An article published this week in the San Francisco Chronicle aims to give further insight into animal hoarding, based on research done on the disorder by Dr. Gary Patronek, a veterinary professor and expert on hoarding. The article — written by Jennifer Scarlett, DVM, co-president of the San Francisco SPCA — is well worth a read.
Before reading this story, the only things I’d seen about animal hoarding were the occasional story on the local news, and an episode of the show Hoarders. It was the first and only episode I’ve ever seen, because the show, while compelling, is deeply disturbing and emotional. While the series explores different types of hoarding, the episode I saw was about animal hoarding: a man who hoarded rats, and a woman who hoarded cats. Over the course of that 45-minute episode, I saw a life many of us will never experience or understand. While the people on the show were being filmed, they weren’t exploited, as is so often the case with reality TV. They seemed to want to change their lives: the man with the rats sobbed when hundreds of them were taken from his home, but he knew he was making a better life for them and for himself; the woman with the cats, after first seeming to want help, lashed out and refused to allow camera crews or animal control officers into her house, even after her father pleaded with her to let them in. I believe she eventually did allow the cats to be removed from the home and receive proper care.
Animal hoarding brings out a lot of feelings: how could people live this way? How could they accumulate this many animals, and then fail to provide them with adequate nutrition or even a litter box? How could someone have so many rats in their house that there are rats living in the walls? People also think it’s something that’s easy to make fun of, but the problems experienced by the humans and animals are serious. Most of the time, human and animal health is at risk.
Hoarding will be classified as a disorder, the article linked above says, which means it will be easier for people to get help — and usually interventions are the only way.