Decluttering for Seniors Prevents Falls while Aging in Place
Decluttering for seniors is essential to aging in place. Remove unnecessary items from the home. Keep clean walking paths to ensure safety in the home. Place important items used regularly in easy-to-find locations. If needed get help from a professional organizer that specializes in helping older adults with decluttering and downsizing.
Tips for Decluttering
These Decluttering tips for seniors are helpful with starting an aging-in-place plan. However, too many seniors and their loved ones end up rushing through the process of cleaning up a home due to an unforeseen medical condition that requires a reevaluation of their living environment and is faced with tackling the entire house in one weekend.
Avoid shoving things in boxes and paying for long-term storage. Follow these tips to stay organized and keep a safe house. Too many seniors trip and fall in their homes due to clutter and hazards that could have been eliminated.
Learn to streamline your household now to make aging at home easier.
Identify What is Used Daily and What is Never Used
Create a plan for decluttering. Whether organizing an apartment, townhouse, or a single-family home, every dwelling can be attacked in sections. Do not get overwhelmed before starting, remember you can focus on one room, one box or one shelf at a time. Therefore, plan where to start and identify what is important first.
Family members or caregivers should consult with the older adult they are assisting to confirm the plan aligns with their wishes.
Identify items in the house that are used daily and items that are no longer used. As an example, any items that are not being used in the last 90 days and are not seasonal such as holiday items or clothing for winter / summer can be set aside into a not-in-use pile. Ultimately, what happens with the not-in-use piles is up to the senior, but understanding what is important and needs to stay is a critical part of the process.
Start Now Before an Emergency Happens
Start decluttering before a medical emergency occurs. Trying to sort through basements, attics, closets, and box after box after a health crisis that forces a move or change in living arrangements adds a huge layer of stress. When rushing to organize a lifetime’s worth of belongings in a few days important things will get lost or thrown out. Avoid this by decluttering today while you are in good physical and mental health.
Start Small and Go Section by Section
A room-by-room approach is the best way to approach decluttering for older adults. Within an individual room of the house, break it up even more. First, organize the surface layer clutter such as separating trash from items that are needed. Followed by the next layer down such as closets in the room or any shelves. Lastly, any boxes or storage areas like closed cabinets, dressers, etc.
A Basic Plan to Declutter
A basic plan to declutter would look like this. Start with organizing the bedroom. Then the bathroom, followed by the kitchen and living room. Those are essential living spaces. Followed by additional bedrooms, a basement, an attic, and a garage or storage shed.
Create a plan for storing things that you are not ready to get rid of yet. An outside storage shed works well for many seniors and eliminates the need for paying for offsite storage every month.
Make Piles: Keep, Giveaway, Donate, Trash
Deciding what to get rid of and what to keep is hard. Make piles. Start with a keep pile, a donate pile, and a throwaway pile. The throwaway pile is extra hard for some. Therefore, this pile can only contain obvious throwaway clutter like old paper, broken items with no value, and soiled and dirty objects unable to clean. As you build a larger and larger keep and donate pile feel free to reevaluate what else could go downstream.
The ultimate goal of decluttering is to reduce the keep pile only to things that are actually used and items with real sentimental value.
Giving away items and donating them is an opportunity to give new life to objects that were once important. Call family members and friends and ask them if they would like something specific. Otherwise, place them into the donate box and share the items with a local organization that will find them a new home.
Clear Hazardous Items
Remove hazardous items. This includes all trip hazards like cords and other objects on the ground. Get rid of old chemicals, paints, and materials in the garage or storage shed that will never be used again.
Remove Excess Decor and Nicknacks
Slimming down the number of items hung up on walls or placed on shelves helps keep the home clean. The more art, decor, and nicknacks that capture dust means more time cleaning. Keep the most important family pictures and mementos, but find family members that would like to have a piece of art or items that are not too sentimental.
Pass Down Family Heirlooms and Unused Items
Create a list of family members and the things that you would like to give them. Having important family heirlooms passed down at the appropriate time means you know they got to the right place. The worst feelings are when an individual is now in a hospital or long-term care facility due to a medical emergency and their house is being cleaned up by family members and wondering if grandpa’s special ring was given to the right grandchild. Do it earlier than later, it is worth it.
Think about family members that might have recently purchased their first home or moved into a new place and could use an extra chair or the second crockpot that is sitting in the back cupboard. The more you can share and give new life to the items the better.
Give Away Excess Goods to Charity
Don’t be shy with the giveaway pile. How many clothes do you need for each season of the year? If you have a winter jacket and just finished the winter season and never saw a reason to wear it, give it away. Same with the pile of umbrellas or purses. While it was fun to collect every color under the rainbow while you were younger, it becomes unnecessary clutter down the road. Yet, there will be people that love to find it at the local Goodwill or equivalent thrift store.
Give Adult Kids Childhood Memories Back
When decluttering it is a good time for older adults to give their adult children back their belongings and mementos from their childhood. Lighten the load and allow them to decide what really is important to keep and what can be given away or thrown out at this time.
Remove All Duplicates
Get rid of all duplicates of items. There is little chance that you need to have four gravy boats or six soup laddles so organize the kitchen for what is essential. Therefore, think about the quality and sentimental value of items as you go through and place items in your keep, give away, and trash piles and keep the best for yourself and let the rest pass.
Get a Professional Organizer Help
Decluttering for seniors is overwhelming at times. Professional organizers for seniors understand what is essential, how to create a plan, and provide assistance to see it executed. There are many organizers that specially cater to helping older adults remove the clutter in the home. At the same time, the house gets decluttered, it is a good time to consider what adjustments to the home will make it senior-friendly.
Declutter & Organize for Better Living
Declutter the home and get organized for living simply. Seniors with an organized home reduce their chances of falling. No more searching on top shelves for something, retrieving boxes from attics or storage sheds looking for an item. Attack all of these spaces while you are more able and have assistance from friends, family, or a professional organizer.
