Neighbours are sleep training. Help?

[Fruitful92]

Hi everyone,

Non-mum here and would love some advice from actual mums.

My neighbours are a young couple and have a small child, I’m really not sure how old but definitely under 2. I met them once and said hi in passing but we don’t speak generally as they use a different hallway than I do.

For a good few months now, I believe they have been sleep training their child. The child’s bedroom is directly next to mine.

I am frequently woken up in the middle of the night by the child not crying but screaming bloody murder for a good 30 mins to an hour, sometimes a full 2 hours of on and off screams.

I am suffering from PTSD and extreme anxiety after leaving an abusive relationship. I have trouble sleeping as it is and this is extremely distressing for me.

I understand babies cry and this is just temporary, but I don’t think it’s fair that I am regularly losing sleep over it. But I struggle with confrontation and don’t want to cause an argument.

How do I approach the subject and try and resolve the matter with my neighbours?

Thank you

But to what end? What can the parents realistically do? There’s only value in talking if there is a solution and I am 100% certain that those parents would want a solution to the crying too!

The only thing this will achieve is leaving the parents feeling worse than I’m sure they already do at a very tough and sleep deprived time.

Unfair you're assuming they're sleep training, they could be in there doing everything they can to settle. You need to find solutions - move rooms, earplugs, white noise, noise cancelling headphones. The pitfalls of attached neighbours. I'd take a crying baby over a loud party - it's not their fault.

My first had terrible colic and reflux and would scream for hour and hours.

We lived in a mid terrace with couples with no children on each side. We used to drive ds around in the car long into the night to disturb them less but we were exhausted. They used to knock on the door most days asking us to keep him quiet, but what were we supposed to do?

They used to ask me if I had tried picking him up or changing his nappy 🙄

I felt bad for them, but sometimes babies cry a lot. I used to walk around holding him up for hours after a feed, tried medications. It lasted for months until he grew out of it in the end and started solids/sitting up.

No amount of knocking on doors and talking to me was going to help with that, it just made me feel like a shitty parent beucase I couldn’t help my baby.

Appreciate everyone’s tips, thank you.

When this first started, I could hear a parent come in every now and then. After a while I stopped hearing that so I assumed some form of training. But of course, I don’t know this for sure. They could very well be trying to keep quiet themselves.

I would never want to make anyone feel bad about a situation that has no solution. Will check out that brown noise…

A parent cuddling/shushing/rocking a baby is quieter than a screaming child, no?

So quite possible to hear the screaming, but not the adult comforting them I would have thought.

I would guess there are very few parents who comfort their child by shouting louder than the child's crying. 'SHUSH NOW, MUMMY IS HERE' would be a bit nuts wouldn't it?

It’s complex but you could say something.

Before I bought my small house I lived in a house divided into 2 flats with a larger house next door. The second baby screamed and cried blue murder almost every night and the reason I was given was
”we are sleep training”. I rented out my spare room to someone else and there was nowhere I could move to in the flat.

When I spoke to the DM about it (they had 5 bedrooms as opposed to 2 of mine) and only 3 were being used it turned out she didn’t want to move her baby’s room as it’d mean her DH got no/less sleep. I was so tired I was worried about crossing roads not to mention I was concerned for the baby.

Turned out when he was 1 or so he was diagnosed with a milk allergy and had to have lactose free products and the DM told me she thought that was why he was crying a lot at night then as it was undiagnosed then.

You’ve got just as much right to a good night’s sleep and shouldn’t have to rely on white noise/earplugs so I’d say something.

You’ve got just as much right to a good night’s sleep and shouldn’t have to rely on white noise/earplugs so I’d say something.

Unless they can move the baby to another room I'm not sure what the OP could reasonably expect them to do. It's shit for all concerned.

YABU to call that “sleep training”. It’s not sleep training at all and I don’t know why you’ve decided it is. How did you reach the conclusion they’re sleep training their child rather than that the child is crying for any other reason? If the parents are ignoring it then that’s abuse but don’t naively call sleep training abuse because you’d randomly assumed that’s what’s happening - it’s a near-certainty that they aren’t ignoring the child.

There is that yes… if they’re short on space.

However as per my other post there are selfish men out there (ex NDN DH) who thought his good night’s sleep trumped mine!

It sounds like neglect to me if it's every night for hours.

Maybe phone the NSPCC for advice.

