To report the parents on the other side of the wall

[SteelMagnolia]

We share a wall with a family I haven't met. The entrance to their house enters on a gated mews, while ours opens onto the street. For at least nine months, we have heard crying babies on the other side of the wall. We have a one year old, and of course, he cries sometimes. But these babies...I think there are two...cry ALL the time. It just doesn't seem right. I'm listening to it now.

I feel like I should report this. Possibly these children are neglected, or perhaps the parents just cannot cope? Our experienced nanny also finds it odd how often, and for how long, these babies cry.

Would I be unreasonable to report this? If not, who do I call? And will they even do anything, given that I've never even laid eyes on these people?

could well have been a multiple birth, they often arrive with complimentary earplugs...

My friends, who are wonderful, doting parents, first child screamed all the time with colic. They often worried they would be reported, but never were. I think if you heard the parents screaming/shouting in anger and heard thumping, as well as crying, that would be reason to call, but not simply crying. It wouldn't hurt to go around and meet them, from the sounds of it, they could use a break.

Also had a screamer of a baby

the reality is that neglected babies are not the ones that cry all the time. Cry-it-out works.

Babies who scream constantly have parents who need support.

i also had a crying baby for 12 months and now he is nearly 3 (well i march) and still cries alot!

Ds2 cried almost all night, (for the first 3 months)on-and-off, often for literally hours at a time, whilst I paced, cuddling him, almost sobbing myself.
My neighbour reporting me would have been the final straw.

I don't know what you should do about it - but perhaps raising concerns with the HVs woudl be better than going straight for SS.

My sister has had the police called on her before, when her 3 DDs have caused her to have a complete screaming meltdown (she had PND) - the girls were ok, it was a one-off, but it was a horrible thing to happen to her on top of the general stress of them being little brats and the PND.

You DON'T know the situation so you cannot do more than put feelers out to the people who might be able to help without judgement.

ds cried every single night for 4 hours from about 1 week old to about 4 mo. We used to put him in a sling and walk the streets with him so as not to annoy the neighbours for the first hour or two. He then cried every single night for about an hour in the middle of the night until he was 18 mo. I felt terrible for the neighbours, one of whom used to pound on the wall when the crying started but there was really nothing we could do. You really need to calm down on the neighbourhood watch until you know what is going on, as others have suggested maybe say hi to the parents and see how you can be a GOOD neighbour rather than jumping to conclusions and piling more misery on them.

I haven't read all the posts however ds cried and cried and cried and screamed for the entire first 18mths of his life. I had a knock on the door from a concerned neighbour and we are still friends to this day. I was never offended that she knocked, she just came over and said "I was wondering if you needed any support, your little one sounds like hard work" she was right he was and I did.

No offense lady, but you have a 1 year old. You are utterly ignorant. If there are 2 babies, perhaps twins, who are toddlers, then it's quite normal to have screaming tantrums several times a day for quite a long time. 2 toddlers, double the tantrums.

What is wrong with society when we are ready to report people at the drop of a hat? Neighbours spying on neighbours and reporting them to the government. FFS. You have NO evidence and you could cause unbelievable stress for the family. It's even possible your neighbour is a childminder.

Leave it. You could always post a note to them if you can't get in the gate.

Menagerie- sorry to hear that your child was a screamer. If on the other hand you had been really struggling with him, and/or abusing him, it is surely better on the whole that your neighbour was keeping a watchful eye on your baby? I think that people who stick their necks out at the risk if incurring the wrath of the parents are wonderful and doing their civic duty. If only more people did, maybe some of the horrible tragedies of recent could have been avoided.

go round and speak to them. be a friend. i hate thinking about all the other mums as lonely as i am, shut away with their screaming kids and no-one even bothering to make their lives a little more bearable, prefering to call ss instead. imagine your life without a nanny fgs!

This reminds me if my sisters situation. She has twins, both if whom had reflux and cried constantly for months and months! I'm sure she would have been delighted to have a knock on the door from a friendly neighbour as she found it quite difficult to take them out very often and became a bit isolated. Maybe you should play it that way and see what's going on for yourself?

please dont ring ss. My daughter is beyond tempremental and will scream not cry hysterically like she is being murdered, shes nearly 2 and has always been this way. NOTHING works, so now i put her down and let her get on with it. the second i pick her up she stops crying and smiles, unfortunatly i have a life so i cant hold her all the time.

i promise you you have never heard a child with a cry as loud as mine

teaandcakesplease I thought it might be me at first too! (paranoid!)
My neighbours try really hard to ignore me, and I am sure it's because my ds has recurrent night terrors during which he screams things like "no mummy no!"

