To have told NDN that dh won’t be helping her anymore?

[Babycarrierdilemma]

NDN has a young baby. We live on the second floor and she has been knocking or messaging every day wanting dh to help her up and down the stairs with the pram.

She has asked twice for a lift to an appointment next week as said she couldn’t manage the train alone. I told her that he can’t take her and she should sort out a taxi to which she said she cant manage car seat / pram and baby alone.

I had 2 carriers from when dc were little so I took them round and gave them to her said I didn’t have instructions but I was happy to show her or could send her the link to YouTube for each one. I said to her that we can’t help her anymore as it’s really getting too much. It literally is as I’m fed up of the daily requests and it’s almost like learned helplessness?

She messaged dh that evening upset and he’s told me I’ve been really unkind ??? It’s caused an argument and I’ve had to say it’s now a deal breaker if he continues to let her disrupt our lives this way?

I agree, she should. I simply answered the OP's question factually because I didn't realise, at the time, that it was rhetorical.

EVERYONE likes young attractive people! Hollywood films, daily soaps, adverts, etc. are full of nice-looking people. It's just normal, fgs! Would Eastenders, Emmerdale or Corrie be so popular if the cast all had to be over over the age of 65 years? We can't just banish nice looking people, and our lives would be impoverished if we could.

What’s your point though? So she’s young and pretty so OP’s DH should be helping her?

"Why SHOULD it end"? Because the NDN has totally overstepped all normal social boundaries. Crying to OP's DH because, she claims, OP has been "unkind"? That is not a neighbourly relationship - that is something more.
I have great relationships with all my neighbours - we wave when we see each other from a distance, stop for a quick chat if we bump into each other, occasionally put each others' bins out when one is away on holiday, occasionally take parcels in for each other - exactly what any normal person would expect of a neighbourly relationship. OP's NDN's expectation of a neighbourly relationship is not normal - it's excessive - and I don't believe you would tolerate it if it were happening to you in real life.

The exact opposite- just because she has those attributes he shouldn't be admonished for being helpful.

NDN was pushing her luck, and went a bit too far. She should have backed right off, instead she inserted herself into OP's marriage.

She's either very manipulative or very stupid. Time will tell.

You deliberately missed @clinellwipe 's point, which was about OP's DH's motivation. Would he be helping the NDN if they weren't young and attractive? Would he be prepared to offer the same amount of daily support to a 75yr old woman - or man? Only OP can know this.

@CurlewKate It doesn't start out with the man wanting to fuck the neighbour. The man gets a buzz out of helping the helpless young woman. He's the hero. He feels wanted.

The NDN has already tried to make OP look mean. OP's DH sulked about ut.

His reaction tells a story, he wasn't sad that his DW didn't want him to help, he was sulky and unpleasant. Helping the NDN out gives his self esteem a boost so he can't see that she's becoming a nuisance. It's one thing to help out now and then but the NDN is looking for help everyday and is becoming dependant on him, that's too far. If she sees him as a Father figure how long before she's asking for babysitting or money.

Absolutely this

Apart from anything else-do people really live in relationships with men who can’t be trusted in the company of another woman? Even if the woman is -and there is no suggestion than the NDN is-a bit flirtatious? Isn’t that exhausting?

Because his wife is uncomfortable with his developing relationship with this woman! He has overstepped his wife’s boundaries! Not to mention this spiteful madam messaging him behind his wife’s back slagging her off! If life is so hard for the NDN, she can access support from her midwife, GP, health visitor, family and friends. Not overstepping boundaries with her neighbours, who are uncomfortable with this level of contact. Don’t let that get in the way of your narrative though.

I think helpful in terms of occasionally knocking for one off things is being neighbourly. My husband does our elderly neighbour's garden when he is doing ours. I have sorted her bin whenever it's blown over and brought them back in, (until the council started doing it). She knocks in an emergency and we do what we can. She's asked us to be present when someone was trying to sell her something. All those things are fine and agreeable to me, because she is not capable and it's occasional. I would not be happy being interrupted daily while wfh, to do things that I have done myself! There are better coping strategies she could learn and save these knocks for better occaional things like putting together something.

Do all women think they live with men who can't be trusted not to have sex with anyone they can when they can?
Do you need to keep a eye on them when they go to the toilet in a pub? When they go to work, do their wives think they are secretly going to an orgy?
What a sad world!

I'd explain that he's not actually helping her in the long run. She needs to learn to be able to manage independently. As PPs have said, it's not easy managing with buggies and babies and stairs, but she needs to work out a method that works for her. She will encounter stairs all over the place in everyday life. At train stations and shops and out walking. She can't have your DH with her all the time, and even if she had a partner she would need to manage on her own day to day. By doing this for her he is actually preventing her developing this independence, so for her sake (as well as yours!) he needs to step back.

If she is suffering from PND or anxiety, she needs to get appropriate support and treatment from her GP/Midwife/Health Visitor.

She’s either a user or after a replacement baby daddy.

Never mind what's going on with the neighbour, is this guy getting sufficient work done?!

I think it's clear from the thread that a lot of women don't trust their husbands/partners.

I find it hard to get my head around, personally. If I didn't trust DH, I wouldn't want to be with him.

@CurlewKate , Apart from anything else-do people really live in relationships with men who can’t be trusted in the company of another woman? Even if the woman is -and there is no suggestion than the NDN is-a bit flirtatious? Isn’t that exhausting?

Some do. Many of us completely trust our partners and see nothing at all wrong having friends of the opposite sex.
Until we find out that it had become an emotional affair or physical affair in plain sight.

You could say that the 'helpless single mum' routine is flirting.
Most mums, single or not, get on with it, not rely on a married male neighbour for tasks and lifts.

The complaining about OP to her DP was way past overstepping the boundaries.
Why can't you see the red flags?

It’s not that. Most people DO trust their partners, until when something feels wrong, then they have to trust themselves.

Of course, if there is reason to suspect, then that's different. But the point at which I no longer trusted my DH would be the point at which I ended the relationship.

@MrsBennetsPoorNervesAreBack , I've trusted every partner/husband I have. Fat lot of good that did.

I'm sorry to hear that.

I didn’t think it would be long before someone implied he’s having an affair. It’s what they do on here. That’s how their warped minds work on here . I mean ffs suggesting he moved her there and the baby is his. What planet are some of these people on?

It’s a bit more nuanced than that- surely you know that.

It’s not like you go to bed one day trusting 💯 and wake up the next day feeling completely betrayed.

You can trust your partner and still then notice something subtle which makes you feel a bit off and question it - exactly what the OP is doing right now.

Or, Are you suggesting the moment something feels a bit off people immediately start divorce proceedings because no one is going to leave a marriage on a whim like that are they? You notice something, it feels a bit wrong so you talk to your partner about it which is exactly what OP is doing.

Sometimes it’s completely innocent, sometimes it’s not, sometimes someone might be crossing a boundary and not even realising it etc. It’s healthy in a marriage to discuss these things.