing her house] but there were some treasures in there that were fun to find* even if the whole process was exhausting and brought everyone involved to tears at one point or another {*a short silver chain I immediately put on, for example!}
My parents downsizing over the last few months, as my mom is nearly one year into her brain cancer journey (she was only given one year to live) and my dad had loaded me up with the final 3 boxes of my childhood. At first I was mortified and did not want to open them and all the emotions around memories. But I did, and it has been therapeutic, we’ve laughed at everything, cried at some things, and my 5 year old is loving 1980’s Barbie! And then I’ve donated, recycled, and kept 1/2 a box altogether. Travel light my friends.
Parents can’t win for losing in the comments section! Damned if we do ( throw away), damned if we don’t! A hard process for all involved. As a parent that is downsizing, I can tell you that it is emotionally and physically exhausting to go through belongings, to take a gauge on the family and consider all feelings, to involve ( ‘please look through this bin!… don’t get rid of anything rashly! But also please don’t save every bit of ephemera!) or not involve ( *note : they don’t need to see my journals and most private thoughts, but do I keep them or get rid of them) times 1,000 decisions throughout a downsizing process that can be expensive if you DON’T get rid of things ( hello, storage unit). A little grace to the parents is appreciated. We are all just doing the best we can :)
From the child of a hoarder who kept EVERYTHING (every menu we ever scribbled on, every note from a teacher, every sock we ever wore), thank you for trying to approach this respectfully and realistically! I wish my mother had gotten rid of so many things because it has been hell on earth throwing away every thing I ever touched/loved/hated/created while my mother bemoans the loss of a single item. (But that pillowcase was your favorite the year you had chicken pox! You did your homework at that red table, how can you get rid of it?)
I was an Air Force brat that moved every two years overseas and was always under the threat of the “weight limit” on our household goods. There is no museum of me in my parents’ long term post-retirement house, but there is a little more for each child after me. I was lucky one year when I returned home from college to pull the quilts my grandmother had made for me out from under the dogs and take them home. I still spend time in used bookstores looking for favorite books I lost to the weight limit over the years. But, never get my husband started on this topic. He is still very bitter that his parents gave away the very large bin of original Legos from the 70s and 80s that he bought and paid for himself. We were living in the same town and they never even asked him about it. Of all the very valid reasons to resent them, this is the one that surfaces (out loud) the most often.
my mother was always getting rid of things. if i didnt wear a dress for 6 months, it went to the poor. i got my breyer horses out just in time, nothing of mine left.
My mother in law is purging and continually brings me stuff that was my husbands. “look what i found!” she’ll say handing me a 16×20 framed professional photo of him at age 3 (where would i hang this?! I don’t have a photo this big of our own kids!). Recently she gave me an article from the local newspaper about a 2nd grade spelling bee that my husband did NOT win (or even place!) but in the black and white photo, he’s seated off to the side of the second row. (what. a treasure.) I’ve just grown to accept these things from a woman I love so dearly because I feel sure there will be a day, years from now, that I hand utter junk over to someone, my eyes brimming with tears, saying “look what I found!” but meaning “please, take this. I can’t bare to be the one to throw it away”
Emily O your last paragraph has me crying. So true. Your comment about the salad dressing in your other comment has me cracking up laughing. Also so true. I have a tin of cloves from 1974. I used them in a pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving not long. ago. I somehow thought the 70s were a yesterday. Well anyway, thanks. I loved both of your comments. ” Look what I found ” Oh, I say that to my daughter and son-in-law all the time. Crying again <3
Wow, hilarious and beautiful. Thank you for this comment.
As someone who grew up with a borderline hoarder, my urge to purge is constant. And I’m impulsive. I am really sad about the things I have tossed over the years. I had a shoebox full of notes between me and my elementary school best friend, about 1,000 Polaroids (not exaggerating, I went to art school) of college life (thrown away when my bf was caught in bed with someone else,) “bad” photos of me from childhood, clothes I made in highschool and college. Now I have two kids myself, and while I do not make and save a Rubbermaid tub of every single year of their life (have a mom friend who does do this,) I have a ton of saved artwork, scraps of paper with funny things they’ve said, a few saved pieces of clothes, the swaddles and all the books we bought from aged 0-9 at least.
My dad was always the more emotional/sentimental parent (a bit of a role reversal from the stereotypical mom/dad roles!) but he died when he was only 55. My mom sold the house I grew up in and downsized. She got rid of a lot of my stuff, which is funny because she’ll hold onto expired canned goods for years.
Janine this made me laugh! My mom sold all my American Girl dolls when I was 15 (without asking!) but has salad dressing from the 2010 in her fridge. She contains multitudes
Janine, Emily. I laughed very hard at this. Oh yes. My mother threw out my basketball shoes signed by Spud Webb and David Robinson (before I’d even outgrown them!!!), but has every issue of Martha Stewart Living magazine, carefully catalogued in special holders, in her 500 sq ft apt. She showed up one day with a collection of porcelain Easter bunnies (like, a lot, and they are big) that she kept through about 12 moves, that were “mine”, and when I said no thank you, I don’t even ferment having these? She shoved the box in my arms and said “well they were YOURS. and they are COLLECTIBLE”. Straight into the trash without a second thought.
I’d tossed an egg carton easter craft my daughter had made, but her 4yo brother pulled it out of the trash and with shock on his face while holding the bunny aloft said “are you a monster!!?”. So we kept it for a bit longer ha.
