AIBU to be incredibly bothered by neighbours complaint?

[user1465383488]

We have lived in our house very happily for the last thirteen years. For the last five years we have been living next to very fussy neighbours. A couple in their thirties,No kids,no pets ,she does yoga in her garden,bakes from home and cycles around in an old fashioned big wheeled bike with a basket full of fresh bread and flowers.He works all day and seems very quiet. A perfect couple I guess.
We have six children here aged between 8 months and 13 years. The eldest two have special needs (autism /mobility problems)
We've always been super aware of not making noise to annoy anyone . The kids with the SN are in the furthest side of the house so occasional meltdowns have at least four or five walls between them and the neighbours.
Problems started three years ago when she knocked to say one of our dogs barked when I left her to do the school run and disturbed their breakfast . I was apologetic and took steps to stop that..training,plug ins,radio, recorded her etc and it stopped.
Then a few months later she hung out of her window on two mornings shouting at us for closing our gate too loud at 8.45am waking her up as she..and I quote " goes to bed late and has every right to sleep in with her windows wide open and not be disturbed" .
She made my then 8 year old cry and the kids creep out paranoid every morning to the car not daring to even speak.
Then we were putting a small patch of decking down and using a small battery drill to screw the planks in at 6 pm on a Saturday.She pops her head over asking if we could stop as they wanted to have dinner in the garden . And we did 😐
Next week she pops over again asking if we could keep our voices down as she was reading when it was just me,hubby and the two eldest out on the patio planting flowers.
Since then I've been paranoid. I dont let the kids play outside before 10 am or after 6.30 ish. If they're stupidly noisy they get brought in,I took the trampoline down because the neighbour moaned.We don't ever play music, the youngest kids are all in bed before 8 and the big three are quiet then and there's never any noise overnight. I don't ever open our bedroom window incase the baby cries through the night as the neighbours Window next to our room is wide open.
I stand out with the dogs in the morning and night so they don't bark and during the day if they start barking they're called in.When I go out they're in the far side of the house .
I "thought" we were being pretty considerate.
Apparently not.
Last weekend whilst the kids were in the paddling pool playing and actually being pretty quiet tbh both of them flew to the fence and started screaming about how we were ruining their lives, she sits crying at the noise we make. We have no consideration and should be ashamed of ourselves as parents etc. They went completely nuts and I told them we did our best but they didn't believe me, hubby at this point stood up and told them to back off as our kids were watching.
Since then my autistic son hasn't slept, he won't go outside. I am paranoid beyond belief. I won't even let the kids go into the two rooms on the neighbours side in the morning and am making them eat their breakfast in a different room 😐 I'm constantly shhhhhhing and trying to stop my 3 and 4 year olds running around all day and I can't face even letting the little ones play or my dogs outside. I'm even getting hubby to leave work to do the school runs whenever I can so I don't have to leave the dogs incase they bark.
It's causing great stress with me and hubby who thinks we should just ignore them and carry on our lives as we were. He is furious I'm so bothered what they think . I really don't know what to do !

They sound thoroughly unpleasant. As (numerous) pp have said, if they want complete silence they shouldn't have bought a house next to a family.

Have you considered sneaking into their house and sticking some laxative in Mrs Basket-Case's cake mix?

Seriously though, don't do that. But do send the letter that Restless wrote. And don't descend to their level, however tempting that may be. Good luck!

How very stressful for you OP. Sorry to hear you feel so restricted in your home.

You and your family have a right to quiet enjoyment of your home without living in fear of complaints which sound pretty unreasonable and seem to be escalating. Perhaps worth suggesting that, given all the efforts you have made to date to address the neighbours complaints are not satisfying them, they should look at soundproofing solutions on their side. You have taken reasonable remedial to steps. Not all the burden lays with you. At some point, the neighbours need to step up and take steps to minimise the perceived root of the problem.
I agree with a previous poster (sorry can't remember who it was on page 2) that you should stop pandering to the unreasonable and aggressive behaviour. You have a right to live and enjoy living in your home (which includes the garden!). I think your husband is right.

