Our household noise is driving our neighbour insane.

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Our next door neighbour is a sweet lady in her late eighties. She hears everything through our shared wall.

Hand on heart I can say we’re not loud people. I’m not a huge fan of background noise myself therefore rarely have the tv/radio on.

Things she’s complaining about are normal day-to-day, our shower, she hears our pipes, central heating (debatable!), washing machine etc.

I’ve just gone over to hers whilst DH flushed the toilet + ran the shower. Yes, you can hear them if you listen out for them in total silence but it’s minimal, nothing out of the ordinary.

I’ve said to DH about not using our en-suite after 10pm. DH who is usually a people pleaser has zero patience for this and says if he wants a shower at midnight, he should be able to have one.

The same with the washing machine, if there’s a convenient time for her for us to have it on. The problem is that she’s essentially housebound and therefore is always at home. Usually sitting in silence, reading next to our shared wall.

Just here to say how surprised I am at the aggressiveness in so many replies here. Not the OP, sounds very reasonable in approach but so many “oh f*^% her, tell her to move” type answers- an eighty something old lady and an OP looking for a constructive way forward. Makes me feel sad.

Don't buy her a fucking parrot or offer to bring her into your home every five minutes 🙄

OP you need to speak to the daughter first. If no dice, speak to adult Social Services with your concerns for her wellbeing and safety.

This is a pretty ageist comment & totally unacceptable….i didn’t write the rest of my comment as it would be deleted! Think on it.

If she's sat on her own, she could just turn them off

If that is the problem, she may not realise.

We had a similar problem when we moved into our flat, our neighbour complained that my husband was stamping about in our living room which is over her bedrooms. He does get up early but pads about in socks so not really noisy. She moved eventually and our new neighbours say that they never hear us at all, just as we do not hear them.

I was wondering this too

Update:

Ethel* just called me to say that she can’t handle the noise anymore, and if we can give her a recorder to record the noise at night. She got quite upset that her son has told her she’s loosing it. I told her we think it’s tinnitus and she seems relieved. She said she’s going to call the doctor now and seems a bit more positive. I have offered to get a white noise machine for her but I’m not sure what use that will actually be. I really hope the doctors are able to do something as it sounds awful for her.

Oh bless her 😢 it must be horrible. Hopefully the doctor can help her. You've been very kind and patient!

What a nice, caring neighbour you are!

You sound so kind.
Tinnitus is so horrendous. Poor woman if that is it. No cure but distraction techniques that can be learnt.
My friend had it after a bad ear infection but fortunately it eventually faded.
Very distressing.

*another update.

neighbour has called us over. She’s been checked by the doctor and she doesn’t have tinnitus. She has a tape recording of the noise which I’ve taken a recording of. Honestly sounds like a the whirling of a tape/yes does sound a bit like running water - but tape recording aren’t actually silent.

Apparently when we went on holiday she couldn’t hear a thing. The first time she’s slept in months. The poor woman is at her wits end.

Apparently she’s had three people over to look at her plumbing and they’ve said it has to be us.

How can it be us, as the water tank is in our room!!!

she has also said she doesn’t wear hearing aids in bed.

Then the only thing she or you can do is get environmental health in to check noise levels. If they can't find anything she'll just have to find a way of managing it

Not sure how a doctor checked for tinnitus though. There isn't a test is there?

Im not sure if this has been said..... but.....
YES - she is being unreasonable, so don't take it to heart but also.....

PLEASE take in to account she is elderly, housebound, and probably has very little social interaction and very little else to think about sadly.
Although she could just be a difficult elderly lady who has been difficult and unreasonable all her life 🤣

If she's lonely and hasn't got much to keep her brain busy at home it will try and fill the gaps. When she was away she was probably mentally stimulated enough to not need to fill in any gaps.

It doesn't matter whether it's tinnitus or not, it's something that only happens at home and you are not making anything other than normal household noise.

This is a matter beyond your reasonable control at this point. It doesn't resolve the issue but there isn't much else you can do.

She might have dementia and be imagining all this noise. Dementia does strange things to people's perception.