Little girl home alone

[girlsmum]

Hi, We could really do with some advice.

My husband and I were in bed last night when we heard a funny noise, it turned out to be hedgehogs so we watched them out of our bedroom window for a while.
Whilst we were hung out of our bedroom window we could hear a little girl crying - not unusual as we live in a road with houses in terraces of 6 and can usually hear quite a lot from other houses. Well, the little girl was shouting 'Mummy' then crying, 'Daddy' then crying. My husband and I nudged each other, relieved that it wasn't just us who had used controlled crying.
It was about 11.30pm and this was going on for about 10 minutes, the little girl kept crying and then she started to knock on a door screaming 'open the door'. We thought that comment was a bit odd.

Then the upsetting bit, her mummy who I don't know to talk to but do see about, came out of her neighbours house walked across the front of their gardens back to her own front door, opened it and looked down to the little girl and said 'yeah?'. !!!!!!!
So, a couple of different possibilities, maybe she had popped into her neighbours for a cup of sugar or maybe she had been their all evening and her daughter (who I believe to be 3 or 4 - as she doesn't attend school yet) had searched the whole house frightened looking for her Mummy and ended up at the front door crying.
My husband and I are both shocked and upset - we're not really sure whether to let this go, as we don't want to get this lady into trouble, but what if their had been a fire or a buglary? What do we do?

That sounds as bad as "my" twins story. I would say wait & see if it happens again & if it does, then call social services.

I hate the idea of leaving little ones at home alone.... something could happen sooo quickly

I know what you mean, it's really hard to know what to do, I wouldn't know either!

Not a very helpful answer, just letting you know I see your dilema.

Nowt like listening to bonking hedgehogs in the middle of the night tho eh? They make some funny noises!

Thank you for your quick responses. Just off to take dd1 to gymnastics will log on again later.

keep and eye out see if its a regular thing.

Please don't call social services - if the Mum had popped over the road for a cup of sugar and SS end up on her doorstep, she'll be devastated.

Agree with custy, see if it's a regular occurence first.

It could have been that her daddy was at home, although I'm not sure why he would have let her roam the house crying.

Agree with Custy, keep an eye on things and see what happens.

This doesn't sit well with me at all and is something I would never do - however the objective part of me does acknowledge that the mum was only next door and she did respond to her child's cries.

I don't condone leaving your child in this way, but I am not sure it is reportable. I would go with Custy - keep an eye and ear out for a while

really want to say phone as if she'd gone for a cup of sugar she'd have returned with item and have been very upset child had woken and she wasn't there. however would I actually have done that if I were you. Please watch out for that little girl, is it too strong to say you might save her life?!!! maybe you could try to chat to neighbour she was visiting and try to find out if indeed it was a cup of sugar!

this may be naive, but could you drop a note in the door to say that you heard her DD 'calling out' (keep it neutral) and wondered if you could help out by babysitting any time?
then maybe you drop a hint without getting her back up
obviously only works if you are willing to babysit though

MY sister went to the the shops one night about 9pm and as she was going out the back door, her neighbour asked if he could cadge a lift to the shops too, she said Yes. She had left her Dh in the livingroom and their 3 kids in bed. Her 9yr old got up, looked out his bedroom window saw a man and a woman (sis and neighbour) and thought that it was him mum and dad heading off in the car and left them alone. He got out of bed, didn't think to look in the livingroom but legged it across their back garden to his uncles house and told him that his parents had left him all alone with his brothers and sisters, he was hysterical. The uncle took him home and walked to the livingroom and opened the door, BIL was watching TV.. and was amazed that ds hadn't thought of looking there.. the poor wee mite had to see a psychologist and everything as he was so frightened for nights/weeks after that that his mum and dad were going to leave him :(

My mum used to leave our front door on the latch and go to the neighbours house for a drink on a sat night, we usually were asleep and it's almost 30yrs ago now so times were different. I'd watch out for this child, but I hope they didn't leave her on her own, that's so sad :(

girlsmum...she sounds too too little to be left alone.How traumatic for her. End of story I think.

TBH I don't consider going next door as leaving a child home alone. If you can hear a child from where you are, you're not abandoning it. Some people with enormous houses would be further away from their children than other people who live in a row of terraces popping next door to the neighbour's. It would very much depend what they were doing of course - if they were watching loud TV for example, they wouldn't hear her, but of course you don't know what they were doing.

This wouldn't worry me too much unless it was teamed up with other dodgy occurences.

ok, so what if little girl HAD managed to open the door and had wandered off tearfully looking for mummy ?

Well if that had happened MrsN, it would have meant that her mother had gone too far away to have heard her, or heard her and ignored her, in which case it would obviously have been wrong. But the mother did hear and respond to her, so I really wouldn't take this one incident as being a cause for concern, unless it was part of a continuum of worrying incidents. Also, we don't know where the father was - was he watching TV at a loud volume in the house, was he out? Too many unknowns here to jump to conclusions, imo. It would alert me to a potential problem and I might be more aware of those neighbours and be a bit more nosy about them in future, but that would be all at this stage for me personally.

Hmm, I see your point. Just think thats still too teeny. I must be an overprotective Mum.

Agree with Caligula - if the child is in bed asleep & you stay in earshot, next door chatting to neighbour is no worse than 2 floors away in a biggish house.

But if the parents could hear her, waiting 10 minutes before responding to her being out of bed & crying (& then being unsympathetic!) is unkind. & if they didn't hear her at once - too far away.

Thanks for your responses.

I think I will keep an eye (and ear) over the road.

I am hoping the mum just popped over to borrow something, but as she did come back empty handed and her own house was in pitch blackness I think she was maybe over there longer than the 10 minutes we heard her daughter crying.

Both my parents and my dh parents used to go to the pub/next door for drinks when we were little and leave us home alone - but that was 20 odd years ago and I like to think that we are all better educated now.

Agree with Mrs Noah I must also be an over-protective mum. There are lots of things that can happen to little ones that dont make too much noise and if you're not in the house you're not checking on them. In the house you usually have monitors to hear what was going on upstairs even if it is 2 floors away. I'd rather be overprotective I think! 20 yrs ago my MIL best friend lost a 17mth old boy by strangulation. He had played with the cord on the curtain whilst in his cot and died. He did not make a sound. They lived ina small 2 up 2 down terraced house and mum, dad and older brother 10 and sister 12 didn't hear a thing.