Lots of sympathy from me.

We had similar neighbours. They made our, and other neighbours lives hell with her continual moaning. We live in a terrace of 3, we're at the end, moaner was in the middle with another neighbour at the end.

She moaned about our dog barking all day - I was a SAHM at the time and was home too, she moaned if the kids played in the garden, DH leaving for work too early and waking her up (8:30am), etc, etc. it got to the stage we were scared to fart too loudly.

She made so many complaints to environmental health - she ended up having recording equipment installed in her house.

The only thing this picked up was her screaming abuse at me one day that my "fucking dog had been barking all fucking day" and making threats that she'd "fucking poison it". We'd been away for the weekend, dog had been with us, we could prove this. God knows what EH said to her, but she moved away pretty bloody sharpish

Man, they should meet my neighbors! Dogs barking incessantly at 1am, teenage sons throwing parties when their mother is away and cars coming and going at all hours. Personal favorite is their friend revving his motorbike at 1am. When neighbors on the other side complained, they just said 'well it's not my bike'. . We are in detached houses too!

Your neighbors are idiots. Sounds like some kind of snobbery issue going on from the comment they made about the other family.

,

Willow2016 I grew up in a farming town/village, a day that you didn't end up with cow shit on your shoes was a really good day. . .

Working countryside is loud..........and starts early, finishes late, and you'll get very little sympathy if you complain.

But back to OP: what do you want us to bring for the party???

*Metallica

volume 11*

I so would! They are being immensely unreasonable, start living your life, user, it's ridiculous that they have intimidated you like this for years

Please send the letter, notify your solicitor and phone the police on 101 to lodge a complaint of harassment. Thae neighbours are bonkers, frankly.

Ahem.....she runs a home baking business making cakes as far as I can gather
Of course, I am sure she will have obtained all the necessary food safety certificates.....

You definitely shouldn't give in to her but I wonder whether one explanation could be that they have been ttc/ unable to have dc? She sees your six dc and thinks it is unfair. She thinks that she would do a better job. Are the children in the other family older? Maybe less painful to see older children. I just wonder why else they would buy a large family house around lots of other families if they didn't at some point think/ hope to have children.

It doesn't condone the behaviour and I think that they need to see how unreasonable they are. I would point out the disabalist attitudes and also tell them that you have a contract with the council to live there for x years so that whatever they say you will be living there and you want to have civil relationships with them but that they need to understand that you don't make any more noise than normal family life.

They are bullying you, and you need to start biting back. Nothing outrageous, but do everything a normal family does. My neighbours had a BBQ this evening with music playing outside. Fine, nice weather for it.

I wouldn't agree with Metallica turned up to 11, but just do things that normal families do, things you can't reasonably be reported for. You'll never be friends with these people, so best thing to do is start grinding them down as they've been grinding you down. Windows open when you like, music when you like. When you are living like a normal family it will drive them crazy and they'll probably leave!

And the reason they like the other family is because they don't live next door. It's a very normal thing in this country to hate your next door neighbours, probably because we all wish we lived in castles with moats!

(Or maybe just a five minute blast of Metallica...)

That's a good letter you have up there. Don"post" it to them!

I think your neighbours ought to invest in a soddin Yurt and find some land miles from anyone.
I have a neighbour who is so unsociable it is untrue. She moans about everything and lives with her dad ( she is 42) . She said she can hear her neighbours making love and is keeping a diary?

We had similar neighbours, except they had kids too. They asked us to go to bed earlier and get up later! Bedtime is 11.30 and we're up at 7.

They were a nightmare for 4 years and eventually the husband received a police caution.

It has been lovely since they moved. The whole street feels happier. A few of the neighbours, as well as us had issues with them.

I'd say carry on regardless. If there is a genuine reason for a complaint the council will let you know.
Sad entitled right on idiots your neighbours are.
Let them eat worthy broth and stew in their own organic worthiness.

