to not let neighbour use my shower!

[NavyOrca]

Next door neighbour messaged me earlier. Her shower has broken and she can’t get anyone to come out and fix it until the week after next. She asked if she could ‘pop in’ to use ours every other day.

I don’t want her to! I’ve got most of next week off work and plan to be at home a lot, doing not much at all, after a crazy busy time lately. I don’t want to worry about somebody coming to have a shower!

For context - I get on with her absolutely fine. We chat now and again and have walked our dogs together a few times in the past.. wouldn’t say we are especially close though.

AIBU to say no to this request? I know that she moved to the area for work and none of her family/friends are around here. So I might be her only option and I do feel bad about this.

How so?

I know @Bippy2024

Have read all the OPs post. Not clear to me how well you know each other, sorry if I've missed it.

Every other day feels a bit much. There is no way I would ask this of a neighbour, even one I knew really well. I feel like you could be on a pathway to a 'no good deeds go unpunished' outcome here.

I think I'd let her do it once, at a time of my convenience, and see how that went. If she's considerate and in and out, I'd feel more relaxed and be more generous. If the placed is steamed up for ages etc etc and she doesn't adhere to the times you note, I'd not offer again.

I find it really strange that you just cannot imagine someone else thinking differently and having a different view of the world. Genuinely puzzling to me.

You don't understand why a communal use shower in a communal use building isn't the same as someone's private shower in their own home?

I think that is a massive ask.
I certainly wouldn't dream of it.
I would find a local gym and use it for the time needed.
Actually being asked would really annoy me too.

@DieStrassensindimmernass what I was asking is how people cope with using a communal shower when they are so afraid of having someone else use their shower?

If the boiler hasn't gone, perhaps she could fill up a washing up bowl at the bathroom sink and stand in the shower with that.
Would take 3 or 4 fills, and a towel or two on the floor, but it's what I'd be doing if I was desperate.

I haven’t read the whole thread but it is possible to buy quite a good portable, rechargeable shower that has a pump that you put in a bucket of hot water and it’s quite powerful (available on Amazon). We bought one as a temporary solution when our shower broke and as long as she has hot water, it would be almost as good as a real shower.

But obviously I agree that it would’ve kinder to just let her use yours.

Perhaps she feels it would have been kinder for the CF not to ask when it wasn't a necessity. "Kindness" after all is very subjective.

Wow! I can't believe the way this thread has gone - there's no way I'd want a naked neighbour and their bodily run off in my flat, and I am a perfectly friendly and helpful person!

Using a communal shower never feels particularly pleasant imho, more a needs must scenario. I feel much more relaxed in my own shower, partly because it's in my own house and only my immediate family use it. Allowing someone else to use it more than once or twice would change that. I get that it wouldn't bother some folk but it does bother others.

Another thread full of mumsnet madness.

Oops, hang on, you're not meant to say "naked" on this thread, it's a bit triggering for a couple of them.

their bodily run off
🤣

I would, without any hesitation. Fix a time that suits you, keep out of her way and get on with your day.
Maybe next time you will need the favour.

"Bodily run off"

😂

Oh mumsnet.

Absolutely not. She can have a strip down wash and wash her hair in the sink at home and go to a gym or leisure centre if she's that desperate for a shower. Nobody actually needs a shower.
Can't believe anyone would even ask this of a non relative.
If she really is that desperate she needs to pay for an emergency plumber and get it fixed today.

I don't think anyone has said that they are 'afraid' of having someone else use their shower, just that its a little distasteful.

I would consider someone I’d walked dogs with etc a friend of sorts. If my neighbour had a shower issue I’d offer her to shower in mine, and I know she’d do the same for me.
last year we had no water for a week (no water at all!)… I was collecting, straining and boiling rain water to wash in…. I’d sit in the shower with a huge bucket of hot water .. wet myself down… lather hair and body then rinse… it wasn’t pleasant but was doable…. Then someone at swimming (my DD swims) said to just sneak off and shower there… she’d only just started there & I felt awful doing it.. but I had the best
shower there & it made me really
appreciate how lucky we are turning on a tap and having clean hot water 😂😂
I would be saying to her that you’re in annual leave next week and don’t really want to commit to times as would like some lay ins. But could maybe help her out a couple of times… this way you’re being kind and offering her the use of the shower once or twice without commuting to the whole lot

Bleach is available but I think some people on here have been drinking it instead of using it to disinfect bodily run off.

I’m that neighbour who asked if she could use her neighbours’ showers whilst my bathroom was refitted (took 3 weeks.) I ended up using two neighbours showers over that time and was in and out in 10 minutes and made sure everything was as I found it.
I wouldn’t hesitate to let a neighbour use my shower and I’m a real homebody who loves her own space. And you say you get on with your neighbour? I think you’re being very unneighbourly and she’d be unimpressed if you said no. It will change your relationship.

It's fascinating reading this thread. I think we're so deeply individualistic, and so "what's mine is mine, and I deserve it", in this country/predominant culture, and it's made us unquestioningly protective of our space and possessions. I say this of myself, too - I often catch myself thinking "CF" about things related to property/possessions (not about this particular request, which I find fine, but there are certainly things I do automatically think it about). We're weird, people (well, Brits?), aren't we?

What if you were born in Birmingham?

Haha... I'm in Birmingham, and am in the "normal request, why wouldn't you?" camp, if that helps 😂