Balancing Mr. George and my urge to purge

One of the biggest tasks in living in a rented place is the trouble of moving out. After three years of highs like having our daughter and lows like having our estate agent doing the vanishing act with our deposit, now its packing time. Our landlord sold this place to take advantage of booming property prices in Dubai and we have to move out of the place and make way for the new landlords who’ll call this their home shortly.

Now there is a huge task waiting for me at the end of this week. The last time I was subjected to this ordeal was three years ago (obviously) and I remember everything like yesterday. We had about 46 boxes, furniture and an assortment of bags and suitcases of different sizes. And back then we were moving out from a one bed room place and the size of the family was 2 – and this time around, each of these parameters as my hubby would like to put it has grown by 100 percent (that would be a 2 bed room house) and 50 percent (our little devil, Smera) respectively.

The packing bit is still easy (as we’ll have some help from the packers!) but it’s the unpacking (which I have to do on my own) that scares me the most. I hate it the very idea of putting things in the cupboards, making sure everything is set out right. I have to confess I have a bit of OCD, for me everything has to be in order or else I won’t let live anyone live in peace.

If hoarding is an obsessive trait, then mine is the exact opposite - that is purging. I am most certain, even this time around I will have much more to discard than to pack.  Initially I thought of asking the hubby to a day off to help me, identify things to keep and things to chuck. But then I realised we might end up at some counselling session to patch things up as he loves to hold on to certain stuff which is unlikely to be used ever again.

Having said that, my purging habit has occasionally caused me heartaches, I once donated my precious little black sweater by mistake and on many mornings have deposited hubby’s Financial Times into the waste bin even before he even got a chance to open the fold.

Please keep me in your prayers as I take on the battle to ensure that we do not go over-board, hoarding at the same time keeping my ‘urge to purge’ instincts at check.