What to Do With Your Loved Ones’ Possessions After They’re Gone
My father loved a bargain. Always clipping a coupon, zipping up to the mall to take advantage of a sale on undershirts or socks or workout shoes. Often, if a deal was really good, he’d buy extra of whatever he was getting to tuck away in the closet for a later date. While he was alive I thought this was a little kooky but mostly smart, but after he died and I was faced with several brand-new packs of Ralph Lauren boxer shorts and khaki shorts with the Gap tags still attached, my only thought (aside from being sad, of course) was: what am I supposed to do with this stuff?
Sorting through the possessions of a loved one after their passing is an emotional experience, and also (in my case, at least) a stressful one—I didn’t want to throw all of this still-usable stuff in the garbage, but I also live in a New York City apartment and as such didn’t really have space for two decorative wooden chests and a Halloween cookie jar and an unopened NutriBullet smoothie blender and…well, there was a lot of stuff—you get the picture! If you are reading this, I hope you don’t find yourself in a similar situation for a long, long time, but if you do? Here is what I learned.
Plan ahead
In The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter, author Margareta Magnusson points out that the best time to deal with the stuff in your house is before you die—it’s both a gift to loved ones and a way to take stock of what you’ve collected over the course of a life well-lived. This is, for a number of reasons, easier said than done, but I do think it’s worth attempting. In my case, that’s looked like talking with relatives about what pieces of furniture and which photo albums I might like to have someday, and asking about how and where different things are stored (more on storage in a bit).
Luckily (luckily?) my own family loves to talk about what people will get what stuff after everyone dies, but I realize that might not always be the case. If there’s a specific piece of art or furniture you know you’d love to have, use that as a jumping off point for a larger chat about what your loved ones have envisioned for their belongings.
Make a list—and a schedule
In the immediate days after someone dies there is a lot to do—if you are me, you will also spend these days stressing about how you are going to eventually transport a collection of history-themed coffee mugs from L.A. to Brooklyn. Expert organizer and author of The Folding Book Janelle Cohen says that the best way to combat this particular strain of agita is to start making lists. "Develop a plan for organizing and sorting your loved one's belongings," she says. "This may include categorizing items by type, such as clothing, books, and household items. Establish a timeline for completing the process, but remember to be flexible and give yourself permission to adjust as needed. Having a plan will help you to not get overwhelmed, and piecing it out will help you to get through it systematically." Books one day, linens the next, then a rest day—what seemed overwhelming at first becomes more manageable when broken up into pieces, especially if you schedule a block of hours each day—and then give yourself permission not to worry about it.
Resell, reuse, repurpose
Unfortunately, while cleaning out my father’s house I did not stumble upon a cache of Faberge eggs to sell at auction, using the proceeds to live out the rest of my days as a glamorous professional caftan wearer. I did find a lot of stuff that felt too good to toss but not useful or sentimental to me personally. It helped to focus on setting aside things I knew I might actually use, like (some of) the aforementioned coffee cups and a bunch of t-shirts repurposed as workout attire.
When it came to stuff I didn’t want or need, I tried to find good homes for everything—my best friend helped me run a garage sale that netted some cash and let me see that other people valued my dad’s stuff, and my mom helped me research which animal shelters would happily receive donations of blankets and sheets to make cozy cat beds. A friend going through a similar process recently split up her late mother’s beloved plant collection amongst family friends, and I also wasn’t shy about tapping into my own network to place things—an American Girl doll went to a friend of a friend with a doll-obsessed daughter, and hockey memorabilia found a happy home with one of my dad’s former coworkers.
Feelings—where do they go?
This is the hard part, I’m afraid. At the end of the day, you will have to get rid of stuff it feels hard to get rid of, because it’s stuff that belonged to someone you loved who is now gone. I myself had several meltdowns over things including but not limited to a Civil War-themed chess set, a new-in-the-package set of Hotel Collection sheets from Macy’s, and Williams-Sonoma pasta bowls from the ’90s with different Italian herbs painted on the rims. Cohen says it helps to lean into sentimentality here: "Try creating a memory box for displaying sentimental items in your home."
Pick out a few special things to keep out and in your line of sight, no matter how small—it really does help! And when it comes to the storage question, be realistic—I have a few small bins in my closet with stuff from my dad’s house, but otherwise I pushed myself to be honest about what I’d want, what I’d need, and what I might find myself holding onto for reasons unclear even to me. As of this writing I have one thing from each of those categories visible from my perch on the couch, and it really does make me feel like I did a pretty good job, in the end.
Illustration by Mar Hernández
Related Reading:
How to Live With Minimal Storage Space Without Losing Your Mind
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