Village bullies - time to move?

there’s no “obviously” about shite advice being a joke on mumsnet!

I spent 12 years in a village

Never ever again.

I could go years without talking to anyone other than dh

I am not Christian and I don’t drink

Came across the village Facebook page and it looks like not a lot has changed in the 30 years since we left. All about church timings and church events. Even the flower arranging class was about church flowers and what new ales the pub has

Obviously not 🤣

Don’t sell, move back to the city and turn your village house into an Airbnb specialising in Hen Do Party Weekends

Then they would have something to complain about

That is absolutely insane. And frankly, quite disgusting behaviour. 'Rioting' against 'outsiders' via non-violent means.

What is wrong with so many small minded people in this country!

seriously?

Hide their bins until after the binmen have been (or take them for a very long walk).

Sometimes you have to stand your ground and keep a dignified silence in the face of bullying. I've had to keep quiet for more than a year while a neighbour has denigrated me at every opportunity. I finally thought by now after getting no reaction for so long they would be bored but two days ago found out the most outrageous lie they had spread that I know nobody with a modicum of sense believes anyway. It's tedious and wearing but giving a reaction is a fatal mistake with people like this.

Village life can be lovely. But you have to embrace it and get involved. It's different to a town in that respect.

You don't say the size of the village. But my suggestion would be to join a committee or two, make sure you make friends with the local shop owner. Is the primary school in the village or a neighbouring one? If in the village again get involved. School gates can be tricky - but talk to everyone and develop a thick skin. It won't take long to work out who is who and who you want to be friends with.

If its 'just' a couple of neighbours being unpleasant, embrace the rest of the village culture so you are the popular one - they will then soon back off.

After a year of two you can sit back - but you do have to put yourself out there to begin with. And it will take time!

I think sometimes people move from cities/towns to villages to live a secluded life - that's not how it really works. If anything, it is much easier to live a secluded lifestyle in a town/city.

I grew up in a small village and there was definitely a social hierarchy that a noisy minority tried to impose on others. Because they had lived there for several generations they felt they had some kind of elevated status like minor royalty and that they had to be consulted on or have the final word on absolutely everything that went on in the village. They were nosey curtain twitching twats that most people ignored but my god they were meddlesome arseholes who would put in vexatious complaints to the local council on everything. They were particularly nasty to my mother and father who are Irish and they made it very clear they their sort were no wanted. My folks were very social though and made friends and after several months hosted a house warning garden party and invited everyone apart from these arseholes. They turned up anyway before being told in no uncertain terms that they were not invited and should leave. Some people are time rich miserable bastards.

It's so difficult - we had issues with our neighbours but honestly we feel like we could sell up and move and still have problem neighbours! So we have stuck it out, it's kind of randomly a problem, but for long stretches of times nothing happens, but I do feel on edge - ours is a parking dispute so anytime I drive home I feel anxious.
Our parking issue is that we have 2 cars, one parked on our driveway, the other on the road, which is obviously unrestricted parking. Very old next door neighbours used to park in front of their house and we parked in front of them (in front of our house), this worked because we both have small cars. No problems for several years but we were warned when we moved in that these neighbours viewed that space as their spot so don't park in it ever. Fine, not really an issue for us to just keep the peace.
They eventually became too old to drive so gave up their car - suddenly us parking in exactly the same place as we had for several years was a problem! They would literally wait for us to come out of our house and shout at us to move our car, that it was their space for their visitors.. who could park there easily as all they would have been slightly blocking with their bigger car was their own driveway! Which the visitors could also have just parked on!?
It was so unreasonable and if they weren't elderly we would have called the police because they were constantly watching us and waiting to come out and shout, even shouted out of their bedroom window when we arrived home late one night.
We tried to stay really calm about it and explain that we weren't doing anything wrong but they just did not seem to understand, so we went to ignoring them instead. My husband only lost it once when they shouted at me when I was holding our newborn who started crying.
It lasted for about 2 years and suddenly stopped, haven't heard a peep out of them about the parking since though I have still seen them watching out the window and we've had multiple people mention that when parking there to drop a card in or to pick us up (so a 5 minute stop), the old guys been watching through the window the whole time.
Some people are just absolutely insane. Honestly I don't want them to move though because parking on our road will become even more of an issue as the elderly people with 0-1 cars move out and younger people move in, likely to have 1-2 cars per household.
So frustrating but unless we could afford to move somewhere with 3+ private parking spaces, I think we'd still be liable to have issues.
The one off bad situations, I would try to move past, the regular issue, try to consider how it can be managed. Can you guests park a street over? That's what some of ours did when it was a big issue, just to make things less stressful. Obviously it shouldn't have to be that way but you don't want to lose out financially by moving due to some people moaning about parking.
I think you do need to list it as a dispute if you plan to sell, but many people don't unless there's been an official log of it for example to the police/council.