When my younger son was in preschool, I picked him up one day and there was a drawing in his cubby of a tiger that said “For Mommy.” I was so touched! I took it home and put it up on the fridge. About three years went by, and the drawing was looking rather faded and bedraggled. So I said to the then-7-year-old “I think I’m going to take this down now, but I sure have enjoyed looking at this drawing you made me when you were small!” And you know what he said? “I didn’t draw that. It got put in my cubby by mistake.” 😂
hahahahahah @ Erin
Erin, that story cracked me up—I will remember it as I procrastinate tossing the boxes of old children’s artwork that keep piling up in the basement!
Erin, that is hilarious!
I live in Oregon and my parents still live in my childhood home in Iowa. Recently, my mom has taken to mailing me bits of my childhood, piecemeal style. An old art project, a little dress I wore as a toddler, my letterman’s jacket. Most recently she sent me some folders with my name on it without looking inside — in it, the discharge papers and invoice for my birth! Incredible, that she had kept that, though I teased her for literally sending me the bill for my existence. I just had a baby last year, and it made me feel so strange and sappy for the him in the future, and all the little bits of ephemera from his life that I will be happy to hold onto.
I can’t believe we don’t get to see the self portrait with the misplaced eyebrows!
yes! i was also looking for the self-portrait 😄
Here for under-eye brows.
Hahah! Same thought!
Several years ago my husband gave his mom a sweatshirt that said, ” It’s Not an Empty Nest Until they Get Thier Stuff Out of the Basement” Anytime he tried to purge his stuff, the comic books would distract him!
Living many states away from my childhood home when my folks downsized, I did not get to do that process…but I still have several items displayed in my home…The pottery sheepdog I made in summer school when I was 12….the hair was made with a garlic press! The music box my godfather sent me for Christmas, the copper 3 Little Pigs piggy bank. I still have my Girl Scout jacket with all my badges on it.
“Closing the museum of me” is so hilarious, bravo. Unfortunately my dad loves the terrible art I created as a child and keeps it displayed in the house, calling it “folk art”, even though I’m now 40. The museum of me is going strong!
That’s so sweet of him, but honestly, the folk art call is real! I had a job that displayed the submissions of a one-time kid’s art contest for years afterwards. I’ve had minimal exposure to kids since no longer being one myself, but I *loved* some of those pieces. There was a dog one in particular that I’ve thought about at least once a week since – and this is 10 years later. There were a lot of aspects to childhood that I’m glad are in the past, but wow, we were little artists!
I am the minimalist daughter of a sentimental father. When he and my mom divorced several years ago, I was suddenly saddled with things he couldn’t bear to either keep or throw away, things like my parents’ wedding album, the champagne flutes they toasted with at their wedding, his wedding ring, and other momentos of their 30-year relationship. The divorce was extremely hard for me, despite being 28 and already married myself when it happened, and I struggle to know what to do with these items. When my parents sold our family home after the divorce, they invited me and my siblings to come look through all our old things–everything from childhood artwork to furniture–and take whatever we wanted. At the time, I lived in a tiny apartment with my husband, so I just didn’t have room for a lot. So many items from my once-happy family ended up donated or tossed, and it makes me sad to this day.
Hi Anon, I hope you are able to find peace with inheriting your parents’ wedding mementos. If you need to hear it, I give you all the permission to throw that baggage away. Keep one wedding photo, turn the wedding band into a cool new piece of jewelry for yourself, and ditch the rest. My parents divorced when I was five, and my dad still lives in the house he built with my mom. He lives there with my stepmom surrounded by all of the things he and mom had in their home- some things still have my mom’s handwriting on them! Sometimes, we just don’t need all of that old stuff.
I feel compassion for both parents and adult children in the question of STUFF! The adult children never asked to have every item of their young lives saved, only to be saddled with the cleaning-out task decades later. But as a parent, I also know the tenderness of all those items that seem to promise to freeze your child *at this age* and then again *at THIS age.* It’s hard to let them go. And truly, what if your child DOES want this memento someday, or that one? What is the answer???
It’s interesting to me that you think the parents wanted to save everything. In my experience, it is often the child who thinks that every minute fragment of childhood must be saved.
Well said, Lindsay. I’m child-free myself, but I have two very different (but always devoted) parents – my father, who only kept a photo album of my childhood, and framed his (and my) favorite shot. Then there’s my mother who kept absolutely everything else, and it grows mustier by the year in her basement. I never asked her to do so. If I went through it all, as you pointed out, it’s possible that I could feel a pang over a few things. I’d much rather do it now, while she’s still in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, rather than later, when I have so much more on my plate. She’s not ready to let go, though. I know how much she adored having babies, and I respect what these momentos mean. Oh, how things can bog us down, though! I too, feel compassion for everyone affected by *things*.
I love this post. It makes me think of the COJ post a while back about framing sentimental objects and items. Perhaps in writing about the little chairs they are preserved in your heart somehow. On the other hand…. some things are just really hard to say goodbye to. Our stuff is meaningful! And shedding it, whether by necessity or choice, is hard. Anyway, I loved the humor and bittersweetness in Alex’s writing. Always love her stuff here. Thank you!
My parents finally made me take the two large totes full of my childhood and teenage years stuff when I got married. I whittled everything down to an engraved wooden box I got for my high school graduation. Sometimes I wish I would have kept all the letters and diaries but overall I am glad to have just one small box of memories.
It astounds me how different people are when it comes to their relationship with their stuff. Both my husband and I come from packrat homes growing up so we swung probably too far in the other direction. We are relentlessly unsentimental about belongings. Photos are gold and don’t take up space. Photos trigger memories. I’m about to clean out my childhood home and it will probably consume all my free time for a year, just when my parents need the most help of their lives and my kids are in high school.
