Neighbour complaining about crying baby

[Thegracefuloctopus]

We have recently moved into a 2 bedroom flat with a housing association. We are the top floor of 2. We have a DS who has just turned 1.

The week before we moved in, I ran into our downstairs neighbour who is an elderly lady, about 80ish give or take. She seemed OK, I introduced myself and said we would be moving in. I said to her "I apologise now for DS, he obviously cries a bit but he's growing through it and rest assured we are doing our best. We have had extra thick underlay and carpet fitted to try and insulate the sound as much as we can" she seemed friendly enough and said "that's OK, I have a great grandson who is 8 months so I understand". All seemed fine.

Fast forward to tonight. DH was walking up the stairs having been to the shop, introduced himself and said "hiya, I'm X, we live upstairs" she said "I know" through angry gritted teeth. He said "oh I'm sorry is something wrong, I know we have the baby..." "yes, I know" she said angrily. So DH says "I'm really sorry if you can hear him, we have been trying our best..." tries to politely explain that DS has been poorly etc. But she walks off.

Now, I understand babies can be loud and in a block of flats it is difficult. But, AIBU to think what the fuck does she expect us to do?!
DS is a fussy bugger, I'm the first to admit that he can be a bit of a shit sometimes. But, he Never cries at bedtime (at least not since we've been here so far) but IS an early riser (5.30am) being his latest. We have done all we can to try and change this but he just thinks it's party time. Once he's up he's fine. We have been very neighbour conscious and tried not to let him cry etc but sometimes you just can't get there straight away.
We also work and he is at nursery through the day so it's not like she hears it all the time.

We also happen to know the previous tennent of this flat who had 2 DC here who are both young.
The downstairs neighbour also gets noise from underneath her flat where some kids hang out but that's not our issue.

So who is being unreasonable?

Agree with others , don't give it another thought, you have been friendly and polite, and you both are hands on parents, working and baby in creche , so she gets a break.

Babies cry. No baby has an adult sleep scedule, anyway, they are meant to wake earlier and then nap during the day
Thank goodness baby is well again.

I remember the 5 am , then 5.30 am then 6 am early wakings for my Ds1 but at least he finally slept through the night , most nights

Im sure your neighbour remembers when her 40 year old man child kept waking her with his crying.

Glad your baby Ds is home from hospital now and hopefully becoming stronger and recovering well now from his recent illness

I’d leave her alone. She knows you’re not deliberately poking your baby to get him to cry, and by going around there/constantly apologising you’re trying to make yourselves feel better by getting her to reassure you that it’s fine. It may be or it may not be but if it’s not then she has to live with it, and she’s entitled to be annoyed. Stop expecting her to tell you that the noise isn’t bothering her at all. If she complains then do the flowers thing.

Fast forward to tonight. DH was walking up the stairs having been to the shop, introduced himself and said "hiya, I'm X, we live upstairs" she said "I know" through angry gritted teeth. He said "oh I'm sorry is something wrong, I know we have the baby..." "yes, I know" she said angrily.

So what do you think the angry gritted teeth and her saying “yes I know” angrily is all about then?

She may not have said anything directly to the OP or her DH but there’s something bothering her.

Having said that, unless we have the baby monitor on, we can't hear him from the next room so I'd be shocked if she could hear him enough to wake her up.

You'd be surprised how much noise travels between floors as opposed to through walls. Upstairs between two bedrooms noise is not an issue. Same noise downstairs is flipping ridiculous, sounds like there is a heard of elephants. Maybe your neighbour hears much more than you do. Could you consider him in your room for the time being or swapping rooms?

Take no notice of her OP. Babies cry, it's a fact of life.
No one, least of all a parent wants to hear crying babies but it's unavoidable.

She may not have said anything directly to the OP or her DH but there’s something bothering her.

But there is absolutely no evidence that the something is the baby or that she is actually cross about something.

She might not like chit-chat with people she doesn't know well and it comes across as abrupt speech. She might have been busy and not wanting to make small talk. That might just be her normal speaking voice.

Unless she had said something about the baby or the noise then it's overthinking it to presume that she is a, cross in the first place and b, cross about the baby.

Going around with flowers and heartfelt apologies based on an apropos of nothing is only going to complicate it even further.

I think anyong living in a flat has to expect that they will be aware there are others also living in the same building.

Even in a detached house there is the noise of neighbours dogs barking, children playing, children's toys (trampoline), people doing diy (sawing, drilling etc) and external noise - traffic, fireworks (topical) BBqs.

Noise is part of life and the closer you live to others the more likely it will be disturbing.

There's reasonable noise - that includes children, washing machines, doors closing (but not slamming).

And there is unreasonable noise. Parties going on til all hours more than 2 or 3 times a year. Base music for hours a day particularly at night, Diy noises before 8 and after 10 (10 am weekends).

The noise your family is making comes within normal limits to the majority or reasonable people, so long as you are not allowing long term screaming without intervention or noisily bouncing around for hours

But there is absolutely no evidence that the something is the baby or that she is actually cross about something

He mentioned being from upstairs and having the baby and the OP said she reacted angrily to this, so I’m confused why you don’t think her anger is connected to that?

She said "I kmoe" followed by "yes, I know" which the DH thought sounded like it was through gritted teeth. Both non-specific, generic statements that give no clue as to what she is annoyed about - if she is even annoyed in the first place.

I'm not having a go at the OP and it's clear she wants to be a good neighbour but, honestly, there is more being read into this than there needs to be.

Well, it was enough to ask her if something was wrong, so I guess it came across that she was annoyed with him about something.

I can picture her talking to her daughter. ' and every time I see them they keep talking about their crying baby. It's driving me mad'!

If she is annoyed at the baby crying, then her annoyance will go through the roof once baby becomes toddler. I lived in a flat where they had a toddler above who ran across the floor all day every day, which was far worse than a crying baby.