The day my kids left for the summer, I immediately came home and entered their rooms. With a bounce in my step, I was free to toss their saved artwork from 2007 as well as their pile of half-used notebooks. Toys that hadn’t been touched in years- non-age appropriate items were finally able to be removed from the house.

For years my kids would hoard things or see me throwing something out and like raccoons, they’d rifle through the garbage cans to retrieve their things. One time my eldest made me contact a stranger on FB to see if she would give us back the doll I had sold her.

So without anyone to contest me, I took 17 bags of things from the home- some to the garage, and others to the needy.

It’s been 9 months, and my kids have managed to accumulate more shit than they had before- as if the prize was a million dollars and mommy expelled from the house.