Our household noise is driving our neighbour insane.

There is a problem called hyperacusis which sometimes accompanies ageing, it causes amplified hearing and can make even normal noise very painful for sufferers, this could be the problem but unfortunately there are no quick fixes

Sounds like she has tinnitus or an issue related to her hearing loss.

I used to take police 999 calls and we had lots of regular callers... One of them was an elderly chap who believed his upstairs and downstairs neighbours were working together to torture him.

He would phone us ranting and raving saying we would be able to hear the noises of them banging, crashing etc. He'd give us a silence to listen but we never heard a thing. We had the whole thing referred out to the Neighbourhood team who never heard a thing he heard - they'd be sitting in the flat with him asking if they could hear (whatever noise). The council were brought in to place noise monitors and recording devices and the only things picked up was his own household noise and his screaming and banging on walls and ceilings.

The council referred to social services, who organised a GP appointment. Tinnitus was diagnosed. He refused to accept this and was insistent the police, council, GP etc were colluding in the torture with the neighbours.

I don't know what the final outcome was but this went on for many many months....

ETA - make no changes at all to your lives. Speak to the daughter. I'll bet there is no recording. Suggest the daughter come to stay for a few days as you can't replicate the noises and want her opinion....

not saying its the case here but with times of use energy tariffs it may become more common.

Talking to her daughter seems a reasonable idea to jointly explore the solutions. Feeling being listened to can greatly deescalate the situation. One of the options would be a white noise machine- they are cheap and cheerful on Amazon and come with all sorts of sounds including nature sounds. A pair of budgies to desentise her to noise and keep her company?(Providing she has enough mental capacity to care for them)

Ask her if she would mind you coming round to talk to her daughter when she comes - maybe try to help her find some solutions which could include reviewing her hearing aid settings with the service provider, playing some background music that she likes / finds soothing / comforting, asking her if she removes her hearing aids at night...

That’s really anti-social unless you are in a detached house.

If she makes a formal complaint you will have to declare it when selling the house. And it will be up to you to explain that the walls are actually quite thin. You can try reaching a compromise. For example no en-suite showers after 10 pm and no washing up machine till let's say 8 am (or whatever time the old lady wakes up). Most washing machines come with timers these days. Conflict with neighbours are easy to get into, very difficult to get out. I would try negotiating a middle position

It sounds like a dementia problem and if so there is absolutely nothing you can do to stop her 'hearing' this imagined noise. I'm willing to bet the daughter does not have a recording of the noise, but it's worth talking to her to get her take on this. Other than that, don't get involved further.

My friend's mother had dementia and was always complaining about 'noise coming from the walls'. Friend went to stay with her, no noise coming from walls. Sometime later the mother deteriorated further and moved to a care home.

I'd say it's her ears. My nan is 97 and swears she hears things no one else can hear, but she's so deaf even with her hearing aides she struggles to hear! I'd speak to the daughter if you feel it would help but would not change my routine over it.

Generally agree but running the washing machine at midnight seems unnecessary?

Sounds like she might need SS help.

My DM is in her 80s and has dementia related to Parkinson’s. She gets auditory hallucinations when she’s convinced she hears the front doorbell or people talking in another part of the house.

luckily she still has enough self awareness that she can usually be convinced she’s hearing things (“am I having a doo-lally moment?”). But hearing things that aren’t there is quite common in the elderly due to a variety of medical causes, and can be very real and distressing for them.

Ignore her x

She could be lonely

I remember years ago there was a program following the people who assess noise nuisance. A lot of it was about factories working after certain hours etc but one was a couple who were complaining no end about their neighbours bathroom fan. They were convinced the neighbour was running the fan just to piss them off. They and the noise bloke stood in their bathroom listening to this fan noise. He could not get them to understand that it was just normal noise, and not even that loud.

I agree it’s a medical issue.

But even if it wasn’t, and she just finds your normal everyday noises too much, tough luck, that’s life in a semi detached house. Don’t be changing anything.

Me too exactly the same. My horrendous vertigo was caused by an ear infection the doctors refused to treat for 8 months. Now I’m hyper sensitive to noises, literally make me feel physically sick and get bad bouts of tinnitus.

It’s probably tinnitus related, I get a lot of horrible noises and ringing.

Also my older neighbour kept hearing loud humming noises, she thought from our house, but us and the other sides neighbours couldn’t hear it. I was listening for three days and worried there was a leaking pipe somewhere. Turns out she went to the doctor and even though she has never had ear problems or hearing loss it was blood pressure related.

Yes as previous posters said I’m wondering about the start of dementia or something psychiatric if tinnitus etc gets ruled out? I think you’ve been more than generous, I would try and speak to the daughter then stay out of her way (and live your life with normal noise!)

It sounds unreasonable on her behalf but I tell you, my neighbour has a boiler attached on a party wall and the noise was making me really ill. Keeping me up all night, jolting me awake. The anxiety was through the roof.

It made me more sensitive to all noise as you were on eggshells listening out.

This is honestly hideous and imagine one annoying noise has triggered her.

Luckily a new tenant moved in and allowed my friend a heating engineer to fix the issue now all is OK but it was an awful couple of YEARS! Totally fine with normal household noise now but I was going bonkers.

Also washing machines/tumble driers on at nighttime unless you are detached can be really antisocial.

Could you have high pressure water or the ensuite a faulty pump or one that could be sound insulated maybe?

OP our neighbour was the same.

Had hearing aids and was obviously to some degree deaf.

His son was lovely and helped mediate, and it turns out when you're going deaf and you're of a certain age and your brain can't always process sounds the way it used to it tries to fill the gaps so you perceive normal daily sounds that aren't quite there or that don't exist at all.

It's an early sign of cognitive decline especially in people who are housebound and have nothing else to keep their minds occupied with.

I had an elderly neighbour like this I think she was just lonely and it was an excuse to come round for a chat. It was just normal noises like the boiler, washing machine ect absolutely nothing I could do about it.

My aunt had an elderly neighbour like this, who became very angry and distressed about imagined noises from her flat. Started complaining about sounds coming through the adjoining wall. This escalated to complaints about loud music, which turned out to be her own radio but which she insisted was my aunt controlling it through the wall... In this case, it turned out that the elderly neighbor was developing dementia and this fixation on imaginary/hallucinated/exaggerated sounds was an early symptom.

Also, if her husband had the TV on 99 and now she’s sitting in silence, absolutely not your problem either, but can she work the TV?

But she maybe complaining about noises only she can hear inside her head. Which I'm sure she finds very distressing.