A man just tried to kick our front door in

[32flavours]

Woke up to banging and shouting and realised there was a man outside booting our front door. I’ve never been so scared, I thought he was actually going to get in. I have a toddler and am heavily pregnant. I called the police and they came quite quickly, he’d conveniently moved on by then. I’m still shaking though, I don’t really know my I’m posting, I’m just too shaken up to sleep.

Glad you managed to get a few hours sleep.

A chain for the door sounds as though it'll be reassuring.

A ring door bell if you can stretch to it might be useful too. It would have recorded the bastard and the police might know who it was.

Yes Ring doorbells are excellent.

You poor thing. That sounds terrifying.

At a guess though, it wasn't personal to you - the guy was probably pissed and thought it was a different house.

Having lived in a crap area, if you are still worried, go for bolts top and bottom, and if you can afford it, hinge bolts on the other side (short bolts that swing into the door jamb on the side with the hinges) - this will make it near impossible to kick the door off its hinges.

“But he was probably drunk or on drugs”

And that excuses it because why, Greatnorthwoods.

32flavors. I can’t and wouldn’t want to imagine how terrifying that was for you.

I can’t see it being personal either, tbh. What grudge could anyone possibly have against a pregnant women with a toddler.
I understand though that’s no consolation when your doors being booted in.

You poor thing OP.

Could you get and install a Ring doorbell? A friend of mine did after a similar experience and it’s really helped reassure her.

Glad your all ok op. I have had similar happen when I was home alone and it really shook me up .

“Not scary enough to keep you off tinternet, though”

Tilly, did you mean to be such a dick

Awlook I think it was offered as an explanation rather than an excuse, on order to help OP assess the risk of it happening again.

I used to live in a really really shitty inner city area (sincerely hope that OP isn't similarly placed) and in terms of one's personal anxiety levels there's a world of difference if you're pretty confident this was a one off random pissed person banging on the door because they'd got the wrong house v it being targeted at you.

Thanks for all the advice, I’m going to look into a Ring doorbell and we’re going to get a couple of bolts fitted. I don’t think it was targeted, he seemed like he was off his face on something, but he was incredibly aggressive and persistent. I dread to think what he would have done if he actually got in. There were boot marks all over the door this morning.

Luckily we had a really fun even planned with our ds today, just what we needed to forget about last night!

Oh and we live in an area that used to be really bad but is being regenerated. It still has quite a lot of deprivation close by.

@32flavours the same thing happened to me some years ago now. I was living alone in a flat (small building with two flats, I was in the upstairs one) and the guy was trying to smash the front entrance door down, he was literally throwing himself at it. Both I and my neighbours called the police and they got him, but not before he'd smashed the glass panels in the door.

It turned out he was off his face and thought it was his house! Nothing like it ever happened again. Just wanted to reassure you that it probably won't happen again, as the circumstances sound so similar. No harm in getting extra precautions installed though!

Hope your feeling better now, I know how absolutely terrifying it must have been for you