How do you approach decluttering sentimental items? If you have things lurking in your house that haven’t seen the light of day in years but you just can’t bear to let them go, read on for my tips for preserving your memories without keeping the physical items.
“But I can’t give away my memories!”
If you’ve ever said this, you’re in the right place. Decluttering sentimental items is one of the biggest barriers people face when they set out to purge the clutter in their lives.
I’m usually very practical when it comes to deciding what to keep and what to get rid of. Even so, there are a lot of things in our daughters’ rooms that have escaped my decluttering efforts. Primarily, this is because these items belong to them. I’m a big believer in dealing with my own clutter and letting other family members deal with theirs.
When our daughter Colleen moved to the east coast last year, she took most of the stuff from her room with her, and we got rid of a lot of things. Now, with our daughter Laura moving to Australia later this year, it’s decision time for all the things she left behind in her room “until she was settled somewhere more permanently”.
When our daughters were home over the Easter weekend, we took some time to go through the boxes that were left in their bedroom closets. Looking through old schoolwork and keepsakes together was fun. We laughed a lot, kept a few special items, and got rid of a ton of stuff!
This exercise reminded me why decluttering sentimental items is difficult for many people—myself included.
Tips for decluttering sentimental items
The challenge with these items is they tug at your heartstrings. Just looking at them can bring back a flood of memories. When I hear myself saying “Awww”, I know I’m in trouble.
Decluttering sentimental items requires a slightly different approach, but there’s still value in asking the questions from my Easy Decluttering Checklist.
First, if something has been tucked away in a cupboard or tote box for 20 years, the answer to “Did I even know I owned this?” is likely no, and “When did I last use this?” is probably longer ago than you care to remember. I admit I was surprised at how much of the girls’ schoolwork I’d kept. I thought I’d done a much better job of purging at the end of every school year. Out of sight, out of mind!
With the easy questions out of the way, the question you’re most likely to get hung up is “Do I love it?” It has sentimental value, so of course you’ll say yes. That’s why I pair that question with two others: “Will I use it?” and “Do I need it?” This is where it gets tough.
Realistically, we don’t need anything that has been tucked away in a closet for 20 years or more. But when it comes to sentimental items, emotions win out over practical considerations.
Here are some ideas to help you decide what to let go.
Ask “Why do I want to keep it?”
Possessions stir up a lot of nostalgia. If you’re holding onto an item because it brings back memories, it may help to remind yourself that the memories are in your head and your heart—not in the object.
If you decide to keep something because you think you’ll use it “one day”, make a point of using it. Take it out of the box and put it in your kitchen cupboard, your closet, your jewellery box, or wherever else it belongs. If you haven’t used it by the next time you go through that space, let it go.
Consider the feel good factor of giving it away
If someone else needs and can make good use of an item now, giving it to them will make you feel great.
A word of caution though. Don’t force your stuff on anyone else. Your clutter is not their problem.
Think about what will happen to it after you’re gone
No-one wants to think about what happens after they’re dead, so this one is difficult. Even so, it’s important to be realistic about the value those left behind will place on the item.
If you think your kids, grandkids, nieces or nephews will want things that hold sentimental value for you, ask them. It really helped me to go through this exercise with my daughters. There were a few items that they just looked at me and shook their heads. It made it easier to let them go.
Keep one or two items
If you’re not ready to purge everything, consider if you can reduce the amount you’re holding onto.
For example, if you have several boxes of baby clothes, choose one or two items to keep. If your grandmother’s china dinner set is tucked away in a box, keep one place setting. If you have boxes of schoolwork, keep a few special items.
Find a way to capture the memories
If you’re still struggling with letting go, find a way to preserve the memories without keeping the physical item. Here are some ways to do that:
- Take a photo of the item and put the photo in a “memories” folder. You may even want to create a scrapbook or digital photo book, or post the picture with your memories on your social media channels.
- Write a poem or story about the memories associated with the item. While decluttering, I found many items I had forgotten about. Instead of keeping them, I preserved the memories by taking pictures and writing about them in my Clutter Tales series. That made it much easier to let go.
