Calling the police to check on a crying baby

[summermumma2021]

Just had to call the police to check on a new neighbours baby. What would
you have done in this situation?
New neighbours live down our road around 100m away from us and could hear loud very distressed crying for over half an hour.

It sounded like a newborn or young baby crying and so I assumed they’d settle or some attempt to comfort them would be made but the crying stayed at the same level for ther period time. I could also hear raised voices and car doors slamming and I asked my husband if he’d heard it too (he was downstairs) and he said yeah he was worried as well.

Anyway in hoping it was nothing and the little one is fine but it just didn’t sit right and it sounded like no attempt to comfort them was being made at all.

i have no idea who the new neighbours are as it’s quite far from our bit of the road but for it to be that loud from this distance didn’t seem right. I have also had three colicky babies so I do know babies can cry for periods of time but as I said it sounded like no attempt to help them was being made.

Anyway police treating it as a priority case and checking things out. Just wanted to share really as worried.

So absolutely everyone should get a mandatory police check...just in case?

No. I asked you what you think the right thing to do is?

If I heard a couple arguing I wouldn't immediately jump to calling the police.

Yet many victims of DV have been thankful that strangers have intervened.
It’s very hard to know, but IMO I’d rather piss off my neighbours over a unneeded call out than leave a potentially DV situation.

So what are you calling the police out for then?

Any raised voice?

How did they hear it?

I'm not the poster you're asking but I live in a terrace house and can hear my neighbours talking.

You can't know it wouldn't any more than that poster could have known it would. It is all speculation on your part, own it. You feel like you're done the right thing. Great for you. There is the possibility it could be quite devastating for someone though. If on balance you think getting a check on the baby was the most important thing then own that. Not much point looking for reassurance or trying to get people to agree with you and then clapping back with the truth, which is that you can't know and just hope on balance you have made the right decision.

In every room?

If you’re arguing in a location that other people can hear you then you run the risk that other people may have a different interpretation of the situation than you. Once your domestic situation spills out for other people to hear you don’t get to control it.

NB Police certainly aren’t embarrassed to be called to those types of situations… they will be doing multiple domestic calls a shift.

I still don't understand how you can glean that much information from 100m away. I live in the middle of a 200m road and I would have absolutely no clue what's going on at either end of the street, let alone be able to say whether a baby was crying without being consoled etc. Or what if a couple talking loudly and slamming car doors (the only way to close them) woke up a baby in a different house? And the OP and her dh listening to this all apparently and not even coming out of their house to have a look up the road. How odd.

What? You can't leave your children alone with your own husband... weird

oh these comments 🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️ I didn’t say that whatsoever.
I didn’t want to go and put myself in a potentially dangerous situation in the middle of the night and neither did my husband.

Obviously I can leave my kids with my husband. Some of these comments are horrific. I think posters like you forget that I am a real person and you’re talking such utter nonsense in such a mean way. Do better!

We did look up the road from our bedroom but it was the middle of the night. We live in a very quiet area (usually) and it was clear as day where the noise was coming from…that’s kind of the point of why we were worried because of the volume of the disturbance.

I can confirm that OP is not feeling guilty as you claim for causing the family distress. Please bore off with your horrible comments and find another thread to argue on. This really wasn’t the purpose of my post.

So the name confusion was because I had logged out of mumsnet and logged back in on my other email. I have two very similar user names which I hadn’t realised until after. I use auto login and I’m terrible with passwords.

It was just a logging in confusion. If I wanted to use a “fake name” or whatever then I wouldn’t choose almost exactly the same name would I?

I never claimed otherwise?

Exactly!

Yeah I added further context in in subsequent posts.
I don’t really understand why you’ve been trying to pull apart and find holes in everything I’ve posted but I guess that’s what trolls do. You could either have contributed something actually helpful or you know…spent your time in other ways!

Triggered much? If you’re that offended about my “perfect standards of parenting” that this post has riled you up this much perhaps you’re feeling ashamed or guilt about your own parenting. Just a thought for you since you’ve so kindly offered up such gems of wisdom on this thread.

Yes the police came but I won’t know anymore and I don’t need to know any further. I’m just glad everything was checked and there’s been no issues since but we are now aware of a wider issue on our estate linked to this.

I wasn’t calling the police “on the parent” I was calling out of a welfare concern for the baby. Attitudes like that are actually really detrimental.

Yeah exactly! If I wanted to make up a reallt
exhilarating tale I wouldn’t make up this.

It is true. My post wasn’t made with malicious intent it was just made as I was worried late at night and wanted to see if anyone had experienced the same and how they handled it.

i never expected to be pulled apart as if I was on trial. This has certainly been an eye opener.

Yeah 30 minutes is a long time for a continuous scream for sure! I think midwives recommend 10 mins if the crying becomes overwhelming for the parent. Saying that, on a bad my baby can cry for 30 mins if he’s overtired when I rock him to sleep… but you’re right that there are variations, and if they were just arguing and not attending 30 minutes is actually a long time. I can’t even go 5 mins and here my baby cry even if he’s in the bouncer and I’m eating dinner

Yeah, I agree. 30 mins of a moderate cry is very normal at a lot of ages but 30 mins of essentially screaming is not to me.