20. Completely clear

‘The cleaning visit really took it out of me. I haven't done much since then. Can we make this a short day? We can do more paper’

She took me into the sitting room where I had left some stacks of paper.

The coffee table was completely clear.

‘I finished them off myself.’ Stella smiled

Every time I passed the room during the session, I kept sneaking looks at it. When I told Stella what I was doing, we both laughed. It is hard to describe how important and startling it was.

‘I've also been opening some financial post by myself’

‘Great!’

Many of our clients ‘hide’ from their finances, not opening bank statements and the like for years at a time. Sometimes it starts because they are having financial difficulties, but more often it is because they just don't want to deal with it. Luckily, many use direct debits extensively, so the bills don't go unpaid and life can go on. It is a big moment for them to retake control!

I took one last look at the clear coffee table before I left.

21.Tackling the kitchen

By now we had touched on most of the major rooms but one. On my arrival for the 20th visit, Stella greeted me:

‘I'd like to have a go at the kitchen cupboards and see if we make space for some of the things I've inherited, particularly the glasses’

The inherited things she was talking about were currently living on the dining room table. This was our first go at the kitchen which was mostly a home for drying and dried clothes. It wasn't horribly untidy; it was just unused and frozen in time with dust.

We started with the cupboard under the sink and found lots of spare rags and j-cloths.

‘I won't have to buy any for years, will I.’ laughed Stella

‘This cupboard is quite big,’ I said, ‘It would take one of those freestanding shelves which would make it much easier to keep things in order’

‘I thought that,’ replied Stella, ‘But, I've been listening to your warnings about not buying storage 'solutions' until we know what we actually need.’

As we pulled out the cupboards and compared the contents with the things she had inherited, some things went into the rubbish pile and a few things for charity. There were quite a number of things that went on the kitchen table ‘To Be Considered’.

‘I like it that you don't push me to throw out anything immediately, even when I'm leaning in that direction. It makes the process less scary.’

By the end of the session, we had done about half of the cupboards.

‘I'd like to finish this first go at the kitchen. Can we make an extra appointment for next week?’ asked Stella.

‘Sure, I'm free on Wednesday and Friday. Which one would you like?’

‘Wednesday.’ See you then.

23. The kitchen - Part 2

I arrived ready to carry on with the kitchen.

Stella led the way down the hall saying, 'I've bought some stuff for the garden; bags of gravel and mulch that we'll have to move out the backdoor before we can start'

'Okay. What are you doing out there?'

'I don't want the weeds to come back after all the work with the gardener and I've planted up a few flower pots. After that we'll see'

We started working on the kitchen drawers. Stella had inherited quite a bit of kitchen equipment from her aunt and she wanted to compare anything that duplicated what she already had. The best we kept and the others went into the charity bag.

A proper coffee break had become a regular feature of our sessions. Today, Stella said, 'I bought us croissants this morning from the bakery around the corner'

After doing all the drawers and finishing the cupboards, we started on the Welsh dresser. Stella has an interesting collection of decorative crockery which we arranged on the open shelves. Throughout the two sessions in the kitchen we'd found lots of candles and tablecloths which we stored in the dresser's cupboards.

'They're just a few more things I won't have to buy for years,'

When we finished, the kitchen looked pretty and welcoming.

24. The box room

'What have you planned for us today?' I asked as I came through the door.

'You know that bedroom where we've been dumping all the empty boxes we thought we might use to store things and those boxes full of video tapes? I don't actually know what is underneath it all.'We found LOTS of boxes which we didn't need anymore. I broke them down and we tied them into 5 bundles.

When we reached the bottom layer, Stella exclaimed, 'Oh, I'd forgotten about these. They're boxes I never opened from my last move so I haven't seen what's inside for more than 10 years and there are some here from an even earlier move that I never opened.'

'I see a lot of that,' I replied, 'People move in and get themselves going in their new house. That takes a huge amount of energy and is exhausting for everyone. The vital boxes get opened and the things needed to make the house work are taken out and put away. Life takes over before the last ones get opened. Because they don't know what's inside, people pack them away in attics, cellars, garages or box rooms.'

'What you are trying to say is that: If I haven't missed the contents for more than 10 years, most of it can probably be tossed'

'You said it. Shall we open them and see what is inside?'

As expected we found things for the tip and the charity shop, but Stella did find a few things she wanted to keep, things she thought she had lost.

When we finished, the front hall was chock full of stuff to go out. Stella had bought mince pies to go with our coffee.

