Sitting on the couch with my family when the A&E channel comes on and it's an episode of "Hoarders." At first glance, I wanna laugh and totally make fun of the fact that these people live their lives in filth and allow strangers to come and clean it up for them. Like how unfair is that to them? When I was kid, I would get in loads of trouble if I didn't clean up after myself and now that I'm an adult I would love for someone anyone to come clean up my house for me.

Now if you haven't seen this show you're probably are reading this and are about to stop because you have no idea what I'm talking about, but before you do just imagine yourself walking into a home, a beautiful home in fact. Although gorgeous on the outside this home is wretched looking on the inside where collectible have turned into knickknacks and knickknacks have turned into boxes and boxes of random misc items that have now lead to piles of trash.

Next thing you know you have a home that's turned into some kind of storage unit of junk, items you've once cherished are nowhere to be found shoved to the bottom of what use to be a hardwood floor now a pile of garbage. These people have been gathering and hoarding these things for years and finally it's gotten so bad that the family members of the victim have now contacted this show to help clean out and hope that this hoarder can start a new fresh clean hoard free life, and in most cases they probably go right back to doing it, but hey at least they can say they tried and now there's a show in their honor.

Returning back home, blessed to have a somewhat clean carpet to walk on, I start to feel so bad for that little old lady on the television. How sad it must be to be a victim of hoarding; I couldn't imagine being so overwhelmed with so much stuff around me. I could picture the struggle of everyday living and just the emotional effects it would have on the victim and well as their families.

"How can they live like that?" I'd say to myself passing my hallway filled with pictures and it hits me. We keep things because of the way it makes us feel when we look at it and most importantly, the memory it holds. I may not be a hoarder of physical items but I've held on to all these memories, good and bad. I am a hoarder of my feelings and being someone that suffers from anxiety, that's not a good thing. I can tell you countless story after story about me; fine one moment and then a song, picture, TV show anything brings me back to a memory I don't necessarily want to remember and all of a sudden my heart is racing, chest hurting, and palms sweating over something that happened to me years ago.

So why do we do this to ourselves? Why do we hold on to pain and sadness? It's like these memories are a part of us that we are not ready to give up yet, but why? it's not helping but only hindering us from our full potential. I always remember that it's my past and it made me the strong woman I am today and maybe by holding onto those awful feelings no matter how painful, it is me "making myself stronger." But the bottom line is we have already lived it, been there done that. We have suffered the effects of going through a hardship in life and we have moved ourselves past that situation so in reality there is no reason to hold onto that memory.