I understand now the instinct to hoard.
My mom and dad are from Holland and Indonesia respectively. They were both born during WWII and the first years of life were hungry and scary. My mother came away with an instinct to hoard money. My dad finally broke her habit of stashing cash around the house, and put it all in the bank, but she is a penny-pinching, frugal woman - you can't get at her wallet without a crowbar. (Thank God, because she saved up well for her last days, and is able to afford the assisted living she's in now. I sure as hell don't have the money to take care of her.) Credit cards are a no-no - if you don't have the money for it, you don't need it. Credit is only for a house and a car, and you pay your bills the day they come in and DO NOT ever pay late fees, etc. It's actually shameful to be charged a late fee.
Naturally, after emigrating to the US, my parents sought out and hung with other Dutch ex-pats. One of their friends was a food hoarder. I'm talking about the entire attic full of boxes of cereal, having to add on rooms to store all the stuff she'd buy. The fridge practically bulging with rotten, expired, smelly foods because YOU DO NOT THROW FOOD AWAY! It was crazy-level food hoarding. But she also grew up in war-torn Europe where food was scarce. My mom said my grandpa would raid nearby farms at night for chickens, eggs, potatoes. You did what you had to do to feed your family. My mom remembers vividly the first time she had an orange, after the war was over, when she was about 6 years old. Such a treat!
But the food hoarding friend, we'll call her Auntie Annie, was a hoarder of epic proportions. I could not understand the point of hoarding all of this food, only to have it spoil, or be decimated by hordes of roaches. (yes, I was serious about the attic being full of cereal). Then I grew up and I understood a bit more about the sickness behind hoarding at that level, and was more empathetic, but still only understood it clinically rather than instinctively.
Fast forward to now, to me. I'm one who shops for about a week to 10 days at a time. Who has the money to buy a month's worth of stuff at once? Plus, I like fresh veggies. But when I began to understand that there was a serious likelihood that we'd be locked down for two weeks to a month, I started building up our stores to cover us for a month.
And now, I understand how Auntie Annie's hoarding got out of control - how the instinct to hoard began in her.
We're about 10 days into our supply, and I'm down to two packs of TP, and out of a few kinds of canned veggies already. My thinking about having provisions in the house is changing, evolving due to the current situation, and I am truly beginning to understand how fragile the supply chain really is. If truckers get sick, we're fucked. And it'll be pandemonium in very short order.
I'm starting to think about things like buying a rack for the garage to store canned good and paper goods, and how to rotate inventory, and buying at least one pack of TP whenever I see any available.
And the hoarding sickness part is, now that I have a month's worth, it suddenly doesn't feel like enough. I'm scared and worried and obsessed with having enough of everything. I just went out today for the first time in a week, had to go to the pharmacy. While I was there I picked up a couple of food items, and I bought two of everything - cause I don't know if it'll be there next week.
I'm in danger of becoming just like my mom's friend, I understand completely now how she ended up the way she did. The worry just takes over. I understand now, and I'm sorry for every whispered conversation about how crazy you were, Auntie Annie. Luckily I recognize the danger signs and will learn from your lesson, and won't let things get away from me.
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If I lived in a different part of the country with a different wife, I might have not only a fully stocked bunker but a bug out bunker as well. 
My wife has kept me sane. I still have more of everything than we need, but we had three kids and a lot of guests so it was easy to say we needed a little (more than) extra in the pantry.
But no guns, or explosives, or rooms full of crap. Just enough to not worry for a while.
This epidemic hasn't been terrible yet. We can still get out and find dairy and meats. But we are set for staples.
are a lot more than the CDC recommends, which is for three days. If the Big One hits we could be cut off from civilization for a long time.
We don't get out often right now -- about once every 10 days -- and when we do we keep on the look out for items we're likely to run short on. We're not as concerned about toilet paper. Every time we go to our local grocery store the receipt is about three feet long with coupons, even if we only buy a couple of items. 
A good place to start is CDC's "Preparing for a Zombie Apocalypse."
