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 would say you have a husband problem more than a neighbour problem tbh.

You intervening on his behalf (when he is ok with helping) does make you look weirdly territorial. But she does need to learn to manage by herself . Your husband should have been the one to tell her.

OPs DH felt moved to give it to her.

I don’t think anything is going on. I think dh just likes to help young pretty ‘helpless’ women. It’s just the knocking and the messages are annoying me and now the way she’s gone crying to him ? I find it really irritating

Yet.
Until he goes getting more attached over the months/years and one day she starts throwing herself at her saviour because she CBA to do things by herself, which will probably include being a working single mother when her 2yrs on universal credit is up.
He's definitely getting a kick out of all this if it's only the young pretty ones he likes helping.

Since she's already come between you I'd go round there again being much more unkind and rip her a new one, then come back and do the same to him when he mentions it after she goes crying to him again. The pair of them have already banded together and jointly pushed you into the "bad guy" position. You don't have much to lose now and the way things are looking you absolutely should be "marking your territory" as it were. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work, but sitting back and watching quietly while she tries to steal your husband away from under your nose isn't going to get you anywhere either. He's already proved you can't rely on his loyalty, by siding with her against you.

Whether your neighbour is upset or not is NOT your husbands concern. YOU ARE @Babycarrierdilemma !

You tell him that you’re done with him helping another woman and see it as the potential for an affair to start… ask him how he’d feel if you were getting another man from the neighbourhood to run you around in their car!!!!

Or …..
whenever she messages you go along too… go on all the car journeys and insist that you’re helping her carry the baby upstairs and she can carry the folded pram!
She doesn’t have to like you… I’m fact maybe if you’re ALWAYS there she’ll stop asking DH!

There is a difference between being trusting and ignoring red flags, I wouldn't be with a man I can't trust but I will never trust anyone enough to ignore red flags, not again. My mom was in a similar situation as the OP, she trusted my dad completely and so did I even when the red flags began popping up and my aunt became convinced that he was cheating (I still feel like a huge idiot for defending him to her). I am not saying he is cheating but based on what she has said, the OP's husband is clearly emotionally attached to the NDN which can escalate.

You are right this could and is getting out of hand. Where is her partner. OK to help a little but with everything people take advantage so have a word with husband and put yout foot down. I am not mean will help anyone but too much is causing problems. Good luck

You still haven't answered my question so I will ask it again:

Do they ring you up whilst you are at work during the day asking for unplanned lifts too and unplanned favours?
Do they interrupt your time with your partner asking you for favours you havent previously agreed?
Do they send your partner texts slagging you off?

If not then your analogy doesn't remotely apply does it?

You arent answering this because you cant and still insist you are in the right 😂

Why does she make it seem like your dh is obligated to help her. She is crossing the line by going behind your back and crying to your hd. You mentioned you guys even argued about it. How would your hd feel if situation was reversed and some guy complains to you about him abs you go and argue with your hd for the sake of the so called guy.... Like seriously you guys need to have a serious conversation about this because by the looks of it young miss is starting to feel entitled to your hd. Sorry to say.

Good on you OP nipping this in the bud before it went any further..she needs to stand on her own 2 feet and learn to cope with public transport and her shopping delivery..As for the perfect Mumsnet Mums saying you're bitter/jealous and all the other crap,ket me tell you if it was one of their poor long suffering husbands/partners(god love them) they'd be round the local Vicars making them have words with this bench.. so glad you got it all sorted x

This isn’t over,@Babycarrierdilemma. I think they’ve become infatuated with each other based on the mutual gratification of their ‘rescuer’ connection, which has evolved into an EA.

She craves his attention and he laps up giving it. He has shown her how invested he is in pleasing her, hence her confidence that she can call the shots. After you threw a kink in their cozy party of 2, she felt entitled to weep and wail to him and target you. He backed her up by calling you uncaring and wouldn’t speak to you. [These immediate reactions show the extent of their enmeshment.] When you uttered ‘dealbreaker’ he agreed to curtail being constantly at her disposal. Now, however, he has gone quiet and there’s an atmosphere. He probably feels unsettled that their primary avenue to see each other ‘in plain sight’ has been thwarted and she is none too pleased.

I believe they are still messaging and will be meeting up behind your back. As their behavior has affected your peace of mind and emotional health, I wouldn’t hesitate to investigate his phone to learn what is really going on in your marriage and life.

'Gaslighting' 😅

It's weird that you've made assumptions about my lack of boundaries, given that I never gave any indication of my opinion of the neighbor's behavior, or whether I would be happy with it in OPs shoes. (For the record I would not)

Read my post. I simply suggested that if some is willing to end a marriage over this, there are clearly bigger problems at hand.