It amazes me when I see/hear of families who keep their kid’s bedroom exactly as it was after they move out. Who are these people that have so much room to spare that they can and are willing to maintain the mausoleum of their beloved child? The SECOND I left home, my parents took over my old bedroom and re-purposed it.
Twyla, agree! I didn’t even wait until my sons officially flew the nest. The year each was a junior in college, I completely rehabbed their room into a calm guest room with a queen bed. They didn’t mind a bit and probably even appreciated it when they brought girlfriends home for visits, lol.
I went through my childhood bedroom shortly after I graduated college, and my dad turned my room into the (very humble) library of his dreams. Among the items discarded: questionable fashion choices I thought my future daughter might wear (not worth keeping), and a shoebox of folded up handwritten notes I kept from friends before cell phones were a thing. I did end up keeping a small collection of band tee-shirts, and a crate of my favorite paperbacks. My kids are now 13, 11, and 7 so I have been dutifully distributing said books according to age. I can’t wait until my daughter is old enough to read Caroline B Cooney’s Face on the Milk Cartoon series, and Mary Downing Hahn’s moody teenage romance (that I was obsessed with) “The Wind Blows Backwards”.
OMG i remember those books.
I am grateful to still live in the home my girls were raised in. Their rooms are repurposed, but I kept anything meaningful for them in our storage space. A bin of American girls dolls. Baby clothes. Beautiful little children’s furniture that a friend hand painted with their names and fairies. Hand made Halloween costumes. Special stuffies. High school letters and awards and 4H ribbons and so much art. Their favorite art supplies. Their piano. I didn’t have stability growing up so to be able to give them this is so meaningful for me. I have very very little from my childhood. My mom only kept what mattered to her, and she can become very disgruntled if those things don’t matter to me. I’ve tried hard to be a different kind of mother, one that loves what my children have loved.
My great-grandfather was a carpenter, so my childhood bedroom was filled with my grandmother’s childhood bed, a set of intricately carved dressers, a fancy dollhouse, and baby doll cradle. My husband and I have struggled with infertility for the last decade and it broke my heart when my parents recently gave away the treasured heirlooms that they had been saving for future grandchildren. I just hope some other little girls love them as much as my grandma, aunts, and I did.
Sending you and your family love <3 I am sure the new owners of those precious items are enjoying them.
I’m so sorry. x
Hi Anon, I know I’m 10 days late to this post and you’ll probably never see this, but your post spoke to my heart and I just wanted to say that I see you and that it’s so, so hard. I have a family heirloom rocking chair sitting in the (mostly empty) second bedroom in my house that’s supposed to become a nursery, if I ever get (and stay) pregnant. I keep the door to that room shut most of the time.
I have an old wood kid sized table and chair set I used when I was really little. Chairs a a bit wobbly, but otherwise good shape. I do not have or know any kids.. still, the table and chairs it in my living room. I SHOULD donate them… but, I feel better if I knew they would go somewhere that they would be treated well and not destroyed. I wish I kept a few past things.. a few toys or high school clothes time capsule.. but I didn’t keep much.
So perhaps just keep them if it feels good to have them around you, if it’s a pleasure to look at them ❤️
How sweet! I wonder if your neighborhood library could use the table and chairs for their kids section? Or if you share your city, one of COJ readers might like the set!
I did not have the happiest childhood home nor did my parents have the happiest marriage. I left home without a lot of stuff. Some years later while helping my father downsize, instead of sorting, we made a decision to f*ck it and chuck it. We loaded his van, drove to the landfill, and had the best time whipping old textbooks, yearbooks, report cards, and familial tat over hills of debris. Shedding the stuff of our outlived lives was absolutely cathartic. It’s one of my favorite memories.
The upside of my childhood home being 1000 sqft is that there was never space for a Museum of Me (or siblings). Every inch was in constant re-creation to meet the current needs. So my childhood stuff was already filtered, boxed, and ready to be dropped off as soon as I settled into one place after the college and post-college moving. A handful of items are in use – mainly ordinary things with a memory attached – but most is in a box in my basement, next to my husband’s box. Every few years we bring them up, enjoy the show and tell and walk down memory lane, and put it back. My parents recently moved and did their version of Swedish Death Cleaning as part of the process, which brought more objects into my home. Those have been trickier – like the Halloween costumes my mother sewed for us kids. And with my in-laws passing, there’s even more coming. The Museum of Your Parents is a vastly larger collection!
STORAGE by Mary Oliver When I moved from one house to another there were many things I had no room for. What does one do? I rented a storage space. And filled it. Years passed. Occasionally I went there and looked in, but nothing happened, not a single twinge of the heart. As I grew older the things I cared about grew fewer, but were more important. So one day I undid the lock and called the trash man. He took everything. I felt like the little donkey when his burden is finally lifted. Things! Burn them, burn them! Make a beautiful fire! More room in your heart for love, for the trees! For the birds who own nothing–the reason they can fly.
Thank you for posting this!
❤️❤️
God I love this poem. Whenever I am cleaning out a closet or purging kitchen utensils hardly used, I yell “Things! Burn them, burn them!” And my husband thinks I am crazy. Haha.
