Lauren Williams Working With Hoarders
The call was labeled as working with hoarders and as Lauren Williams started her presentation it was apparent that yes, it was about people that collect, but it really morphed into something far greater. The act and compulsion to hoard is a disease and is identified as such. Knowing how to identify people that have a genuine illness and the right way to assist them is essential and the fix is not just to clean out the place.
Lauren Williams offered that she has taken better than 60 hours of professional training in order to recognize and treat people with this compulsion. She is a paid professional that gets paid by the hour for her work and in some instances, it is recognized as a medical issue.
There are private groups that will fund treatment and not all insurance carriers identify it as a treatable disorder so many people will tap out their resources trying to get help.
She discussed that it could take as few as 5 minutes of carefully offered questions to recognize that there is more to the clutter than meets the untrained eye.
It is a mental illness that affects app 2.5% of the people around the world, and this is greater than the percentage of people diagnosed as bipolar, OCD, PTSD among few.
People have sympathy and recognize the lesser common and few identify with the hoarders. While a hoarder may not recognize the difference between a used pizza box and a Picaso painting. They cannot make a decision between what is and is not important. 
The identification of the disorder is not simple and can start as young as 5 years old. It is not easily diagnosed as people do not recognize the disorder or look at it as a fringe to something easier to diagnose.
The disease does impact people in many ways. In the case of a parent, they may be raising their children in an unhealthy environment. Neighbors may ne complaining about horrible orders as well as pest infestations, or fire hazards.
Cleaning out a home or apartment is time consuming as well as unhealthy and can take a lot of time, as the person that created the mess, sees it as a threat to their possessions.
Lauren offered links to resources for understanding the disease as well as ways to get help for afflicted people.
It was a highly enlightening call and Lauren was very open with her response to questions.
If one does know of someone suffering with the affliction seek help from the resources offered or reach out to Lauren through her ActiveRain Profile.
Lauren Williams Working With Hoarders
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