Who is BU- me or neighbour?

[SmashingBumpkins]

We get on well with our neighbours. We're not 'friends' as such but will always stop for a chat etc.

Yesterday I saw the woman at the corner shop and we walked home together having a chat.
On the way, she mentioned that I woke them up that morning with my hairdryer and, subtly, asked if I could not use the hairdryer early in the AM. With the way she asked she wasn't really asking for a response or even a conversation about it, just kind of mentioning it in passing I guess in the hope I'll change my routine IYSWIM. So, I didn't respond there and then.

I got home at told DH. He was really miffed about it and said she was very U and I should have told her to bugger off.

This hairdryer usage doesn't happen every day- 3 or 4 weekdays I shower at the gym so don't use a hairdryer at home. On the weekend, I either don't bother drying it or I'm doing it at about 10am.
So a couple of work days a week I do dry my hair at home and it's about 6am when I'm doing it- I recognise that this is v early for some!

I can't really dry my hair elsewhere in the house as the other 2 bedrooms are occupied by DCs and in the living room is the dog who's terrified of the hairdryer and will bark like a mad thing causing more noise.
DH said I'm mad for even considering sneaking around the house in the morning using the hairdryer somewhere inconvenient for me just to avoid inconveniencing the neighbours.

So, AIBU to be using the hairdryer at 6am a couple of days a week? Or is she BU to mention it?

I should say it's quite a powerful hairdryer and we have quite thin walls (we can hear their phone ringing, for example).

Bird What I meant was coming from the assumption that someone needs to be woken up by my hairdryer, I would rather wake up my NDNs who are nice people but I don't particularly know or care about than my DCs who I love beyond words. I'm assuming that grown adults can also cope better with slightly less sleep than children.

Of course 6 am is a perfectly normal time to get up. Plenty of people have to be at work at 6/7/8 am or even earlier if on shifts and need to get ready and travel to get there.

Define 'normal'. In our terrace of 3 houses, none of us would be up at 6am, not even dh who gets up at 6.30am. The rest of us wake up at 7.30am and the others in terrace are retired and get up even later - why shouldn't they?

What time do you think the bus and train drivers who do the early shifts get up?

An abnormally early hour? How is this relevant? What time does the taxi driver go to bed?

Whoever suggested OP just does it the night before or lets it dry naturally - what madness!

6am isn't that early and she isn't making noise for the sake of it, she is drying her hair FFS!

YANBU :)

DH takes the dog on her run whilst I have breakfast, prepare everyone's lunch, check emails etc. He gets back about 6:20am

Surely that's your answer? Dry your hair whilst he's taking the dog out. You can prepare lunch whilst the dog is around (or the night before), and for sure checking your emails can be fitted round everything else.

Augusta has gifted you the solution, OP. Yay - problem resolved eh?

OP your last post has nailed it: YABVVU.

You only like your neighbours but love your DC beyond words .

Since you love them so much obviously so much more than us mere fools would you not like to spend a few minutes with them before leaving for work? Otherwise pop your hairdryer and styling bits in a portable basket and go somewhere else in the house to do it.

Really quite taken aback with this attitude. I really hope you never need a good turn from this neighbour.

Well, clearly, you can't not dry your hair so I am not sure what to suggest? Perhaps dry your hair at the last possible minute? Do you have a plug socket further away from her wall? Or, alternatively, carry on as you are. I don't know if a hairdryer would particularly bother me in terms of noise because it's a constant, white noise so maybe she is being a bit sensitive.

Crabbitface - apt username.

Matilda I realised it sounds twattish when I typed it and I didn't mean to imply others don't love their kids just as much but I didn't know how else to express it. Of course I care more about my kids than my NDN, I don't know why that's so surprising or makes me so unreasonable.

Augusta It'd need some re-jigging of a years old routine but could be do-able for sure!! The root of the issue is looking more and more like our devil dog!