When my folks moved I thought I would be the most sentimental out of the three of us siblings- I’m the oldest and generally the most wistful. I was really surprised at how easily I let things go, though! We photographed my doll collection and I packed all but 4 of them away for the secondhand shop. Books? I thought I’d end up taking cartons and cartons of them back home with me, but in the end I took the irreplaceable ones and had friends go through the rest before we packed them for the seller, as well. I ended up bringing maybe four boxes of papers, childhood books, knickknacks and photo albums home. The photos, books, the four porcelain dolls, two china tea sets and my dollhouse, and some handmade baby clothes that I wore as a baby, along with some handmade clothes my grandmother had given me for my Cabbage Patch Doll were the only things that I really am glad I kept. Oh, and my great-grandmother’s majjong tile box that I use as a jewelry box. I am sure we got rid of (tossed/sold) a lot of our childhood stuff we could have kept, but I like thinking about the collectors and people who get to enjoy our books and toys again.
My parents showed up with a couple boxes of my baby clothes a few years ago. “I can’t throw away your CHILDHOOD!” my mom told me. So now I have to throw away my childhood. Haha! It was odd because we chose to adopt from the foster care system and never had an infant. So there is literally NO use for the scratchy as hell baby clothes unless I want to keep them for decades in case potential grandchildren wear them? What a waste! But among the clothes were handmade blankets from my parents friends. Quilts and crocheted things. So much effort and love went in to those, and it felt so wrong to throw them away and equally wrong to give them to my dog, who would probably chew on them. So they did go back in the box and I still have them for no real purpose. They really are so scratchy I don’t think anyone would use them on an actual baby (so no point to donate). I did keep my beloved childhood stuffed dog, Strudel, leaking stuffing, though what I will do with him beyond shove him in the attic is unknown. It’s such a weird, nostalgic trip going through all that ephemera!
My MIL just died and she was a maximalist. I’m sitting here is my husband’s childhood bedroom pumping and looking at all the stuff we need to get rid of. Jeezus Christ.
Oh geez. Sending hugs. Was recently in this same situation minus the pumping. Opened envelopes full of my husband’s baby teeth, every pair of glasses anyone every wore etc so much! My gift to my children will be that I’ll go through my stuff and theirs and they won’t spend every weekend doing it for months on end while cursing all the shift I saved.
I’m 40yo and the “museum of me” aka my childhood bedroom is still almost fully intact (the bed is different) at my parent’s home. Even the closet has some of my old clothes and shoes. I live across the country, but when we travel home for the holidays every December, it’s a return to my high school bedroom including a fully stocked bookcase with gifts from my high school classmates wedged in between books. It’s weird. But oddly comforting. Part of me wants them to get rid of it all and the other part of me enjoys returning to the museum of high school me 1x a year.
My mom, bless her, kept everything including old report cards. They were surprisingly helpful in securing an ADHD diagnosis at the age of 41yo. I wish I could post photos here of my childhood dollhouse from my grandparents house. With its custom paintings, framed miniature pictures of me and tiny furniture acquired over various birthdays and Christmases, my now 7yo son is largely uninterested. But the real gem is a self portrait I drew at the age of seven or eight. It’s me, full body, encapsulated in a large dill pickle, with smaller gherkin all around. At the top it reads “I’m in a pickle.” Get it???? Cracking myself up for 41 years and counting…
In a Pickle – I will absolutely assign this project to my 10 year old this weekend. I will frame it and adore it and make her throw it away when I die.
Oh my gosh! I used my report cards as part of my ADHD testing! I thought my mother was crazy for saving all that stuff but at 55yo it came in handy. I think you need to frame your pickle portrait and hang it proudly in your home! It’s brilliant!
I want to see the inside of the box! Purple velvet!!
My dad, a widow, pared things down in 2005 when he moved and then 2012 before he sold that house and moved to memory care for his Alzheimer’s. I have one plastic bin with some photos/yearbooks and that’s really good for me! My in-laws’ house will be much harder to clean out, god forbid when that day comes.
I think my mom has been more attached to my stuff than I’ve been! She recently had a pipe burst and had to hire a company to help her sort through everything because of the sheer volume of things ahead has (expensive!!). She would text me about assorted items I didn’t even realize I had left or things that meant nothing to me – a generic card from my graduation a decade before? Toss it! I have boxes of mementos that I’ve kept and weed through every so often, but that show (adapted from the book which I haven’t read lol) Swedish Death Cleaning really made me think about what sorts of things we keep and what we let go of and ultimately whose responsibility it becomes to go through it all after we’re gone.
My boyfriend of 6 months recently told me that the dresser I use for extra storage in my kitchen is ugly. I gasped and exclaimed, “But that’s my childhood dresser!” It was my dad’s many years ago until he, mid-childhood, gave it to me to use. To me, it is so integrated into my memory that it’s impossible to see it as ugly. I see the beauty in the nostalgia. To be completely honest, I also think it is objectively a beautiful piece that’s a bit worn. I think he associates scuffed, chipped, etc as ugly, but I think the imperfections are what make it charming. He tried to back track, “Maybe it’d look better if we refinished it!” I thought it was funny. But regardless, I’m keeping it, and
Oh my goodness, I experienced this from your bf’s side. Recently married and when my new husband (who is 51) proudly showed me his “antique” chair that belonged to his grandparents, I burst into tears. I am not overly sentimental about stuff (except my mom’s bike, which I ride), but that hideous 1990s striped-in-Ronald-MacDonald-red, navy, and gold upholstery over a knobby wood frame that looks like it came out of the Oval Office… it is not neutral. It would overpower any room with its “Here I am! Put a golf border up and some of those china dogs and a few horse prints and I’ll fit right in!” My taste, by contrast, is minimal, Scandinavian even. I suggested reupholstering it and he cried, “but the fabric reminds me of my Grandma!” Um, exactly. So I am crossing fingers that it makes its way to his office. I think it’s telling that it didn’t end up in any of his married brothers’ houses. Their wives took one look and said, um, no thank you!
