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I Would Never Tell A 50 Year Old To Death Clean

Middle Life Adventures

10,385 views

Do you owe your adult children an empty house? After clearing estates and working in hoarded homes, I challenge that decluttering advice and look at what actually helps families: shared responsibility, practical planning, and room for parents to live in their homes now.

Chapters:
0:00 Do You Owe Your Kids an Empty House?
1:44 The Real Work of an Estate Cleanout
2:37 You Still Live in Your Home
4:01 When Your Adult Kids’ Boxes Are Still There
5:48 Decluttering Won’t Fix Family History
7:18 Who Does the Decluttering Work Now?
9:04 When One Child Gets the Estate Work
11:03 Help Your Parents Without Taking Over
12:38 Your Relationship Matters More Than the House
14:26 What Parents and Adult Kids Actually Need

Midlife reinvention. Strategies for starting over after 45, life after empty nest. Personal Growth. Empty Nest stage and changes to daily life. Personal Growth and Development. Emotional decluttering, grief decluttering, grief minimalism. Personal Growth, Self development, self improvement, self help. We cover adventures for people over 40, mid life topics. Mid Life, Bucket List, Adventures, travel, hobby, nature, exploring, Silver hair, life hacks, life advice, top 10, midlife crisis, life over 40, life over 50, middle age, second half of life, aging gracefully, midlife awakening, finding purpose later in life, redifining yourself, personal growth, self discovery, confidence over 40, confidence over 50, life wisdom, lessons learned, things i wish i knew earlier, lfe advice, mindset shift, emotional resilience, mental clarity, inner peace, social anxiety, coping, intentional living, women in midlife, women over 40, women over 50, feminine confidence, motivational video, inspirational video, personal development, self help, life coaching, storytelling

20 Comments

@diamant1081 4 days ago

My mom had papers and bank statements going back to the 1990s. I offered her several times to sort out all those papers and create an up-to-date overview. She had a brand new shredder somewere in a box. I said that there was no rush and we could make it to cozy hours with coffee and treats. But she never accepted my offer to help her with the papers. At a certain point, I stopped offering my help in that. I didn't want to turn it into an awkward situation. I had to respect her rejection of my help. Sometimes the only thing you can do is to accept a no as answer. Irma from the Netherlands

@MystickalGoddess 3 days ago (edited)

As an end of life nurse, I can tell you I've heard grown children tell their parents they were throwing out their "garbage", "junk", "crap" the hurt in the eyes of the parents was profound. Our stuff of course, is not junk to us. But to others it probably is. Basic human compasion needs to be exercised. At one point, these grown children will be in the bed at the end of their lives and a little respect is expected and well deserved.
I'm 55. I'm "death cleaning" per say. I am just tired of too many things and also tired of being the family historian. When I go there's no one to pass photos and such on to. So why keep unnecessary extras? Or things that might have mattered to my mom or grandma but not me. I gave myself permission to declutter those ❤
I had a large tea set from my great-grandma. I kept one cup and saucer. Now I can drink a cup and think of her instead of storing the china away in a cabinet and doing no justice to the memory. Now i have more room!
I'd love to hire an organizer to help with my irrational clothing attachments, but no funds at the moment. I am making good progress though! I deserve an uncluttered closet! Thanks for this video - Kris from Indiana ❤

@TonPat 4 days ago

Death cleaning right now at 56. Lost each of my parents within 18 months of each other. Last year, I had to move mom from 2br to one-room nursing home, I made all of the decisions for her.
This summer while in ICU mom needed things from her nursing home: her purse, her glasses and her hair pick. When she passed in hospice, we turned off the lights, closed the door and I left with her purse, her glasses and her hair pick.
I came home and stuff mattered less. I am working through things with 3 categories ‘in use’, ‘seasonal’, and ‘for kids’. I am letting go of the things kids say they don’t want. You can take a picture of things that have memories and let new memories form for others. When I get stuck, I remember purse, glasses and hair pick was all that mattered in the end.

@youandmeandmultiplescleros402 4 days ago (edited)

Instead of death cleaning, I’m creating a document with photos of items that have had importance to me, emphasizing that my attachment to an item does not in any way constrain what my heirs do with it. This way they know the stories that go with the items. I also note the few cases where an item has actually monetary value. It shows respect for the people and things I value.

@orenlewis8679 4 days ago (edited)

Dearh is such a monster and no one knows when it will come. An 18 year old friend died in perfect health yesterday. So terrible and would've been worse to ask her to clean out her room before she died when she had no plan to die.

@NancyShipley-d8z 4 days ago

I'm a 63 year old single childless cat lady. I have nothing I plan to give anything to anyone when I'm ready to die. I'm on a fixed income and will see what I want and don't want in my own time. If I decide I don't want something I'll take it to my apartment complex's community bench so someone else can use them

@ElizIndRhythm 2 days ago

We had to deal with this with my father when he passed. He was battling dementia, and asking him to get rid of things literally sent him into a panic attack. Over a year later and we're still finding things and dealing with them. On the one hand, this process is beyond difficult, but we also don't regret not making my Dad miserable. His life was hard enough his last year, and even if we had asked him about everything, he may not have remembered the stories or reason he wanted to keep them, while strongly believing that getting rid of them would be painful and wrong.