25. Putting away in drawers

The front hall was completely clear when I arrived. All the collapsed boxes, kitchen rejects and the 'unwanted' that we'd piled up were gone.

'The car was fully packed when I set off for the tip. I could just see out of the rearview mirror. After all we did last visit, I couldn't think of a really chewy project for this visit, so I figured we could do the default one: Paper'

'Hey, we aren't always going to have highs like finding all that stuff to go to the tip. Okay so paper doesn't sound exciting. However when we finally finish the paper,that will be HUGELY exciting'

We got through 5 more boxes. Stella has some furniture with narrow little drawers in her bedroom that we have been using for filing. Putting away what was in the 5 boxes made the drawers too full.

'Can we weed out some of the older paper and maybe refine these drawers a bit?' Stella asked.

'Of course, it's your paper!'

Over coffee and cakes, Stella showed me the shelf she'd bought for under the sink. Because everything was already sorted, it didn't take very long to install it.

26. Missing paper

Stella opened the door looking very nervous and tired.

'Hi. How are you?'

'Not good,' said Stella,'I haven’t slept, it’s been a dreadful week. Monday, I went to the box that I thought was the one filled with the business stuff and it wasn’t. I panicked and rushed around looking but couldn’t find the right box and that made me even more worked up. So I stopped because I couldn’t look systematically I couldn’t even think. I needed to have someone with me. You were coming today, so I thought, I will wait for Chrystine."

'Okay," I said, 'Let’s start at the top of the house and look in all the boxes.'

So we did.

I found some old business related stuff which raised our hopes for a moment.

We’d worked our way to the front room and behind the door were some boxes that I’d labelled. It wasn't there. We methodically made our way around the room. We got to a bookcase with some boxes in front of it. Stella said 'These are my grandfather’s things 'But then she looked closer, into the bottom shelf of the bookcase itself.

'Oh my, oh, here it is!!'

'I am so glad that you actually found it yourself!' I said.

We retired to make coffee and eat pain au chocolate.

We didn’t actually do much else on the visit, we talked over coffee for 2 and a half hours, Stella reckoned that it was all part of decluttering her mind after it had gotten so full of yuck over the week.

'Usually, we talk a bit before we start, but you knew that I needed you to pitch straight in.' commented Stella 'And, usually, you ask me what I want to do, my sense of control and responsibility for deciding that was established at our first session. But this time I needed you to take the lead in how we were going to do it!'

'I’m interested that you didn’t phone or e-mail me,' I responded

Stella said:

'I didn’t think that you would know. I have always been responsible for that box. You hadn’t ever even gone through it. Why would you know where it was? If it was gone, it would be because I took the box to the tip or to a charity shop. It is important that I control panic and leave certain things for an appropriate time'

'But, we’ve been careful. Paper has either been shredded or put in re-cycle bags'

'Yes, I know,' said Stella," and if I had done something silly, I just wanted you to be here when I found out!'

The HUGE satisfaction for us both was that the process is working! We did a box of paper after lunch.

27. Much tidier now

When Stella made this booking, she was expecting friends to come for drinks before they all went out to dinner together. We were going to titivate the sitting room and consolidate some of the things we’d been working on.

‘My friends have had train problems so they can’t come today and I was up late last night seeing Obama through his celebrations. So I don’t really have a plan for this session’

‘Okay, shall we do some of those bits and pieces that have been bugging you? We could start with packing away the Christmas decorations.’

‘That’s good. Can we then go back to that cupboard under the stairs? It’s aired out now. I’ve bought some special stackable plastic boxes for things like light bulbs.’

It didn’t take very long because we’d already sorted under the stairs and disposed of the rubbish in an earlier visit.

‘The place is now so much tidier that I’ve started thinking about decorating. I’ve had these pictures framed and I bought cushions. I want to use the needlepoint cushion covers we found. Come see the dining room. Do you notice anything?’

‘You’ve removed the three vases of fake flowers you were using to screen the mess in the room.’

‘I’ve given several lots to the charity shop and the others I’ve just thrown away.
As soon as I have anything for charity, I rush out and take them immediately!’

Then we went back to our default activity: sorting paper and did a couple more boxes.

Stella said, ‘Please notice, I am actually sorting paper into piles, not just watching you or playing around the edges.’

As we worked, we talked a bit more about the last session when we had to find the box. If it had disappeared altogether, our process would have been thrown into doubt.

As we finished for the day, I said:

‘We’ve only got three more boxes of paper to do.’ Stella replied, ‘Our next default task will be the books.’