Today's cuppa: Yorkshire Gold tea
If you've been a fan of Style Network's "Clean House" since its premiere in the fall of 2003, and especially if you've watched the previous two "Messiest Home in the Country" specials, the "Dirty Little Awards Show" and the just-completed "Search for the Messiest Home in the Country," you may think you've seen the worst of what host Niecy Nash calls "mayhem and foolishness."
I beg to differ.
Tonight, July 1, at 9 p.m. ET/PT (with repeats at that same hour on Thursday and Friday), Style premieres the two-hour special "Messiest in the Country 3," which visits the Cincinnati, Ohio, residence of Sharon Baglien, 57, a recently retired police detective, and her 20-year-old daughter, Brigitte, who made the desperate call to "Clean House" to get the junk out and transform their home.
Somehow the women got up every day and navigated around piles of stuff and expired food everywhere -- the result of 30 years of shopping and hoarding -- while also dealing with a non-working kitchen sink, a dripping bathroom shower with a bucket in it (in, by the way, the only bathroom) and a broken stove, dishwasher, and washer and dryer.
Oh, and the washer had overflowed at some point, soaking the giant mounds of stuff in the basement, which were still in place, along with long-expired food. At least the mice were happy.
The only thing greater than the sheer tonnage of junk stuffed into every corner of the house, from groaning attic to packed garage to long-neglected storage unit to the basement -- where, as designer Mark Brunetz pointed out, eyes wide, "You can't even see the walls" -- is the depth and breadth of Sharon's denial.
"I don't believe," says Brunetz, "at any point, Sharon and especially her daughter Brigitte ever lived in a house that was orderly. It's like speaking to someone in English, but they're hearing it in Greek, and that's what makes it so difficult.
'In many ways, while we were there, we were trying to invent a new language in which to communicate with her."
Sharon Bagliens' response to questions about the state of her home usually involved a smile and the use of the word "overwhelmed" (along with a few words that will be bleeped at airtime).
"She definitely has a way of dealing with perhaps not understanding what's going on," Brunetz says. "Her veneer was just, 'I'll smile and look like everything's great.'
"The thing about Sharon, she told her own story. We really didn't have to do much. We just opened the doors and turned the cameras on and asked her some basically relevant questions, and her story was just told by virtue of how she communicated -- or lack of communication -- and then really what he house looked like.
"Oftentimes, you really want to dig deep into a story, but we tried, and we could only get to far. But I think, a picture speaks a thousand words. In this case, it did."
Nash -- who, with Brunetz, has been with the show since the beginning -- is usually firm and unflappable in the face of the most mind-boggling heaps of junk, but was reduced to tears in the basement.
"That was very real," Brunetz says. "I'll tell you what was interesting about doing that. Niecy never really gets (very far) into the house, especially the basement.
"So when she walked into it, it was her first walk into that basement."
The junk there was even deep enough to entirely hide "go-to guy" Matt Iseman, and he's not exactly small.
In the end, "yard-sale diva" Trish Suhr had to use a 7,000-square-foot empty department store to house the Bagliens' stuff for the yard sale.
(By the way, while yard-sale proceeds usually go to financing the redecorating, in the case of the "Messiest Home," the money goes to the residents' charity, and the show picks up the tab for a total-house makeover.)
But between the beginning of the sale and the final reveal, both women, at different times, stormed off the location.
"We closed the show without (Sharon)," says Brunetz. "It speaks to this idea that, in many ways, 'Clean House' stays fresh because, although the main themes of the show are the same -- that being the clutter and the people -- how the story gets told and the outcome and all that, constantly changes.
"The show will follow up with her, but that will be 'To Be Continued.' For now, this is how this played out."
Nash often says that clutter is an outward manifestation of something going on inside, and that's a consistent theme of the show. Every junk-laden house contains stories of a life or a relationship gone awry.
Brunetz is even working on a book about the psychology of clutter and our consumer culture, which should come out about this time next year.
"Clutter," he says, "keeps people from being present to their lives. It's a principle of the show -- when you have all this stuff, and you create a life around this stuff, it keeps you anchored in the past. It doesn't allow you to be present in the very moment you're living in."
For example, Sharon Baglien refused to let Brigitte discard any of her childhood possessions and spoke of her daughter in nostalgic terms -- even though she was standing a few feet away.
"She was so torn up," says Brunetz, "around missing her daughter that she didn't realize her daughter was standing right there."
In the end, "Clean House" tries to organize lives, not just houses. Asked if the show might, in some small way, be doing work on behalf of the Almighty, Brunetz laughs.
"You know," he says, "I'm going to actually take that compliment in, because normally I would slough it off. I'd like to think that one of the things I do, and we're doing it as a show, is walking in the truth of what it is to be human.
"So I consider that high praise, and thank you very much."
After all, no matter how silly or benign or frivolous TV reality shows may start out to be, they still have, at their core, human beings with real, human feelings.
"The cool thing about reality is," Brunetz says, "sooner or later, you're going to run into real people, and we definitely ran into some real people at 'Messiest Home 3.'"
This family was just rude! They did not deserve all the things the team did for them. They have a real sickness when it come to all that crap. I can't believe they could just smile like they didn't know what *****es they were being. Sharon and Bridget really need some professional help and a major attitude adjustment
I totally agree... They were disrespectful. When the daughter wouldn't apologize to Neicy I wanted to pull her through the television and shake some sense into her.
I joined this group specifically to vent about this episode! I have never seen anyone more ungrateful and rude to a crew of people who were working on their behalf. BOTH of those women have some apparent psychological issues but I'm amazed that they couldn't even behave themselves for the camera. They have humiliated themselves on national television. I feel a great sense of wasted effort for all those that worked so hard to help these people. Not only did they not deserve it, with their blatant refusal to face their issues I'm positive that the home will be ruined in no time.