Matilda would you not like to spend a few minutes with them before leaving for work? But nipping into their rooms to dry my hair for 10 minutes whilst they complain at me for waking them up isn't really 'spending time' with them before work is it? It's just using their room for drying my hair whilst they happen to be in there.

Plus, this isn't sustainable longer-term. It's fine now that DC are young but don't fancy wandering into a teenagers bedroom at 6am to dry my hair.

Madness. Of course you should be allowed to use your hairdrier in your own bedroom, it's not as if you're using a pneumatic drill! If you live next door to other humans, you have to expect some noise.

Yabu. If it's powerful and loud you should do it in another part of the house. I consider 6am very early.

I dry my hair about 6am everyday for work. Pretty sure my neighbours will be able to hear it but there's nothing I can do about it. I need to shower in the morning and leave by 7am. It's not like it lasts long, just ten mins or so...

Silent hairdryer www.bohairmia.co.uk/products/valera-valera-swiss-silent-jet-8600-ionic-silver (supposedly)

I don't this it unreasonable, unfortunate but that's life.

I think I would look for a quieter hairdryer just so I wouldn't feel bad everyday.

I lived in a flat once, I wouldn't have worked out unless I knew the chap below was out, it's rude.

Clarence It's £94

Bumpkin, ask neighbour to buy it for you! I would rather pay someone 94.00 even for just a year of peace. (Sleep lover, me).

The answer from me would be no

Smashing I certainly didn't read it as you love your children more than anyone else does at all - I read it as intended. You love your kids more than words - simply that and I agree with you.

I can't believe, as many other have said that you're being criticised here. It's a terraced house - that's part and parcel of it.

Whilst I'd make fair effort to not play really loud music, using a hairdryer is reasonable.

I think they're being completely unreasonable to expect you to stop.

I'm blow drying hair that early as I'm out of the house for 6:30am. DH takes the dog on her run whilst I have breakfast, prepare everyone's lunch, check emails etc. He gets back about 6:20am and I head out about 10 minutes later

Why don't you change the order you do things so that you are drying your hair in the time when your DH and the dog are out on their run?

It's not about whether you love your kids more than your NDN, for goodness' sake. What a ridiculous thing to say. The point being, OP, that if it's something you refuse to do because it will affect your kids, you KNOW you are being unreasonable by doing it in the first place and affecting your NDN. You won't wake up your kids because that's unreasonable ,but you dont care if you do it to your neighbour! Massively rude, selfish and entitled. Either buy yourself a hairdryer that doesn't make a noise, wash and dry your hair the night before (I do not know WHY this is so difficult a concept, plenty of people do this), or do it in a different bit of the house. You are being staggeringly selfish and a bad neighbour to boot.

I would say that 10 minutes of hairdrying once or twice a week on a week day is hardly excessive. 6am is in the normal range of morning wakeup times for a week day, and as it's only once or twice a week, hardly like you're bothering them daily.

If they are very sensitive to noise and can't afford to move to a detached house, there's stuff they could do like move their furniture around to have the wardrobes against the ajoining wall to reduce the noise (if you are also able to do this it will help). if your DCs in the bedroom next to yours cant hear it, it can't be that loud.

Xenapants - curly hair can look shit after a night of being slept on and need to be restyled even if not rewashed. (one of the many reasons I've been straightening mine for the last decade)

It's interesting the OP's DCs aren't woken up by the noise of her hairdryer in the room next door when the NDN is. OP only thinks it would wake them up if she dried her hair in their bedrooms. It can't be that loud, more the NDN is a bit sensitive to noise.

6am is not early for lots of people. In which case this is not unreasonable.
6am IS early for lots of people. In which case - in THIS case - it IS unreasonable. I get up at 6.45. If a noise next door like this woke me up at 6am that would be unreasonable.

So would the 6am risers object if someone was noisy at 5am?

Have you dried dry shampoo? Or using the hair dryer in the hallway? I dry my hair at 6am in the morning to avoid waking up the kids and neighbours.