Last summer I went through several boxes of childhood paraphernalia that my parents had brought with them when they retired and moved from Canada to Sweden. Including all my old report cards (I was a “pleasure to have in class”), practically every essay I ever wrote in school, a million letters (mostly received by me, but also some I sent), artwork, boxes and boxes of photographs etc etc. I threw most of it out and my dad was aghast – “How are you going to write your autobiography some day without all of this?” I guess I’ll just have to make it up…
You will regret those chairs for the rest of your life.
I’ve made a pact my future self that my future self won’t beat me up with regret over items that I’ve donated or decluttered. If I do happen to regret something, it’s usually only a mild feeling, that’s tempered by remembering that I made the best choice I could at the time. So I give myself grace and move on.
Gosh, I hope she won’t! I’ve given away dearly loved items from my childhood and my children’s childhoods to both dear friends and relative strangers and my heart swells to know they’re living new life with new littles.
I don’t think she will. She will be happy the rest of her life about the space she has in her apartment and the breathing room and easy moves – and have the memory surrounding the chairs! Space is so valuable, and not being held down by things as well. My parents still have nearly everything of THEIR childhood and OURS – and now they are in there 80s and can’t move to a simpler apartment because the house is full and overwhelming and they are worried about a move.
(I made a dramatic statement because I know the author has the power to invite the chairs back to her world: WRITING is everything).
Oh, I just met the chairs when I read the post yet I already regret the chairs! They are truly perfect.
I’m now in my early 40s and spent most of my 20s being extremely minimal in a Brooklyn apartment. Now I have kids of my own and there is so much I wish I had kept!! I purged records, band tees, toys, paper dolls, etc etc etc. Things that I would LOVE to pass down to my kids now that they would be cool and vintage. I’m here to tell you HOARD MORE!!
Oof. Just noting that the reply above about making a pact not to beat myself up over regret is from a different Liz than the “hoard more” Liz!
or….don’t? Maybe the records would have been heavy and cumbersome to move from place to place, maybe bugs would’ve eaten/stained the t-shirts, maybe the paper dolls would’ve disintegrated…saving things *does not* guarantee their condition on the other side. Signed, my collection of Boxcar children books was ruined by silverfish
I don’t have a strong perspective on hoard vs unload but I do have a strong perspective that silverfish are the devil incarnate
I regret throwing out so much, because as a teen I remember finding things like my mom’s high school yearbooks and figuring out, whoa, mom was cool! It’s like discovering a big secret to snoop through your parents past. I have taken that from my kids!
We moved several times growing up so there was always an element of tossing out items. After I graduated college, my older brother moved back in with my parents and took my old room. I had already moved across the country on short notice and took the few things I cared about at that time. I think there are still bins in a storage room of stuff I wanted to keep from our move in 1999 (!!!) that I’ve told my parents they can just toss out or donate. I haven’t looked in those bins in 26 years so it can’t be important. My husband and I each grew up with a parent who was a bit of a pack rat, so we’re equally ruthless about conscious consumption and selling/donating what we don’t need. We’ve also both had to help clear out the homes of grandparents and that is a task I wouldn’t wish upon anyone. I wish more people would embrace Swedish death cleaning! One of my husband’s grandmothers was the model of it and it was truly such a gift when she passed. We could focus on memories of her and not stress about her stuff.
My dad first downsized when I was 22, so I went through and had a yard sale with most of the toys and books that I could part with, and convinced him to keep about 6 boxes of things and a giant garbage bag of stuffed animals. He’d bring me a box every time he visited over the next few years, until I had it all… or so I thought. He downsized again for a move across the country last year, and now I’ve got two bins of all my childhood art, and a couple of boxes of all our framed photos, and a couple of boxes of just miscellaneous paperwork. And then there are a few boxes of our own family ephemera that he couldn’t part with, but he didn’t want to move… so he moved it to my unfinished basement. How the turntables. My partner is very much not a packrat, and I very much am. I think he’s frustrated by the clutter, but understands the emotional tax of going through all of the boxes to keep, donate, trash. It’ll take me a while, but I’ll manage… eventually.
My FIL donated, gave away, sold and trashed so much of his house before he died. It was such a blessing not to have to deal with so much stuff (he had six kids!) Ever grateful for that man.
Oh my gosh, I schlepped my old dresser and nightstand with me from my parents years ago (2014? 2015?) and held onto them ever since, moving around with them throughout states despite the dresser being in less than great shape and wobbly. Finally in 2024 when we were giving away almost everything we owned to travel, I worked up the courage to give them away and I believe they are now in another girlhood bedroom (hopefully with the dresser fixed up!).
Hi Daniela, I’m in my mid-sixties and *still* have my childhood nightstand, dresser, and mirror! They were a present from my grandparents, who selected the French Provincial style (white with gold trim and curvy legs) and asked me to choose a three- or six-drawer dresser. They don’t really match anything else but they have moved with me to three different states. I enjoy their solid construction and association with good childhood memories. No shame in keeping old furniture as long as it still works in your current life!
My mom made me take all of my stuff as soon as she could. I still have my teddy bear, Raggedy Ann, and my favorite childhood books. After moving my in-laws (not hoarders, but also not known for editing their stuff) this summer, I wanted to come home and toss the teddy immediately. I am always editing and getting rid of things we don’t need, but I am going even deeper now. I do NOT want to put our kids through what we’ve been dealing with.