As usual, you summed it up just perfectly... sans the smells. ;)
Appreciate it, Matt. And thank goodness we don't have Smell-O-Vision!
God bless the Clean House crew. I cannot imagine working with the Bagliens. Their denial is so deep that I don't think a backhoe could excavate them from the prison that is their mind.
Sharon needs professional help that she likely will never get. Brigette needs to move out of her mother's house. To some degree, I understand what Brigette is going through because my mother was also a hoarder. We had rooms in the house that could not be opened because they were crammed full. I was never so happy to move away to college. My dorm room, and later my apartment, were neat. Lived in, but neat and orderly.
My mother moved to a much smaller place and to her credit, she cleaned a lot of things out when she did so. However...last year, I had to fly home when my mother was hospitalized for two weeks. She lost 20+ pints of blood and I nearly lost my mind. My cousin and I spent four 12-hour days cleaning her house. It was unreal what was in there. It was so bad, I had to stay in a hotel because staying in her house just wasn't possible. It was too cluttered.
She was somewhat resistant to our cleaning efforts, but a lot of tears later she was appreciative and understanding that keeping everything was a sickness.
All of this to say that I can't even imagine what the Clean House crew has to go through working with total ingrates like the Bagliens. I can only hope that they keep their home clean, but honestly I don't think they will and that is a real shame.
I just saw this episode tonight! We can all be guilty of getting attached to things but there was so much more going on with those two. There's clearly something missing in Sharon's life that causes her to shop and bring home STUFF.
That basement was crazy, well, the whole house was crazy, but that basement. Wow! I'll be very interested to see a follow-up especially in light of the whole "Someone's taken my Grandmother's purse" business.
The people from the messiest house #3 were heinous! How could you treat Niecy, Matt, Trish and Mark (plus all the people you never see behind the scenes) so poorly when they had done so much??? I am very surprised Niecy didn't just walk out and say "I'm leaving you here with all your clutter, mayhem and foolishness!" But, I think Niecy is so nice and she wanted to do something wonderful for those two ingrates (sorry if I misspelled that...) . I would be surprised if they keep the house clean. It will be interesting to see what it looks like when and if Niecy and the crew go back. Seriously, the lady had RATS in her house and rat droppings.... it's a wonder they weren't seriously ill!!! My house is messy, but nothing like what was on that show... the woman needs to realize she is a hoarder, compulsive shopper and a rude lady!!
Sharon and Bridgette are pigs in more than a couple of ways, wait that's too insulting to pigs.
This article about the Clean House episode was great. Mark spoke well about what was going on here. I definitly want to read that book.
I saw the videos and pictures of that house - and it was bad.
When Matt was buried in the basement - of course it was for the camera. Sharon and Bridgette were laughing thru his arising. The others were not. I cant decide why they were so shocked at something that was obviously staged.
I also saw the video on the Clean House site in which Matt spoke warmly of the 2 women, of how nice they were to work with. To find the video you have to click on a few tabs that are about behind the scenes of the episode. He was speaking the truth, at whatever time during the 2 weeks that video was done, that was how he felt.
The interviewing video - those women were nice, worthy of people feeling sympathy towards them werent they?
I have not read ONE comment on ANY site discussing this episode that does not vilefy these 2 poor souls. I see myself in that mom, so that is the extra vision I have here.
First, she had JUST retired. Retiring is one of life's major steps that causes issues all by itself in someone who has no issues. It IS a big deal.
Of course, that house is a lifetime of issues, 30 years worth as she says. In trying to understand my "collecting" I realized it is because "things" were taken from me against my will when I was a kid. At first, I am talking about material things - whether toys or something I loved being wisked away without me having a chance to say that's MINE. But I also think it means somewhere I lost a sense of control over my life, my self.
Are there darker ideas of what else was taken from Sharon - it's not a stretch to think that either.
My collecting things has gotten worse over the last several years.
I had a hard time when my daughter left home. I didnt realize it until a therapist pointed it out to me. And after the first one hour talking to him, in which I did not even discuss my kids that much, he had it.
I was open mouth astonished when he told me that the current problems I had were because my daughter was growing up, growing away. But he was so right. It took awhile until I was able to let her go, not in the phsyical sense of course, but the idea that my girl was grown up.
I dont know all the reasons why I "collect". I am slowly trying to gain insight into it. People make fun of me too. In this case the poison spewing at these women is a whole hell of a lot worse than that.
Mark was very right about not living in the "present". But I dont think you can just ***ume the "opposite" by saying it's living in the past either. It is just not living at all.
I feel numb. It is like coming out of anesthegia, just numb and foggy and out of it.
I feel right enough to add that it also is about having some feeling of control over your life. To a "normal" person (and I simply mean just a person who feels normal without hoarding issues!!) they are thinking what sense of control? Your house is so bad you cant even sit down. But you can reach out your hand and grasp one dish, one small thing you can curl your fingers around and it is yours.
Yes I know there were m***ive amounts of stuff there, but I am hoping that you get the idea.
Sharon - God bless you. Let HIM hold you in His hand.
Someone please tell me how I can catch this episode. I managed to miss it each time it showed. Thanks much.
Here's info from Style on re-airings of the special.
Schedules are always subject to change.
But the next airings of "Clean House: Messiest Home in the Country 3" are schedule for:
Friday 8/14 @ 8pm*
Thursday 8/20 @ 6pm
*There is a chance that this might change.
The listings grid can be found at:
http://www.mystyle.com/mystyle/shows/schedule.jsp