My condolences on your mother. I'd get someone professional to clean out the house. I don't understand hording but I would get him some professional help before he gets too bad.

Dsf, so sorry for your loss. Of course cleaning out her house is hard, even more so now that she's gone. You are probably dealing with very many memories in the process. This is so hard on many levels.

Is it possible someone else could clean out her house for you, or even with you? Can your brother help? Is he at all willing to work with you? Feelings of loss could reasonably trigger increased hoarding on his part. Would he be willing to agree to an exchange? He could keep some "precious mementos" which he would select at his discretion (you wouldn't be telling him what to keep) and he would voluntarily give up some of the other stuff.

If you really do have to clean the house by yourself goal setting and organizational skills will be even more helpful than usual ( because of your recent loss and all the memories). Setting clear parameters and objectives before you start will be really useful, as will being flexible and allowing time for both your and your brother's grieving processes.
For example: (parameter) "we need to keep all the legal papers, get rid of all the newspapers and choose which books to keep". You would come up with your own categories of what to keep, trash, sort, donate, etc. If something is solidly in either your trash or donate category you don't really even need to look at it unless you think it might contain something from the keep or sort category.

Example of an objective: "we're tackling the kitchen today" or "for the next 10 minutes I'll work on this pile here". Breaking down overwhelming tasks into a much smaller pieces can be really helpful.

Again sorry for your loss. Wishing you peace and success in the days ahead.

EDIT: Also wanted to say, celebrate even small successes with rewards. Lunch out for a morning of hard work no matter how much you got (or didn't get) done. A few days off when you finish the job (if you can). Any other thing you find rewarding.
And, how is your relationship with your brother? Now could be a good time to strengthen that if possible.

Just some thoughts. Sorry for your loss and that you are going through this.

Thanks for the replies. I’m trying to hire a cleaning service, but my brother has to cooperate, and he isn’t answering his phone. I know I will reach him eventually. I thought mother’s new husband was helping around the house, but he wasn’t. Apparently, my oldest brother said it was about as bad as can be last week.

My mother developed hoarding due ot brain tumor damage.

I had to sort her stuff while she was alive and angry at me about it all.

Take out what is legally needed. Donate what is safe to donate. If you ask, "Yes or no?" and think, "Maybe?".... It is a NO. Or you re-sort stuff *again* three months later.

Anything that's not good enough/clean enough to donate? Or required legally for some reason? Or valuable as a memento and in good shape? Leave in the house, and that counts furniture. Then call in 1-800-Got Junk or similar, and it all goes. All.

(NOTE: I have durable and incapacity POA both for my mom, so this was all on me. Yay.)


You can't save a hoarder from themselves. I've learned taht the last few years with my mom. The hoarding will be... Well, till the hoarder chooses otherwise.

So if your brother is also a hoarder? Best you can do is try to see if your area has professional health care visits for such, social workers, etc., b/c this isn't yours to do. We're family, not healers/fixers much as we want to be.

HUGS and condolences. Just my perspective after doing several rounds of "it's this or Mom is homeless"... *sigh*

I’m so sorry for your loss
Sending much support & many prayers <3

dsf95, either would be enough to stress me out, cleaning out my mom's house after her death or seeing a brother on the edge of spiraling down. Having to handle them both at once is a crisis. Sending you all of my support right now, hoping you can care for yourself as you care for both situations, too.

that has got to be horrible, i am so sorry to hear that. one of the deepest ironies in life the that is so cathartic to let go of something that means so much, but it its also so hard because it means so much....i really hope you get through this ok. So sorry

Big hug for you ds..... I am so sorry that you're going through such a hard time....

Hoarders can use terrible anger to keep you out... If your brother continues to dodge you I would call the city or adult protective services to get involved....

Bless you....xo

How are you doing now, ds?

Thanks for the comments. I’m sad. My hoarding brother (I’ll call him Dale) won’t let me pay for a cleaning service. Dale doesn’t think it’s as bad as our other brother (I’ll call him Kyle) thinks it is and wants me to wait a month.

Kyle lives in Oregon and flew home, but had to evacuate because of the fires.
He’s also possibly becoming radicalized towards the Right and believes antifa set the fire to hurt Trump. Funny, he lectured Dale and me that Dad would have wanted us to be Republicans, but I was like, umm Dad voted for Clinton.

Oh, no, dsf95, and now the west coast fires factor into your family dynamics, too? And current political controversy comes in? It just seems to get more complicated day by day. Sending you support for the strength just for today. This is a lot.