I'd say hello to your neighbours because it's a nice thing to do and you'll be able to gauge what kind of people they are.

Doesn't sound like sleep training. She might have night terrors or a medical problem. I think abusive parents would also not be likely to sound this way at night, and for prolonged bouts.

I can imagine it's horrible for you but it doesn't necessarily mean a child is being mistreated.

It’s baffling how you’ve managed to blame men when you were absolutely clear in your post that the woman made the decision to prioritise him (and, let’s be honest, her too) over you. She thought their sleep mattered more than yours. You have no idea what he thought so it’s odd to blame him given that it’s either a view of both of them or just her.

speak to neighbours and explain your POV?

Revolutionary, I know.

Her post is quite literally 'how do I approach the neighbours about this'?

I’m surprised at all the posters who think you should just put up with it/ move your bedroom in case speaking to them makes them upset because they’re probably tired.
well OP is also tired and it’s because of their kid who is not her responsibility that she’s tired.
absolutely say something- wrote a note and explain your PTSD and ask what they can do to alleviate the noise. They need to be aware that their child is affecting other people. -tired or not, this isn’t a fair situation to impose on neighbours. They do need to be aware that their choice to leave the child alone when screaming is having an impact on others, whose choice it is not.

So you just assumed eh?!

She told me she was doing all sleep training and slept in a separate room to her DH as he was getting his sleep disturbed. Was I supposed to think she was lying about this?!

She told me his views on sleep training and he didn’t speak to me re this.

It doesn’t even need to be a PTSD issue here. OP is entitled to a good night’s sleep just as much as her NDN and broken sleep night after night is no fun for her especially as it’s not her child. They use sleep deprivation as torture methods!

The most considerate neighbours I met were ones who lived 2 doors down from me but their baby cried and they thought I could hear the crying. I told them luckily I couldn’t hear it at all, but they were apologetic and nice enough to mention it before it could’ve become an issue, which it never did.

But let's be realistic here. What's gonna happen after she approaches her neighbour? Toddler magically starts sleeping at night?

Off course OP is entitled to a good night's sleep and I genuinely feel for her but it's a bit difference between your neighbours throwing a rave at 2am and a child screaming in the middle of the night.

Your neighbour was kind to give you a heads-up up let's say you could actually hear the kid screaming, what would have changed? Kid would have magically stopped?

YANBU. Sleep training doesn’t (or shouldn’t) involve leaving the baby to scream for ages alone, that’s awful. We did it and returned and reassured every 2,3 minutes!

In your circumstances, because of your background, you’d be within your rights to have a word. Be wary though that more may be going on than just “sleep training”. If you get any concerning vibes off them report to social services.

That doesn't sound like sleep training to me it sounds like a child who doesn't sleep well or perhaps is having night terrors.
I'm not sure what you want the parents to do though, I expect they also feel terrible about it and wish he wasn't waking and crying in the night.
It is awful for you but short of getting ear plugs or moving bedrooms I don't know what you can do.

The neighbours could try eg intervening with their own child before the screaming has gone in so long on each occasion - they need to disrupt their own sleep a bit and get up to settle their kid in the interests of being considerate. They might want to think about living the child’s room / bed rather than suggesting that OP moves hers. One of mine had night terrors and yes, I got up and went to her and soothed her (she never woke sufficiently to remember any of it, but it stopped her screaming). The neighbours should not be just leaving their child at this stage. It’s profoundly selfish.

Yes, that’s really going to help them if they’re walking the floor with their child night after sleep deprived night.

There is literally no proof that this isnt happening though.

The OP just says she couldn’t hear the parents, but why would you over a screaming child?

Parents are going to want to keep the volume low, not hype the kid up further. So there’s every chance you won’t hear the parents at all.

A screaming child is torture. Why in earth would you leave one to cry for hours to spite yourself, let alone for the benefit of the child? It really doesn’t make sense even with neglectful parents, unless perhaps there is a serious drug problem in the house and they are doping themselves to sleep through. Could that be happening OP?

Other than the fact OP used to hear the parents intervening but no longer does. I made the assumption that means they aren’t going in any more and you’ve made the assumption they are, just more quietly. Either way, they can’t ignore the nuisance level of noise they’re generating

This is a really insensitive thing to say to a woman who’s escaped from abuse and processing that in terms of PTSD.

She’s not made the choice to have a child yet she has to suffer lack of sleep and the triggering of her PTSD?