I have also been known to shout at him when he has been whinging solidly for six hours during the day, and you really can hear everything thru the wall.

With regards to OP, I think in this country people make such a big deal of speaking to strangers.

Example-there has been a spate of burglaries on our street.
It is not a very close community, and I am sure the fact that people tend to ignore alarms when they go off etc doesn't help matters.

I noticed a police van across the street and the next day spied the man who lives in that house.
I had never spoken or even waved at him but I marched across the road to ask him about it.
He had been burgled, and we chatted about who lives in his house, who lives in ours, and agreed to watch out for each others houses.

This is the thing, if everyone tries to live in their own separate bubble and is always in fear of what others might think, terrible things are allowed to happen right in front of us.

Please don't call SS (at this point) but please DO go over there. You don't need an excuse. You are neighbours!

Tbh OP, if you are as genuinely concerned as you sound then surely it is more important to overcome your embarrassment or whatever it is and actually approach the parents rather than hiding behind an easy anonymous phone call? Be willing to put yourself out a bit and have some concern and compassion for the parents as well as the babies!

The anonymous phone call approach reminds me of alan bennett's a lady of letters!
See

and REALLY avoid such inflammatory talk as 'report the parents'. For what?

northernrock good to know I'm not the only one who thought that

Our upstairs neighbours used to make comments about how often dd cried as well, I always assumed they were just gifted with a unusually quiet baby until i had the boys and realised quite how unusual the amount of screaming dd had done was... I mean i knew at the time she cried a lot but assumed it was still within normal bounds, babies all cry right? But dd would scream for hours and hours on end, nothing soothed her, in fact often as not being held and soothed just made her angirer.

She had reflux and was in pain and there was simply nothing i could do to stop her screaming, there were times it got so bad i had to just put her down for five minutes and go stand at the door for some air as i felt like i was about to lose control.... i'm sure the neighbours saw that and assumed i was just a neglectful cow who wasn't even trying to calm her down.

duchesse

"...it is surely better on the whole that your neighbour was keeping a watchful eye on your baby? I think that people who stick their necks out at the risk if incurring the wrath of the parents are wonderful and doing their civic duty. If only more people did, maybe some of the horrible tragedies of recent could have been avoided."

What, by ensuring SS are busy investigating families where there is no evidence or indication of any abuse or neglect? That is not doing your civic duty, it is being stupid and mean-minded.

The horrible tragedies involved families who were already involved with an over-stretched SS.

the world has gone mad.....

In fairness to OP, doesn't this just show how architecture can damage community - it seems deeply bizarre to me to have never spoken to the family with whom you share a wall but I can see how if they are behind a locked gate it could easily happen.

not at all weird, i also share a wall with a family i don't meet, i just don't pay any attentio to any noises, it is very hard to judge what is happening wihtout seeing, try it, put the tv on any random channel, not knowing what's on, and try to figure out what's happening... i can garantee you won't.

i have a friend who had twins, a few years ago you could often find her sitting on the floor on the living room, crying, ... it is hard.
by all means help if you can, but don't report them as criminals unless you do have something to go on, not even to the hvs, many are not sympathetic and just to happy to judge.

someone suggested to go round and offer a cup of tea and a chat, you should do just that.

Do most people not understand that a gated mews means that the OP can NOT "just go round there"? She CANNOT GET IN!

I think the idea of a note in the mailbox would be good though - I presume, as it's gated, that the mailboxes are outside the gate? Do you know which house number they are?

A note is a good idea. (Unless of course there is abuse/neglect going on, in which case its easy to ignore)

As others have said though, there must be a buzzer-how would, for e.g, Parcelforce deliver a package or whatever?

Well there might be a security guard on the gate, don't know, there were a few like that near where I used to live and if you didn't know the name of the people, you wouldn't get in.

Intergalactic I'm sorry you're lonely. :( You don't live in Minnesota, by chance? We could hang out! :)