Amen to this! No one wants your old stuff, or even your parents or kids (especially not your kids).
I can relate to this a bit. My in-laws were in charge of the estate of a friend who passed away (she didn’t have any close, immediate family still living). She was sentimental and kept EVERYTHING. Even with very detailed instructions, it took them months to sort through it all. My mother-in-law said it was a learning experience and she does not want her kids to have to do this someday. I’m sentimental, so I get wanting to hold on to special items (I also still have my blankey and teddy) but those treasures might only feel like stuff to get rid of to someone else. I also don’t want to burden my child with sorting through my entire life when I’m gone — or when it’s time to go to a senior living facility LOL.
“the Museum of Me”, love this !
The view from the other side of the rubbish bags…I am in the process of moving house after 30 years in the same place, downsizing from three-bed house to probable one bed apartment. For years I have stored my very adult kids’ stuff and now push has come to shove. My son – no probs. My daughter…she slides away from every task like an eel, doing half the job and then leaving it. She is coming to stay in about ten days and there is nowhere left to wriggle out of. I shall take my grandson out for a walk, give her a rubbish bag and she can get busy. She doesn’t want stuff herself but would rather I got rid for her. Frankly, no. It’s the adult thing to do and I have held onto far too much for far too long. I love her but really not the broken bracelet from 2009. I shall, however, treasure the hand made pottery head of Anne Boleyn. You simply never know when you might want to dust that.
I think you’re in the right here, Annie. She’s got to take care of it herself. I think I was similar to your daughter and my mom finally forced the boxes on me and made me start schlepping them around from apartment to apartment– it made me realize how much of it I wanted to get rid of. It’s not your responsibility anymore!
My mom (of COJ downsizing fame!!) sent me a literal pallet stacked almost 5 feet high to my doorstep during the pandemic. In it was all the things she had kept for me from my childhood and adolescence. Unpacking, sorting and purging it was an experience, to say the least. It’s changed how I hang on to things for my own kids! It’s such a draining process to let go of worthless, useless items that once meant something to you!
Hi Hali! Say hi to your mom for me, too!
My parents delivered a Uhaul trailer to my door full of stuff from my childhood. I was touched thinking of the affection and effort that went into saving these things. But going through it all brought up so many emotions (not all positive!), I felt like a crazy person. Same as you, it made me think about how to save things for my kids, who are just toddlers now.
That photo of the chairs! It put me in mind of this absolutely beautiful children’s book called “Little Blue Chair” that is all about the travels of one man’s outgrown childhood chair…I hope your chairs have similar adventures!
So sweet. That’s exactly what I’m picturing for my chairs. Gonna have to track that book down.
That book is so good. I think my parents still have a copy in their home….
In 1986 I was the only one of my 1st grade friends who did not have a Cabbage Patch doll. My parents hinted that I was getting something special, and I excitedly told my friends she was finally coming! My dad handed me a wrapped box that I opened to find… a fake Cabbage Patch doll. She had spiky short hair, no toes or belly button. She certainly did not have a birth certificate, and she wore an ugly brown shirt under overalls that made her look like a tv grandpa. I took her to my room, cried, and told her I hated her. My family moved at least ten times between the day I got Suzy and when I moved out at 18. I am now 46 years old and have a shoebox of items from my childhood—and, of course, my beloved Suzy, whose head got smashed in by my brother when we got in a fight when I was 13. What does one do with a beloved, creepy doll with a cracked plastic head that exposes her brain – who I tried to super glue back together but only made her worse?! I can’t throw her away. Do I bury her? Donate her to a doll artist? Burn her in some odd ritual? For now, we hide her in random places in the house to scare whoever opens the cupboard or goes to crawl into bed.
Your description of the fake Cabbage Patch doll is too good. I’m glad Suzy is still floating around.
Love this story Florencia, especially the hiding her to scare people, amazing!
This is all soooo relatable and timely for me. I just last week spent time at my parents’ house, slept in my childhood bedroom and cleaned out closets that in their depths contained a younger-me museum. It was emotionally exhausting but ultimately cathartic and healthy finally confronting the time warp and cleaning them out. But I too have an ancient babydoll that I couldn’t toss – she’s not a damaged off-brand Cabbage Patch (omg so cute and hilarious) but she was essentially my Velveteen Rabbit. And I too mentally went through the options of burial? Ritual doll cremation?? Such a weird, specific thing to contemplate. Anyway, nice to know other people are having the same strange dilemma – solidarity y’all!
I had a few things like this that I couldn’t bear to get rid of but didn’t really want to keep taking care of. What I settled on was this: I took pictures of the things, said goodbye to them, and then a very kind friend took care of them for me. It was only a few things —less than a bin’s worth—and I can continue to think of them as existing out in the world, but in truth, I have no idea what ever happened to them. If it had been a large quantity of items, I wouldn’t have been okay with asking for help, but I whittled the pile down a lot on my own first and just asked for help when I got to the end. It turns out that what I really wanted to keep was the memories associated with the items, and I can do that with the photos on my phone. I’m surprisingly okay with how it turned out and I don’t regret it.
I’m currently vacationing in my husband’s childhood home and his room is mostly still intact (45 yrs old, our two kids are sleeping there). It’s sweet, but also some of his childhood art and trophies do seem like clutter and aren’t appreciated. But the Robin Hood Legos?? Gold! Meanwhile, my folks were eager to send me off with storage bins of my items when their empty, unfinished basement was larger than my whole apartment. That stung. It’s hard to be faced with decisions on downsizing in your 20/30s – I was partly horrified of teen photos of myself, but now nearing 50, those would be lovely to have.