OP has said that she lived in this building when her children were babies and that is why she bought slings to get up and down stairs because her husband didn't help her. Now, suddently, he is the 'village' for this single mother when he couldn't even be bothered to help his own wife in the same situation.

It's not that he wouldn't. He couldn't. He was back at work and in the office full time.

People are filling the gaps in this story with their own negative perceptions of useless husbands and temptress neighbours and rescue complexes... It's madness.

But if it’s just so challenging to live there without help several times a day to get the pram in and out, wouldn’t he feel terrible that his own wife and child had to struggle with that every day? Instead he is telling his wife that she’s horrifyingly uncaring, because she thinks someone else should be managing like she did instead of getting her husband to be on call.

It's not that he wouldn't. He couldn't. He was back at work and in the office full time

Right- but he expected her to carry on doing it alone, using a sling. Therefore, he thought it was ok to do, possible to do and not an issue at all. He wasnt ringing her from work asking her how she was managing or popping home on his lunch break to help.

He views his wife as perfectly capable of doing this apparently mission impossible feat but not the neighbour. LMAO

Why isn't this help being directed towards OP? If he has time to help the neighbour there is almost certainly plenty he could do within his own home, and he could be doing his own family's shopping instead of taking the neighbour to do hers.

Plus it's inevitable that it will start impacting family life - OP won't be able to get to an appointment because he's out in the car giving neighbour a lift, he won't be around when one of the children has an accident, neighbour still expects his help when he has a work deadline or OP is ill, etc etc.

Reminds me of when dsis was struggling down plane steps with toddler and baby whilst bil was leaping to help complete stranger with her case ahead of her. It went in dsis’s (large) book of bil’s black deeds.

I can’t imagine that the OP’s dh is having an affair with this girl but, like my bil, enjoys being Mr Hero. If one’s own dh helps you, it’s an appreciative grunt at best, whereas a stranger will be falling over themselves with gushing gratitude, which must feel good I expect.

The needy neighbour is taking the Mickey, but if OP complains she looks like the bad guy.

I’d just have a heart to heart with dh and say the neighbour texting him has hurt her own feelings and that they should be helpful to neighbour, but OP is worried she’s over-relying on them.

Shall I say it again?

The OP mentions 'the message where she said she didn’t know how to say and didn’t want to say but she has cried all afternoon and is stressed after my visit and that I wasn’t kind'

When you had your children, assuming you are a mother, were you not in parenting groups or on forums where some women coped really well with being a mum, and others didn't? Where some mums had PND and others didn't. Where some had a strong support network of friends and family as well as partner, and others didn't.

I don't find it incongruous at all that the OP could cope with the stairs and the neighbour mum needs a bit of help. OP liked wearing slings - plenty of mums don't. I loved them, but couldn't put on a wrap sling on my own and struggled with back carries, always.

This idea that if one woman can do something or cope with something, then all women should be able to, is extraordinarily lacking in empathy and insight.

That still doesn't make it the OP's husband's job to help her all day and every day. She needs to work this out herself and not be crying to him behind his wife's back.

OP, I hope you are finding lots of jobs that need doing now that you have a super helpful DH!

The minute she messaged your DH she revealed herself. She’s after him. Nobody with any self respect would ask for that much help.

Sure but lets look at the husband's behaviour here for a moment shall we?

1. His wife has kids. He has given this NDN her mobile number to ring without her permission for when he isnt there. This means that not only does she ring the husband, when he isnt available, she is ringing the OP for help whose number he didnt even ask if it was ok to give out. He did this without her permission or discussion.
2. He has told his wife she is unkind when NDN has slagged her off to him via text and is triangulating her with this NDN
3. He is apparently "sulking" and refusing to talk to his wife rather than inviting an adult conversation about it

Do these behaviours sound to you like a kind and supportive husband? because they sure dont to me. He sounds like an absolute twat who thrives off attention from other women and is taking it out own his wife that he cant have that. The husband is lacking in insight and empathy here in buckets.

We only have OP's side. What we know of her is she's threatened divorce over this, and told a woman who has asked for lifts to what I assume are medical appointments that she can't help, and thinks so little of her husband that she thinks he's enjoying being a hero.

He sounds nice. His wife doesn't.

It's not all day every day. It's carrying a pram up and downstairs most days, and occasionally carrying a Tesco delivery upstairs. Help for ?medical? appointments has been refused.

I can see that it's a bit annoying, but nothing more than that, and certainly not threatening divorce territory, especially when he doesn't mind doing it. It really is no big deal, and the OP claiming it interrupts her time with her husband is weird. Is she as jealous and lonely when he takes the bins out, or goes to the loo, or - heaven forbid - goes out and sees his mates?