Let It Go
Joan Acocella on Scott Herring’s “The Hoarders,” a history of hoarding from Grey Gardens to the DSM-V.
Every year before Thanksgiving, Acocella's mother watched her throw away the polystyrene containers. What was in her eyes? Grief? Anger? Eagerness to fill the space? In 2013, the APA declared such habits a mental illness: "hoarding disorder." Her mother never had to find out.