Wow! So relevant. My mom repainted and redecorated the “Museum of Me” a couple of years ago. She had slowly been bringing items to me. When we bought our first house she off loaded the really difficult but awful stuff like photos and letters and yearbooks. I have moved, yet again and now have a house half the size of our first. The giant mission style oak chair I made n high school has moved with us but I am afraid we cannot keep it. For me it’s not difficult to let go of, but for my husband it will be 🤣.
A few years ago I went through an old box of birthday cards and I found $75 in unclaimed gift money! I must not have appreciated the cold hard cash when I was 5…
Tossed all the random sport participation trophies but kept my pageant banner and crown. I remember my mother being sad my older sisters broke her pageant crown while playing and I surprised myself by being upset when the same thing happened to me! Also, you are making me re-think keeping all my yearbooks. They’re in a bin in a basement but I never look at them and they are heavy to move!
Somewhere around my high school years, my mom got large plastic bins and jumbo Sharpied each of our names on one. The idea was that we could keep anything that fit in that box. (The reality is we all stashed so many other miscellaneous boxes around lol.) Slowly, over the last decade or so of us all being adults, we’ve whittled it down to that one box. My parents have lived in the same house our whole lives, and thankfully understand that two of their three kids are constantly on the move, and let us take advantage of the space in their attic. My two siblings are quick to be rid of things, but I am too sentimental and that box is packed to the gills. ;)
My parents are still together, but they are three houses beyond my childhood home, so I’ve had all my stuff for years. And now that they’ve downsized, I have *their* stuff too! That being said we’re in the process of reorganizing the basement, and I’ve found so much wonderful old stuff. A pair of jeans that my friends drew and wrote all over as a goodbye gift to me when my family moved across the country when I was high school. My old Walkman (still works!) stopped in the middle of Fiona Apple’s first album. TONS of my childhood books (some very good condition Richard Scarry!). And the most wonderful thing of all—a journal my brother kept in second grade. He died when we were in our early 20s, and one of the things I miss most is having someone to reminisce with (he was my only sibling). I vividly remember so much of what he wrote about in that journal—things I haven’t thought about in years and years. It was truly a gift to find it.
So glad you found your brother’s journal. What a treasure.
My minimalist-meets-sentimentalist solution was to buy a scanner! I have photographed and scanned report cards, letters to the tooth fairy, funny art, etc. and am in the process of compiling them into photo books that I will print. (I’m in Canada and use Pikto.com). This way, I can hold onto some special memories without having plastic tubs full of stuff in my closet.
Yes, I’ve seen moms recommend that even while kids are still little. Take photos of their art (and other school projects) all year and then order a photo book at the end of the year. Don’t save the actual pieces.
I did this with my girls’ prolific collection of artwork, when they were little – I took photos of the art and incorporated them into our photo albums. And of course I kept several amazing pieces, some of which are framed.
Alison Mazurek does something similar with her kids’ art. Such a good idea. https://www.600sqft.com/blog/category/Kid+Art+Book
You can also add the pictures into a WiFi enabled electronic picture frame. I traveled for months a few years ago, and that was the first thing I set up wherever I was staying. It’s so fun to see those pictures pop up!
My parents have been very generous with keeping my childhood items given I’m 36, but have been dropping off one box at a time of things for me to go through. The other day it was a whole lot of clothes. Amongst the old t-shirts and socks were a pair of Playboy boyshorts with the phrase ‘Bunny Girl’ emblazoned on the back, as well as my name on the label ( I went to boarding school ). My husband looked equal parts horrified, incredulous and fascinated when I pulled those out haha
I have stuffed animals and model horses that I can’t bring myself to get rid of because, as a child who empathized very deeply with animals (I became vegetarian at age 10, then tried to start an anti-animal cruelty club that did nothing for my popularity in middle school), I still anthropomorphize them and feel terrible having to chose which to keep and which to leave. What if these inanimate chunks of plastic feel rejected or abandoned?? I just can’t do it.
But Kat, wouldn’t they be happier being played with? Please donate the horses to your favorite nursery school or church!
Agree with Cynthia! How do your stuffed animals and model horses feel being kept in a bin and unused? Thank them for you time together, take a photo to remember them, and pass them along to someone who will give them the life they deserve!
same, kat, same.
I totally relate! Cannot throw away a stuffed animal of any kind. Have to donate them or shove them deeper in a box.
I live far away from where I grew up, so when my parents sold my childhood home, I wasn’t very involved in the downsizing process. Which was fine — I remember saying to my mom on the phone that no, really, it was OK for her to recycle the notes I took in 9th grade social studies class! She did put some things aside for me; my childhood and teenage journals, which provided hilarious reading material during COVID lockdown, for example. But I’m actually pretty grateful not to have had to do a ton of agonizing over what to keep. I live in a small space with limited storage, and things that once seemed really important (prom dress? medals from swim meets? shoe box full of notes passed in junior high?) just don’t anymore.
