How Much Junk do you Keep?

Nurses General Nursing

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A question for non-hoarders please :)

I've been sorting through stuff and reevaluating my relationship to things this year. I've gotten rid of a lot of stuff. Right now I'm going through a lot of old nursing training handouts, powerpoints and stuff from the last decade, some old stuff from school, other training I've had or continuing education. Some of it is obviously recycling, some is still good information.

I think I'm going to slowly read through the stuff that I've forgotten as a refresher for the next month or so, then probably ditch most of it. Perhaps certain information will point me towards things I absolutely should know and am rusty with now.

So it made me wonder about how much stuff other people keep.

-What do you keep?

-How do you keep yourselves current on information you don't use very often in your practice?

-Do you even bother?

-Are there other areas of nursing you're interested with and don't practice, but maybe like to keep more current?

I keep piles of crap. Many old textbooks. I have textbooks from the 90s. Do I ever look at them? No. I use Dr. Google. I have gotten rid of the printouts for many classes.. I'm generally too lazy to declutter. I have a 5ish bedroom house with just my husband. So, plenty of room for me to store my junk..

If you plan to leave your house to someone, do them a favor and clean it out as much as possible.

I am in the process of doing the same. It has taken almost 2 decades to get started. There were things from my parents, grandparents, siblings, and my kids. It is slow and pretty painful, dusty, and bittersweet, but it is finally happening.

I just want to make it as easy as possible when my kids eventually have to deal with the house.

Besides, I have found money, a savings bond, and some newspaper clippings from 1935, along with Big Papa's pay stubs and rent receipts. He earned about $50 per week (with OT) and paid $1300 rent for a year.

Just my 2 cents.

I still have textbooks from nursing school back in the '90s. I thought I'd gotten rid of them in the last move, when we went from a four-bedroom three-bath house to a room in our son's home. But I ran across them again a few months ago when I was going through some of the stuff in my storage unit...don't know yet what I'm going to do with them, but they're so obsolete it's not even funny.

I just recently pitched my books from the '70's.

Specializes in Surgical, quality,management.

Besides, I have found money, a savings bond, and some newspaper clippings from 1935,

Just my 2 cents.

Yep I found prize bonds from the UK that I am trying to unravel currently.

Specializes in ICU.

I just threw out a box of papers and folders from 10 years ago. Several brown recluse spiders crawled out of it! It had been sitting in a closet for a long time.

Specializes in Psych (25 years), Medical (15 years).
What do you keep?

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I don't keep any old textbooks or handouts at all.

Specializes in Pediatric Critical Care.
I just threw out a box of papers and folders from 10 years ago. Several brown recluse spiders crawled out of it! It had been sitting in a closet for a long time.

Thank you for immediately convincing me to throw out any and all boxes of paper in my house.

Specializes in Pediatric Critical Care.

I currently feel stifled by how much "stuff" I have, even though objectively it isn't very much compared to other people that I know. But when I was a travel nurse and everything had to fit in my car, I learned how free it felt to not be weighed down by "stuff", and now I miss it!

Specializes in ED, ICU, Prehospital.

2 Year Rule.

If not used, worn, or seen in two years....it goes. Habitat for humanity. Goodwill. Church. I never sell things and I don't do yard sales. The first brings the crazy and the second brings the 5am doorbell and grandma's fighting to the death for a macramé plant hanger.

Exceptions, weapons and paraphanelia, but I often re eval the need for any particular thing in that category...tools, nice furniture, items with meaning or emotional attachment like gifts from my parents who have passed away.

Went from 2200 sq ft 4br 2ba house with two barns and a cellar chock full of crap I didn't even remember I owned...to a 1000 sq ft condo, well organized and brutally pared to necessities and a few nice items. I could move in two days flat now.

The nursing books were primarily ebooks and my study material was also online...so I pulled every damn item off my personal computer and copied them onto a 500g thumb drive. Absolutely zero reason to kill trees and take up space for anything literary these days.

I'm a purger, but I kept this stuff for a while. I just recently tossed it though, which felt good. I did refer to my old power points a couple of times, mostly to look up something that I had a feeling we were taught wrong in school, lol. They will be out of date quickly, so it's not the best reference. I never bought actually texts, I only used e-texts. If I had texts, they would have been long gone!

2 Year Rule.

If not used, worn, or seen in two years....it goes. Habitat for humanity. Goodwill. Church. I never sell things and I don't do yard sales. The first brings the crazy and the second brings the 5am doorbell and grandma's fighting to the death for a macramé plant hanger.

Exceptions, weapons and paraphanelia, but I often re eval the need for any particular thing in that category...tools, nice furniture, items with meaning or emotional attachment like gifts from my parents who have passed away.

Went from 2200 sq ft 4br 2ba house with two barns and a cellar chock full of crap I didn't even remember I owned...to a 1000 sq ft condo, well organized and brutally pared to necessities and a few nice items. I could move in two days flat now.

The nursing books were primarily ebooks and my study material was also online...so I pulled every damn item off my personal computer and copied them onto a 500g thumb drive. Absolutely zero reason to kill trees and take up space for anything literary these days.

That's impressive. Life goals, right there.

I recently purged a ton of stuff. I half-@$$ed the Konmari thing. I completely purged all of my teaching stuff- but somehow convinced myself to hold on to a few nursing textbooks. I may have to rethink that.

Specializes in EMS, ED, Trauma, CEN, CPEN, TCRN.
Went from 2200 sq ft 4br 2ba house with two barns and a cellar chock full of crap I didn't even remember I owned...to a 1000 sq ft condo, well organized and brutally pared to necessities and a few nice items. I could move in two days flat now.

That is awesome!! We went from 2300 sq ft 4/2.5 home to a 2000 sq ft home, but the second one had a less open layout and didn't feel like 2000 sq ft. We gained a family member (our daughter) and downsized to a 1785 sq ft townhouse that has a wonderful layout for our family. I got rid of four 6-foot bookshelves in the process (donated a ton of books) and a lot of clothes and shoes, but I still need to downsize more! I have a lot of Danskos that are lightly worn, so I am going to check out the local consignment places for those.

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