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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Downstairs neighbour complaining about my breastpump, AIBU not to change rooms at night?

733 replies

Cealee · 08/12/2015 17:11

Just bought a new powerful pump as I'm exclusively expressing. We live in a flat that's split over 2 levels so our bedroom is on 1st floor, our lounge upstairs on 2nd floor. Our neighbour (on ground floor) caught me in hall to ask what the 'mechanical noise' is that wakes her up Blush I explained its my breastpump and that I need to express at 11pm, 3am and 7am to maintain supply. She said it makes ceiling vibrate and is very loud (even though it's not on the floor it's on a cushion on my bedside table!) She asked me to do it upstairs. I explained this isn't practical as my DH wears earplugs so I need to be able to hear baby if he wakes. She suggested I take baby upstairs with me!! Why should I have to move my sleeping baby upstairs (and risk waking him) every time I express milk? He's just started sleeping through and got used to his cot. And there's no way I'm going to move cot upstairs and sleep on sofa for the next 8months Angry

AIBU to think it's rude to tell someone not to express milk in their own bedroom? It's not like I'm playing loud music! I don't see why neighbour can't just get some earplugs!

OP posts:
shinynewusername · 08/12/2015 19:09

OP, you really really don't need to be pumping at 3am! No wonder you are losing your perspective.

Your baby is sleeping at night. If you weren't expressing, would you be waking him and insisting he took the breast? Express last thing at night and first thing and everyone will be happy.

SuperFlyHigh · 08/12/2015 19:12

OP finally I think you're missing the point here.....

Yes you can expect some noise with babies during the night but that doesn't mean you should subject your sleeping neighbours to them.

A tantrumming toddler in the middle of the night is not easily dealt with as I doubt she wants to sleep in same room as the child or is delighted by being woken by the noise too, but it should pass... The mother in that case should calm the child and/or remove from the room if near people to be considerate to others, is what my NDN now do. if it was every night and impacting severely on others sleep "if" she had rooms spare then yes it would be a suggestion getting him to switch rooms for a while.

It is also not essential. You do sound a bit stubborn here and never a good idea to start that with NDN, wouldn't you rather be friends and potentially have mum/child friendly relationship with her?!

MsJamieFraser · 08/12/2015 19:12

OP you need to separate the breast feeding from the noise of the machine it is making, the two dont go hand in hand, she is not objecting that you are breastfeeding she is objecting only about the noise, and only the noise!

If someone came on here to state that their neighbour was hoovering 3 x a day in the early hours, everyone would be on here stating they were being unreasonable!

That's exactly what the pump is!, it a noise that is not acceptable in the early AM, every 4 hours, its neither here nor there that its a breast pump!.

Yes it may be only 3 x a night for 15 mins, however its broken sleep every night and if it were me, it takes me a good hr or so to actually drop into a settled sleep, and also once I am awake or been woken, no matter how hard I try I cannot get back to sleep!.

You cannot expect your neighbour to live like this, for months or years on end, its just not fair to impose this on them, or subject this on them for this length of time.

You need to address your neighbours concerns, your imposing your family life on your neighbours and unfairly so.

Yabu, and I think you know that, however I hope you come to a solution that is suitable for all.

sweetsomethings · 08/12/2015 19:14

Omg YABU you are so selfish . You are not the first person in the world to have a baby. Did you actually just say your neighbour should sleep in a differs room. You have got to be joking no one is that entitled.

Zucker · 08/12/2015 19:14

So is the baby sleeping through and you are having to set an alarm to pump milk? Can you see what's wrong with this picture? YOU need sleep to keep up with the milk production. I can't imagine the advice given was meant to be carried out with such military precision.

DancingWithWillard · 08/12/2015 19:16

I'm with SDTG. I would wait until just after you had finish expressing, give you long enough to fall asleep and then put my earplugs in and jam my stereo against the ceiling. It seems as if understanding how your neighbour feels is totally beyond you so a taste of your own medicine might do the trick.

I notice you are completely ignoring everything the PP's who have asked why your husbands' sleep is to be preserved but your neighbour must move to another room?? Or why he needs earplugs if you claim he sleeps through everything anyway. How did he manage to get up for work in the morning if he can't hear an alarm?

R0nJ0n · 08/12/2015 19:17

I don't think many people would expect a baby or toddler to be moved out of a bedroom because of noise made at night. That kind of noise is beyond the control of the parents. An adult using a piece of electronic equipment that's easily portable is different.

You own a breast pump because you have a baby, the noise of the pump isn't being caused by the baby. it's not really a normal family noise, especially at 3am.

kungfupannda · 08/12/2015 19:19

It doesn't matter whether the noise is being made by a 'piece of medical kit' or by a washing machine, or a treadmill, or loud music. It's something that can be resolved, so you need to make an effort to resolve it.

There are multiple options available to you - it's just that you don't particularly want to take those options because each of them will cause some inconvenience to you or your husband. Having a baby brings all sorts of changes and inconveniences and compromises. You had a baby. Your neighbour didn't, so why should she be expected to be the one who suffers or changes her living arrangements?

You could ask your husband to sleep without earplugs and leave the baby in the room. Yes, this might mean that the he's woken, rather than the neighbour, but it is his baby after all.

You could look into a quieter pump. Yes, this might mean that it takes longer for you to express at night, so you lose some more sleep, but it's your baby, not the neighbour's.