Bunnychops

I wonder what she would make of the cows making a racket all day/night when they have the calves taken off them? (can hear them from farms half a mile away )
The owls hooting and cheeping all night (I love it personally)
Would she want an asbo on the swallows and house martins cos sometimes its a close call whether or not they will scalp me if I am sitting on my garden steps as they swoop up to my roof.

Am sure she wouldnt appreciate the tractors and wagons going up our road at harvest time, lorries moving beasts around, big tattie lorries.

Round here its horse crap on the roads you have to dodge if you are cycling bet she would complain about that lol.

Oh and would love to see her nose wrinkle at muck spreading time can smell it from half a mile away too!

Oh I think she would spontaneously combust round here..

Is it worth asking them for their email address so that you can send them the letter via email. You then have a trail of proof and if they respond then their unreasonableness will be obvious.
If you do go this route it may be worth actually listing all the adjustments you've made until now, and add this to your letter.

Not Metallica..........

Judas Priest

TBH OP, they sound rather uptight and I say this as a 30 something, with no kids who being brutally honest, would cringe inwardly if I saw a large family with young kids and dogs moving in next door because I do like my peace and quiet and this is despite me living in a detached house.

Living in a neighbourhood is about give and take. I put up with my neighbour's incredibly loud children (and there are only two of them, but they are exceptionally loud compared to the other neighbour's kids), she takes my parcels as she's SAHM and doesn't complain about my wandering mouser.

Complaining about noise from a gate at 08:45 is daft tbh unless it's a portcullis. Now if a neighbour approached me (as actually they did to my parents when I was growing up) with something like a 'can you accomodate my nightshift pattern by doing X instead of Y' that's a bit different, but no-one actually has the right to complain about normal family noise at 8:45am. God knows I'd sometimes love to as we currently have builders starting at 7am and shouting up and down the street about 'what cunt did what' for at least 15 mins prior if it's after a weekend-

Donot give themyour email address! They will be badg3ring you constantly!

After reading this, I'm fuming on your behalf OP! Your neighbours are rude beyond all belief and clearly have an issue with people with disabilities, hence the "decent family" comment.
Be polite and Ice Maiden calm when you deal with them, people like that don't know what to do. Definitely send that letter, keep records and live a normal life!
As an aside, years ago I had a "situation" with a neighbour. They thought I was subletting my house because it had once been a council house (I'd committed the heinous crime of having bought it and hadn't announced it to the world). Cue loads of letters to the council (Who told them to get stuffed) and some fairly epic over-fence shouting about everything I did. I was always polite and reasonable, which just made them spit feathers all the more. The final straw for me was when I heard them in the garden talking to the local priest and telling them I was a Satanist! From then on the gloves were off. I kept up the polite facade but plotted revenge. I decided to draw the line at a mock black mass on the front lawn (it was suggested at the time by a pal), but I can honestly say that Metallica is effective :D

Send the letter above OP - then throw a party with fireworks at 10pm.......

Forget them - they are being ridiculously unreasonable and bonkers - or they get off on intimidating people......

Op I am sure this thread has moved on and you have been given this advice ten times over, but you need to start pushing back with your neighbours now.

The noise your describing is simply family life noise and you have been accommodating to them so many times.

I would challenge them to go too EH and make a complaint about you because I can pretty much guarantee, EH will ask them to do a diary and it will be " gate shut loudly once, Thursday 9am" " drilling once, 5 mins Saturday 6pm" "children splashing in a pool"

THEY will be told its family life and noise and they will be told to bugger off basically. Some people are living with real bloody issues, this is nothing. If you do this hopefully you will be able to relax in your home again because its not fair on you.

Next time she moans about something, I would be very tempted to respond with 'We have pandered to your every whim and complaint, now piss off'.

Yes but thats the idea. If they are badgering constantly via emails, they can ignore them but the op has proof of their twattishness.