To ask neighbour to close curtains

[Handrearedmagpie]

First of all, I know IABU. It's more a question of HOW unreasonable.
My young DS is autistic, non speaking and has a severe learning disability. Meltdowns are triggered by sudden changes like adverts on the TV. Neighbour diagonally across street from me has very large windows and an ENORMOUS TV. Never shuts her curtains/blinds so DS can watch her TV from our house and fixates on it when his own tablet is removed before bedtime.
Every. Single. Night. It's meltdown when adverts appear on her TV. Obviously I shut our own blinds but he knows her TV is there and just opens them again, or he will go upstairs and hyper focus on her TV from my bedroom window.
How horrendously unreasonable would I be to ask her to close her blinds for half an hour at night just to avoid this nightly hysteria??! I'm at my wits end with it.
YABU - absolutely unreasonable. It's your child's disability to manage.
YANBU - you can only ask and see what she says.

This must be so difficult to live with, I'm so sorry.
However, in my own home, across the road as well, no I'm afraid I'm not going to alter my normal routine which suits me.

There are other options, such as frosted glass....you can even buy a special spray which you spray onto your windows and when dry, it creates "frosting" - I've used it in a past workplace and it does work.

I’m no Christian but I do know that when Jesus said “love thy neighbour” he didn’t mean just the person that lives next door who waters your plants for you when you’re away.

Maybe Thatcher was right after all (god that sticks in my craw!) and there Is no such thing as society any more.

I wouldn't like to be asked tbh. I have seasonal affective disorder and have been barely functioning the past couple of weeks since the nights are starting to draw in. Having my curtains open and getting those extra few hours of daylight whilst I still can makes a big difference. I'd feel obliged to do as the neighbour asked, as I wouldn't want to disclose my mental health issues to a stranger and if I refused with no reason, clearly a lot of people would assume I'm being a dick.

There was no suggestion she was going to dictate anything. A polite question isn't dictating.

If I were your neighbour I’d have no problem obliging gif you - but I’m a SEND mum. In my experience most people who haven’t had a child with autism etc have zero understanding or empathy.

Well if you think being neighbourly includes only speak or interacting to neighbours until you want something, thank god your not my neighbour 😂

Neighborly is saying hello, checking on others, offering support and interacting without the expectation of gaining favour from them especially if you have never bothered to even say hello or introduce yourself.

Asking in the expectation the other person will comply is dictating imo. If she didn’t expect the neighbour to do it, she wouldn’t ask.

Some people on this thread have NO idea of what it is like living with a child with complex non-verbal autism. Imagine living with a child who will always have the levels of understanding and empathy of an 18m - 2 year old, and meltdowns to match, but with the size and strength of an older child, and then an adult. OP, I absolutely sympathise. I am an ex-Headteacher of a special school with children just like your son and I am full of admiration for parents like you.

Thinking about what might help. Does he have the ability to understand visuals? How does he communicate? Could you build in an alternative to his routine that he enjoys, starting before the crunch-time of 8pm - something which will give him sensory input? What regulates him?

Also, are you open to your CWD team in the LA? You can self-refer in, you don’t have to wait for school to open again.

Definitely not. It be doing something with my own windows rather than expecting other people to accommodate me.

Good job the neighbour has got another big window in her living room then eh?

It's not the being neighbourly that's the issue is the telling/judging of others who aren't exactly like you.

Can't you get a black out blind for your window?

Good job the neighbour gets to choose what to do with all of her windows.

No, many of us do.
We just don't expect others, unconnected to us, to change their lives or see our issues as theirs.
HTH

I have a massive conservatory attached to one side my living room, but I still like to keep my living room window curtains open until I go to bed, because it lets even more light in. I don't understand your point.

Some of the comments on this thread have been worthy of judgement. And mean to a mother who is obviously struggling and at the end of her tether.

In the summer that's hard

My life would be duller, literally, though.
🤣

Errrrm no, sorry.
I wouldn't want to be responsible for your child's meltdowns.
I'd likely forget- not be in- you'd get pissed off thinking I'd done it on purpose/can't be arsed.
And that's not taking into account sitting in a dark room when the nights are light...
You can get windows with blinds fitted between the panes of glass....that would solve all your problems.

No, they're not.
You seriously cannot judge a person for wanting control over when they close their own curtains.
It doesn't mean we don't sympathise with OPs situation.

Closing the curtains for half an hour a couple of times is categorically not ‘changing your life’.

Having to close your curtains when your neighbours choose, and not when you choose, is quite unusual.
OP needs a different solution.

Quite. One has to wonder about the lives of PP who say this shite if this is such a HUGE deal

I'm a SEND mum x4 for more than 30 years now, and I wouldn't be prepared to close my curtains for more than a week.

Do you have to arrange to be in every night to facilitate the curtain closing?
Because that's pretty restrictive to be fair...