You could move the baby upstairs with you. Yes, this might wake the baby, and lead to you losing more sleep but it's your....well, you know where I''m going with this.

You could go upstairs without the baby and take the monitor with you. I'm not sure I see any downside to this one.

You are allowed to leave the room when you have a baby. You don't have to be within touching distance at all times. I co-slept with both of mine, carried them in slings pretty much full time for the first three months or so, breastfed on demand, so I get it. But you have to be sensible about it all, and you can't expect everyone around you to change their lives around to accommodate your parenting choices, beyond the basic consideration that most people extend to parents with young babies.

Janeymoo50 · 08/12/2015 19:21

I really thought the responses would be telling the op she WNBU and the neighbour should get over herself. There needs to be compromise op, it must be pretty loud to wake your neighbour every night, I'd be totally miserable if I was working full time and your breastpump woke me up every night for months on end.

yorkshapudding · 08/12/2015 19:21

Leaving aside the issue of whether a powerful electric breast-pump qualifies as 'medically essential', your neighbor isn't actually telling you it's not essential or that you shouldn't have one. She's simply asking for you to show a bit of common courtesy by going to another room if you're going to be making noise.

You seem adamant that because it's a breast-pump the normal rules don't apply and your neighbour should be perfectly happy to be woken in the night. I realise that feeding choices are a hugely emotive subject and clearly it's important to you to give your baby breast-milk any way you can. I completely respect that. But, in the nicest way possible, your neighbor doesn't care how you feed your baby. They care about being woken up in the night, three times a night, every night by a loud and irritating noise. The fact that this noise comes from a breast pump doesn't make it less irritating, doesn't make the sleep deprivation any easier to deal with and doesn't absolve you from the responsibility to address it.

I'm glad you've agreed to take some steps to fix the problem but if they don't work then I hope you will consider moving to another room or use a manual pump at night.

StackladysMorphicResonator · 08/12/2015 19:21

What Enjolrass said - either he won't wake up to a crying baby, or the baby just grunting in his sleep will disturb him. Which is it? It can't be both! Hmm

BoffinMum · 08/12/2015 19:22

To be honest I have bf four children and owned something like six pumps and one of the most efficient by far was the manual Avent that doesn't make a sound at all in mechanical terms. Could you have a go with one of those? It's a bit mean to wake your neighbour routinely when other options are available to you, as other people have said.

LittleBeautyBelle · 08/12/2015 19:23

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Sharoncatastrophe · 08/12/2015 19:23

OP please don't stop pumping on the advice of people here. You do seem to have your head screwed on but it's tough when you're vulnerable and exhausted and people are telling you to do things that you know are wrong but it's so tempting. But stay strong, you've done amazingly well to pump all this time

EElisavetaOfBelsornia · 08/12/2015 19:25

Jeez vipers! OP has a new baby, is pumping 24 hours to give her baby BM. No she should NOT switch to formula because of her neighbour, ffs. She should do what she can to minimise noise, but hey, the neighbour lives in a downstairs flat with a baby upstairs. OP is not being selfish or entitled. She is doing her best for her baby. See what you can do to reduce noise OP and ignore the flaming.

MiaowTheCat · 08/12/2015 19:26

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Redglitter · 08/12/2015 19:26

I love how the OPS husbands sleep is so much more important than the neighbours Hmm

Surely going to another room and taking the baby monitor is the most sensible solution. Though I'd love to know what ear plugs drown out the sound of a crying baby when it's in the same room as you

Fuckitfay · 08/12/2015 19:27

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Sharoncatastrophe · 08/12/2015 19:27

Little beauty OP can't BF her baby - obviously, she's hardly going to pump all that time if she could just latch it on instead Hmm

purplefizz26 · 08/12/2015 19:29

The world doesn't revolve around you just because you are breastfeeding/pumping. There are ways around this so you don't have to disturb your neighbour.

You are being inconsiderate.

shinynewusername · 08/12/2015 19:32

Who has suggested the OP stop pumping? But there is no need to pump at 3 am - that's mad, as well as inconsiderate. I have been looking after postnatal patients for a decade and I have never ever had someone need to express in the middle of the night to maintain milk supply. It is just daft.

Viviennemary · 08/12/2015 19:35

yabU. Your husband's sleep cannot be disturbed but your neighbour's can. Hmm Just feed the baby. No need to use a breast pump in the middle of the night. You sound like an entitled nightmare.

sweetsomethings · 08/12/2015 19:37

EElisavetaOfBelsornia who said she should stop pumping and give formula. One person at the start of the thread who I think. Out of all the comments are you the op?

combined02 · 08/12/2015 19:38

I really do feel for you! It is such an exhausting time, as well as a lovely time. I think it is only the 3am one you would want to worry about, but I am really not sure about the 4 hours after 11 weeks - can you check it?

Not sure if anyone else has said this, but are you still trying with the latching on? My first dc wouldn't latch until we really pushed it - I was in hospital at the time by coincidence and a nurse persuaded me to stop using the machine and let the baby get really hungry for 6 hours or so and dc would then latch on, and it worked with one boob, and it then took about a week for dc to latch on both. I am thinking that at 11 weeks your wee baby will be very hungry after a few hours (the problem with mine was that it had been very sleepy) and so might well latch on really well.

Whether you are being pfb or not, enjoy!

MistressMerryWeather · 08/12/2015 19:39

What a pile of shite, LittleBeautyBelle.