“I remember a friend visiting and opening my bedroom door to see a massive pile of shoes,” Anna Macdonald tells me. “I think I must have been sorting them out – I was often ‘sorting’. I think it was escapism – a distraction, really, as it was rarely effective. I’ll never forget the look of horror on their face at the sheer amount of stuff I had.”
For much of her life, Macdonald has been ruled by the sheer volume of clutter in her home. The impact of this has had a profound effect on her mental health, relationships and sense of self.
“I had a pretty normal, middle-class life until my mum died when I was 14,” she begins. “My dad remarried and I became part of a larger blended family. There was so much stuff and it was often very dirty and chaotic… it sometimes felt like we were living in squalor.”
Shorts
Shortly after the death of her mother, Macdonald sadly lost two other close relatives. At this point, she began compulsively shopping. “It was my addiction of choice – but I didn’t even realise it was an addiction. I just really liked buying things. I wouldn’t call myself a hoarder, but I definitely had much more stuff than I needed.”
