Hi,

It may be that you and your daughter are different enough that you will end up needing to both feel a little uncomfortable. It sounds like you've been trying to do that on your end, allowing her room to be over-full.

On one end there are some that consider someone with a spotless desk an uptight neat freak who must have OCD. On the other hand there are those that would consider an adult with a generally messy house who keeps an entire closet stuffed full of mementos such as old ticket stubs, bits of beach glass, a past boyfriend's sweater, etc as hoarding.

Neither of those people probably really have a disorder, if neither has it interfering with their (own) life. There are enough people with really clear disorders to try to not worry too much about the ones currently on the normal spectrum.

Being a total non-professional, it doesn't really sound like she has a serious problem currently. But more the very common messy kid who feels attached to all their stuff to the point of feeling like their stuff is an extension of themselves.

You do have the right to not be extremely mentally uncomfortable in your home (as she does also).

Perhaps if you sit down and talk you can come to a compromise that will allow you both something. For example that you'll let her have freedom with whatever will fit in her own closet as long as she will put her own clothes away and bring the laundry out and keep the door to it closed so you don't have to see. Or perhaps a different style of compromise is she gets more freedom with keeping her papers etc but she agrees to be much more careful about not leaving items around in the rest of the house where they bother your natural sense of order.

Personal growth for all through valuing eachother's right to be different. smile