@shirleypatten6212 4 days ago

I was doing Swedish Death Cleaning before I even knew that it actually was a thing. Years ago, my DIL told me I better start getting rid of my stuff because she and my son wouldn't have time to go through everything and it all was going into the trash. It sounded harsh at the time. But since then, I've been donating items that have no real meaning to me. Now that I'm 79, I want to get to the point of having only the items I actually need to live and items that truly give me pleasure.

@MicheleDaly 3 days ago

A book came out in the late 90’s called “Die Broke”. It counseled putting enough aside to see you comfortably through the expected end of your life and letting go of the rest. Not so much an “I’m Spending My Kids’ Inheritance” strategy (a popular bumper sticker on RVs back then), as an altruistic approach. Giving away excess through donations, sharing, and random acts of kindness while you’re still around to enjoy seeing the fruits of your life-long labor being put to good to good use - such as celebrating your kids buying their first home, watching a non-profit grow, and so on. It had the added benefit of not having potential heirs waiting for you to die, so they could get their share of your estate😂Thank you for another thoughtful video💜🦋💜

@harmonygordon6901 3 days ago

" Somebody better tell my China cabinet. " 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣💀

@ingerlarsson7096 4 days ago

Your videos are helpful 🌟 thank you🌞🌷🇸🇪

@ColKorn1965 2 days ago

I'm 61 and I've been Death Cleaning since 1986, when my grandfather died.

@LadyMaryanne 4 days ago

Great video, thank you. Blessings to you and your family 🕊️

@edennis8578 4 days ago

I wasn't ready for death cleaning at 50. I was more ready at 60. At 71, I'm less ready (😁) but I know I need to get rid of half my stuff. I can't keep track of this much, honestly.

@summertakacs-michaelsonch8842 3 days ago

Margareta Magnusson's approach bothers me. She had her elderly, but healthy dog euthanized as part of her death cleaning journey because she didn't want to hassle with moving with her pup. This is my own value judgement, of course, and I understand euthanizing dogs when the time comes...but it was the tone of objectifying her healthy dog that got under my skin.

That said, I do put about 5-10 minutes of thought in a day on what I will leave my kids. I have all our documents in one easy place, all passwords. After my Husband dying 4 years ago, downsizing and everything plus the previous owner leaving so much junk on this property, I am kind of over stuff. Grieving and decluttering is so difficult. My adult sons live with me, they have autism/ADHD. The more simple I make our lives, the easier life just is, and also, I always do think of them in everything I do. I'm 52, and after having done a death clean/downsize, I don't want them to have to go through that themselves, not with their Mom's stuff. Simplyfying has been awesome for us. Everyone's situation is different, I don't agree with the prescriptive method of Magnusson's death cleaning, nor her euthanizing a healthy dog for convenience.

Also, I death cleaned my coffee table away, as I was tired of dog tails knocking things over on it, moving it when vacuuming, etc. and I have never looked back! I kept the dogs, tho!😂

@tiltektin 6 days ago

Thank you for this, I have been the one talking about the concept to my parents, but it felt really strange to talk about, now I know this is why.

@anitam569 4 days ago

My husband and I have each made a list of our 10-15 favorite things. When it comes time to downsize, we'll start by keeping those. Or, should something happen to either of us, we'll know what should be offered the kids as important mementos.

@vsandls 11 hours ago (edited)

People in my family have all lived independently into their 90s. The bible tells us to prepare our fields to receive the rain. I'm preparing for longevity and blessing.

@havenothadmycoffee 5 days ago

I have been making a binder with important information, photos of items special to me and the story behind them. I have also just been writing little about memories when they come up and little things to family as well. I am definitely telling them now but I imagine having something written down would help saying goodbye when the time comes.

@CocoB22 4 days ago

This is a really important subject. I think both sides need a good dose of reality. Cleaning out a home is no joke. Currently I am doing it now. The majority of the contents actually belong to me. They belonged to my mother and grandmother. The best of the best I have kept and the rest will be dealt with. There were no treasures just stuff. I have gifted things to people who are already cherishing them. There are things I absolutely would hate to see donated, but I cannot sell them. The amount of work to sell them and meet with potential buyers is not something I am able or even really willing to do. I have personally have zero regrets. By many standards I live an extremely privileged life and I know that and while social media can be extreme at times looking at some of the collections of random things that people think are “valuable” or will be “valuable” some day makes it extremely easy to become really upset if that will be your inheritance. If you have not looked at or seen that collection in years and it’s in wrapped in paper in a box in the attic- time to sell it and put the proceeds in an inheritance account.

I would also add- get rid of obvious junk, trash the toaster that needs to be tossed. The old sticky Tupperware can be trashed. Lastly, bonafide antiques deserve care, make sure they get it.