They sound like massive arseholes and you're not in the wrong at all. Having nice neighbours is really important. Mine are great and it makes a big difference to my life as a single mum, living in a street of decent people who look out for each other. So it depends on whether a) you can win them back round b) whether you actually need to - or want to, tbh.

I will give a suggestion but with caution. It might be worth feeling out your parish council. My work puts me into contact with a lot of PCs and oftentimes they live up to all the negative assumptions we have about them but there are some really good parish councillors out there. The good ones are very happy to talk informally about all sorts of confidential or tricky things and will try to help. Or at least be aware of the issues and be able to advocate for you in the community without making a whole hullabaloo about it.

You could go to a a meeting just as a member of the public (that’s normal) see who’s there, how they appear and get a sense of if there’s one you might like to chat with sometime.

it’s all very weird

the op decided to have a baby alone
she had the baby alone back in May
6 weeks later she’s posting about her DH and MIL
and now this

I would love to hear the neighbours version of what’s going on

I agree - this is just stirring for the sake of it - however if it is not I suspect the OP has entered a small community being a big show off and thinking she is the great 'I am' and looking down her nose at people who already live there

@Redgreenfroggy

Absolute batshit behaviour. Village schools are gold dust and are being closed down due to lack of pupils and this village wanted to stop new pupils? Village shops are closing due to not making a living and they wanted to stop more customers to the shop? I expect if there is a pub they would want to ban the new people from there.

It would have been just deserts if the build hadn't gone ahead and the village had lost it's school and shop.

Absolute batshit (shakes head in despair)

you have the very confusing postibg history

one week you’re a single parent of a newborn
next week your DH had gone back to work after maternity leave and your MIL is helping your out
today you’re single parent

and all in the last 2 months

you’ve been a single mum for a few weeks? well you were referring to your DH back in june 🤷

you have a newborn OP?

You have to consider the reason why you moved to this area. If one of the driving factors was for being part of a village community, it isn't working because the people you live around are toxic.

If the social element doesn't bother you, you have to be firm. They may own their houses, but they don't own the village.

Tell the person who moves your bins that it is unacceptable. Advise the people who complain about your visitors parking on an unrestricted road to speak to the councillor about the possibility of restricted parking being brought in. Either they wouldn't do it, or the councillor will tell them that they are being ridiculous.

When in Rome, do as the Romans do. If it's not the done thing to park in the road, you should ask your guests to park on your drive.
I wouldn't stay in Royston Vasey though, life is too short to feel disliked in your own neighbourhood.

Call them out! If they say a random place on an unrestricted road belongs to "Alan", ask to see the deeds that outline this. To be honest if someone tried this shit with me I'd be parking there all the time.

Move the bins back in front of their houses EVERY DAMN TIME.

They'll soon get bored and move onto some other mundane thing to forth about.

I don't think you should move. It's likely you could go through the whole process, lose money and end up with even worse neighbours.
People don't like change. I bet the neighbours have lived there for years and literally anything you do will be annoying. Give it time. Keep yourself to yourself and eventually they will forget about you.
I would say with parking however, if your friends are parking in front of their houses it might be annoying. I would report anything your can to 101 like the blocking in. Maybe also make sure you have a video doorbell. If they start lurking around your house and purposely moving their cars around to block you in, you have something to show the police. Now that would be embarrassing for them.

How long do you think youd have to stick it out for before being able to recoup your money on the house? Is there any way of being able to get tenants and live somewhere else?

In the meantime, i think you should be documenting everything. Keep a daily diary.

They don’t tell you these things on Escape to the Country 😬