Neighbour just rung doorbell at 2.30am!

[greywolfie]

I'm now wide awake and fumming. She rung twice so I opened the front bedroom window as I worried it might be an emergency. Women stood there on her phone in tears and I thought - oh, she could need help.
My husband is on his way down to.open the door.
Then she says...."my cat is in your garden"
I mean - FFS!
I said "well your cat will get out of our garden"
"Really?"
"Yes. If your cat is still in our garden in the morning we will bring it back"
Shut window.
Husband then opened the door and she started telling him about the damn cat- I yelled at him to shut it.
He wanted to go out and get it but I said that was mad and would encourage the over protective cat mother to do it again in future.
For reference, we have 2 elderly cats that very rarely scale the fence. One night one got over very late and was struggling to make it back (we have stuff by our fence that would've also helped her bloody cat up, if he cared - but their side is just the bare fence). I was a bit worried but would NEVER have rung their bell in the middle of the night! About an hour later our old lady regained her energy and made it back.
AIBU to go round in the morning and point out you don't ring people's doorbells for this reason? It's batshit right?

"’Be Kind’ people who get sucked into normalizing and enabling anxious, trauma induced or unhelpful thoughts and behaviours actually cause harm. They continue the cycle of destructive behaviour for those who have them.

You need people who point out how you behaving and how it’s not ok."

Absolutely agree with this.

Individuals dealing with anxiety need to take on the responsibility for getting better themselves.

In the same way that diabetics need to manage their own diabetes, anxious people need to manage their anxiety.

I'm not seeing 'be kind' to Type 2 diabetics who are constantly neglecting their health through overeating on mumsnet.

This.
You are right to be annoyed. Your neighbour is one of those stupid, selfish, entitled people who puts animals before humans. Completely batshit behaviour. And your husband risked rewarding, and therefore getting a repetition of, the behaviour you absolutely do not want by trying to do what was completely unreasonable for her to have asked.
I would be going round today and telling her in no uncertain terms never, ever to disturb me again at night.

She was youngish- mind 20s I'd say.
Part of my job is working with vulnerable young people and I think she probably was struggling with her anxiety. However, I agree with previous posters who've said that kindness isn't always automatic sympathy and support. At the 5am call I found myself switching into automatic work mode- is there any real peril? Is the cat sick or injured? No. I'd like to think I was firm but not aggressive in pointing out her impact on my household, the likely outcome of the situation and the fact that she should not repeat this behaviour.
I guess she saw a cat who was marching up and down the fences- and projected her anxiety by thinking he was lost, confused and 'not understanding gardens'. Whereas I just saw a tom cat on the prowl.
Oh and when I told husband to 'shut it' I was talking about the door not his mouth! I had a sudden 2am fear that it might be some kind of scam.

I 100% agree.

OP- You are being extremely selfish wanting to sleep at night.

From now on you should be up at that window on cat watch. All night long. The moment you see any feline activity near your garden you should be sounding a neighbourhood alert (bonus if you can set off a flood light too) so that people are aware of a cat travelling from one back garden to another.

It's utterly appalling and grim that your neighbours aren't being made aware of this happening- I seriously dont know what this world is coming to. What kind of horrific apocalypse are we hurtling towards if we aren't made aware of where our local cats travel at night.

I shudder to think of it.

If she’d let her get the cat she wouldn’t have still been looking for it at 5am. Karma really

Now that I can understand. You inconvenienced her so she inconvenienced you.

Don't be so ridiculous 🙄

I think you were pretty nice about it if I’d been woken up at 2:30 over that I’d have unhinged my jaw and eaten her

Well you must either be a non cat person or a cat person who doesn't actually understand cats.

The cat got in. It can get out again.

I would be absolutely livid if anyone woke me at 2.30 am for that!

She’s your neighbour, she was upset, so yes, you could have put your annoyance aside and helped her retrieve her cat. Your DH was up and offering to go get it, so it was petty of you to tell him not to. All that was needed was a conversation to the effect that this was a one off and not to disturb you like this again.

It’s a cat
doing what cats do

if she isn’t happy with a cat being a cat she shouldn’t have a cat

If I was OP I would have asked her specifically why it was so upsetting and why the cat needed fetching them. No info on that at all.

This.
And they all seem very sure that because this was the first time it'd happened it'll only be a one off and OP will never have this happen again. Not sure how they can be that certain unless they've all got crystal balls.

No, just no. This is not what kindness is.
Matyr, doormat, enabling, people pleaser all come to mind.

I don't understand why anyone thinks it would help this young woman to pander to her wholly unreasonable anxiety. It would help in that moment but in no way would it help the rest of her anxiety ridden life, it will simply make it worse.

Being kind is not always kind!

My cats are house cats. Occasionally one will get out (invariably at night) and I have to bloody commando creep through the neighbours gardens to get it back. Dodgy as hell. But I would never ring the doorbell and ask them to help (unless it was daytime).

Bloody animals time it for the most inconvenient time, I'm sure.

reading this I though it was going to be my sister that was searching for the cat as totally something she’d do with no consideration but your description of the housing layout doesn’t fit 😆. Rather than the at not understanding gardens, it sounds like the neighbour doesn’t understand cats 😆. I might have had a bit more sympathy if it had been a vulnerable indoor cat. Once awake and DH downstairs though I’d probably have let her get her cat to avoid the risk of the second waking but you may not think that way newly woken at 2am

I'm not seeing 'be kind' to Type 2 diabetics who are constantly neglecting their health through overeating on mumsnet.

Possibly because type 2 diabetics who neglect their health are making a conscious choice to do so - it’s within their control. That’s not the case with mental health issues - anxiety, for example, can be triggered in seconds, and can spiral out of control. Blaming the person is counter productive and can be harmful.

If I was OP, I wouldn't want to have encouraged any long conversations about cats in the middle of the night.

If she doesn't want the cat to leave her house then she needs to keep the cat in her house. This would fuck me right off too OP.

All the neighbours cats seem to love being in my garden, which is weird because I never feed them and we have a dog that goes crazy when she sees a cat. (I think that’s why they come here.) 😁

I would go round and (kindly) explain to not wake you up and that it’s normal for cats to be in other people’s gardens.

Depends on the neighbour eg if she was elderly, more infirm and on her own.

If she was young and capable she could sort herself out.

Haven’t RTFT but since you were already awake at that point and your dh was out of bed, I would have just got the cat for her. She shouldn’t be knocking on peoples doors at that time but she obviously felt desperate. You weren’t very kind.

Tbf op said the cat wasn’t in the garden at 5, it may have been there at 2. No one looked. I’d certainly not have been bouncing out of bed at 2 am just to cuddle a cat anyway. Most cats don’t like being accosted by strangers anyway and it’s a good way to get scratched on top of everything else