Wow, this is so timely because I have dedicated the day to going through huge boxes of mementos and—through some sneaky procrastination—I haven’t gotten so far. I’m 36 and newly-ish living with a partner I feel incredibly confident in, for the first time, in the smallest apartment I’ve lived in since my early twenties (either alone or with another). My parents recently asked me to take all my stuff from their storage…all of this is appropriate and fine. But the grief is enormous! One of the things that I’m really wrestling with is how many sentimental things I’ve kept because I anticipated my one-day children enjoying them—a beautiful dress, a photo album I made of Polaroids I took as a teen, or (egotistical, perhaps) all my journals since I was 5. I don’t have children, and I’m not sure I want them, but letting go of these things so I can make my current life more livable and enjoyable (because the emotional and mental toll of clutter is REAL) feels so painful to choose when the story isn’t necessarily over. Similarly, letting go of furniture or art that doesn’t have a space in this small home feels painful…it’s a moment of accepting where I actually am versus where I thought I’d be at this age—with more space or more money, or more something. I can stand by all of my choices and feel proud of who I am, but there’s some grief that comes with saying goodbye to sentimental things you had assumed would have meaning one day in the future…but that future is here and it’s not what you thought it’d be. It’s like I’m saying goodbye to so many past and potential versions of me at once.
I can tell you that almost every item I kept for a one-day child was played with a few times then discarded. My daughters just plain did not care about my things! They cared about their own chosen things. Exceptions were books and the Fisher Price Little People sets that live at grandma’s house.
What Midge said!
Haha, Midge and Kimberly, I totally get that! I think for me, it’s more about that I won’t even have a chance to be rejected by my phantom-children that is tripping me up! I come from a family that is held together by a lot of lore–what will my life mean if the lore is mine alone to hold? I am an artist and so am wondering what I can make with all of these mementos that can maybe become regenerative…but I’m in an existential hole about it all today!
That box is AWESOME!
Oh gosh, what a timely post! My basement flooded in the spring and I am going through plastic tubs full of memories…my mom kept so much. I have my brownie uniform, awards, patches, notebooks from Y Leaders Club, pictures in albums, Girl Scout sash w badges, little tiny dresses I wore, baby dolls…everything. AND my sons things!!! Baby clothes, toddler clothes, baby blankets, rattles, books, toys….i am enjoying looking through it all but question what to keep! I’ve decided to neatly box up my son’s things and let him have the fun of going down his own memory lane someday. Purging some items of mine, but it’s SO HARD. Memories are hard to throw away!! I find if I can’t recall an item, away it goes.
It appears that I am in the minority here. When I graduated from law school (almost 15 years ago), my sweet parents asked me if I wanted my childhood stuff. I immediately said no. And have no regrets. I have mementos here and there from my husband and our daughter but things don’t really do it for me. I love the acts.
Same boat – I moved across the country at 22. My parents did not keep anything and I didn;t take anything other than essentials.
This is a hard process!! Did anyone else have a visceral, stomach- flip reaction at the tossing of the yearbooks?! How would I show my hypothetical grandchild the picture of the friend who made me the perfect Dave Matthews/Verve Pipe/Barenaked Ladies mix tape, and what if I forget my art teacher’s name??
I had the same feeling, Julie! I’m not very sentimental and have happily tossed most of my childhood possessions. My yearbooks and journals are the exception!
Yearbooks!! For me, it’s even less about the photos and more about the messages – lordy, my friends and I would write novels to one another on those blank pages (or wherever we could find the space). And the message you crush would write to you? Oh man…nostalgia is something powerful.
Nope. I tossed my childhood yearbooks years ago and have never once wished I had them to show my kids. (They do get a kick out of me talking about life pre-smart phones though. They call it “the olden days.”)
Totally agree! I remember when my mom brought out her old high school yearbooks when I was in high school and the JOY we had looking through them, reading what everyone wrote. I hope my kids have the same experience some day.
I’ve kept the yearbook from my Junior year. It has a sweet message from the red-headed boy I had a crush on; he was a Senior and about to leave our American military high school for college in San Diego. Sooooo cute and we were both in the high school play (our characters shared a chaste kiss at the end, but on the last night we started making out hard core and they brought the curtain down on us). Reader, five years later I married him. We just celebrated our 33rd wedding anniversary. That year book message was the start of it all.
Oh, Cris, what a wonderful story! I am so glad you have that yearbook as part of the story of your relationship. And too funny about the last kiss that brought the curtain down!
Rude, I think it should be illegal for my parents to ever move or declutter xD
Sadly I went through a minimalist phase in my 20s during which I (proudly) ditched almost all of my childhood belongings. Do not be me! Turns out sentimentality kicks in around 35….
We are downsizing my mom right now from her house to a condo – its not my childhood home, also divorced parents. But my mom has lived alone for 15 years and her house is in ROUGH shape. She’s not well enough to handle it (hence the relocating to a retirement community) and so the whole thing is falling on me and my husband… the house repairs, the realtor appointments, the financials, and of course – the going through all her “stuff”. I also have two young kids. I’m impressed by how this essay makes this situation out to be fun and nostalgic – mine is just hard.
Alex, That’s a lot to deal with. So sorry you’re going through this. Just two young kids alone and a job is enough. I hope your able to sort everything out with as minimal difficulty as possible!
This sounds so hard, Alex. I had a hard time downsizing my mom, too. But I also found some glimmers and learned so much. I’ve taken what I learned plus found a boss and mentor and now I help people with downsizing (among other things) as a professional organizer and move manager. Your mom is really lucky to have you and your husband to help.
We went through this with my grandma a few years ago. It mostly fell to my mom but my sisters and I flew out for a long weekend to help. It was a doozy. So.many.possessions. A decision or two or four required for each item. We had some fun with her zany (and much sequined) clothes but mostly it was very hard emotional work!
Welcome back Cup of Jo! My mornings weren’t quite the same without you! Hope you all had a wonderful vakay!!