- Record a video to tell the story of the item. This is an alternative to poems and stories if writing isn’t your thing.
Dealing with sentimental items is the hardest part of any decluttering exercise. Once you’ve captured the memories and let the items go, take comfort in the thought that the rest of your decluttering journey will be a breeze. The worst is over.
How do you deal with sentimental items when decluttering? Drop me a comment below and let me know.
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I love the idea of taking a photo or doing a video of sentimental things. 😀
Thanks Rachel. My latest round of decluttering has inspired so many new clutter tales. Capturing the memories in pictures and words makes it easier to let things go.
I’m bad at declutterring even though I’ve been doing it a lot this days. Thank you for sharing me your tips. Hope this will make it a lot easier.
It can be hard Fadima. Good luck with your decluttering project!
I’m very good at decluttering, even items that may hold sentimental value. I just ask myself, will I ever use it? If the answer is no, it goes to the charity shop. What I like about taking items to the charity shop is that it gives me the feeling of passing on the happiness that items have brought me. Plus, the money raised goes to a great cause.
However, when it comes to sentimental items belonging to my partner, he keeps everything and just says, ” You can let it go once I am gone.” It may sound sad, but for whatever reason, he just can not get rid of any sentimental items.
That’s great, Hugh. I am getting much better at decluttering sentimental items as I get older. I think the realization that my daughters have no interest in them helps.
Your partner sounds a lot like my husband. My husband comes by it honestly. His mum lives in the house they moved into when he was a baby and she’s never gotten rid of a thing! What a chore that will be one day.
Oh, that’s going to be a big job to clear out and go through, Michelle. It reminds me of my partner’s sister’s garage, which is full to the ceiling of boxes containing who knows what. They moved into the house in 1978 and have never cleared anything out. And the cupboards, drawers, and wardrobes in the house are bursting full of stuff.
I don’t know if you have anything like this in Canada, but here in the UK, we have a company called Vintage Cash Cow that buys any vintage items from you. They also buy old jewellery, even if it’s broken. They send you a postage label, and all you need to do is put everything in a box, attach the label, and they come back with an offer. I’m on my third box.
Vintage Cash Cow sounds great, Hugh. I haven’t heard of anything similar in Canada.
There is so much need out there, so the “feel good factor of giving it away” really resonates with me.
Yes. I love how appreciative people are when I put something on the Buy Nothing page. I’ve had people message me after pickup to tell me how much they’re enjoying the items.
That’s so true. I still remember a man who was so happy when we gave him a free living room set. He and his dad came to pick it up, and he was just beaming.
Sentimental items are so difficult to declutter! My parents kept a lot of stuff from when I was a baby, and now my sister is going to use it for her son (and then hopefully I will if I am lucky enough to have children!). We hoard a lot of stuff in our house – mainly sentimental 🙈
That’s great that your sister is getting use of the items your parents kept. Our niece came over at Easter and her three children had fun playing with the toys we had kept from when our girls were small. We got rid of a lot but I’m glad we hung onto a few things.
The sentimental items are the hardest to let go of and all your tips are great. I try to keep at least 1 item to remind me of each stage and age and then everything else I can eventually let go of. I would say it takes several rounds of decluttering for me over time!
That’s so true, Ab. With every round of decluttering, I find it easier to let go. I like your approach of keeping one item from each stage. It’s a good balance.
I passed on all the things I kept for each kid when they made their final move out from the house. Basically a bin for each of them. It was so much easier given they were adults, to let them take responsibility 🙂 My own personal childhood and other life moments box actually got reduced way down before I moved to CO. 1 very small fabric box now and I have no idea what is still in there! It’s sitting on my small built in shelf. Sounds like a fall project to me 🙂
That’s the stage we’re at with our kids now, Deb. Anything they don’t want, we’re getting rid of. We’re driving to PEI to visit Colleen later this week and we’re taking another load of stuff to her.
Good plan Michelle!