If you live in a semi or terrace .....

[mayblossominapril]

and an attached neighbours 3 year old woke up screaming and crying a few times per week between 11pm and 2am, would you be able to hear said child and how much would it bother you?

We live in a terraced property and have a 2 year old

I've apologised to our neighbours for our son thankfully rare screaming and crying, especially when it's late at night or in the early hours, they've said they've never heard him, whether they're just being polite or genuinely can't I don't know, but we've never heard them either so I'm leaning more towards them honestly never hearing him.

If it was the other way round and I could hear someone else's child it wouldn't bother me, even if it woke me up

@hmmph and if you heard things during the day that led you to be concerned then that would of course be the correct thing to do.

But you do realise that if those parents went to their health visitor and asked for help or advice for what was happening it would be brushed off as normal or given some wishy washy advice about gentle sleep training.

And in their sleep deprived state it just may not occur to them to knock on your door. Or they may be too embarrassed since they clearly don't know how to solve it themselves.

And in fact although we've all assumed that OP is the neighbour, perhaps they are parent and are in fact concerned about the neighbours.

OP if that is the case then you have my deepest sympathy. Dealing with a child that just won't sleep is no fun at all. Dealing with it and worrying about neighbours is even worse. I very much hope your neighbours are decent human beings but if they do complain then that is infinitely more reflective of them as people than you.

It wouldn't bother me as I have kids.

In my old house my neighbours told me they could hear my dcs. Once they had kids funnily enough I could hear theirs too.

The current gems have been known to bang on the wall when my tween has a meltdown. I ignore them.

I am your neighbour. It doesn't bother me as such I just feel for the poor little mite

I used to live in a small Victorian terraced and could hear a lot of next door noise - voices, hoovering, etc. Don't hear much in our 1930s semi though even though it's a bigger family living next door.

I'm in a terrace and can barely hear anything from next door... and whenever I apologise for my noisy children (we had 2 under 2), they swear they never hear us and are always worried that their own noise must drive us mad. So it's fine.

Yes it would be annoying to be woken in the night like that. But for goodness sakes it's not a teenager playing rap music - it's a baby! Anyone saying they'd ring SS or complain to the parents is ridiculous- babies and small children cry. At night. This is why there are millions of sleep deprived parents (including me - I only got woken up twice last night though, wooop). This is why there are hundreds of books written on child and baby sleep, promising things like 'the no cry sleep solution' (ha). This is why sleep consultants make hundreds and thousands of pounds from desperate parents. It is so tough and can push you to breaking point. Neighbours complaining would have been the final straw for me so I'm very good we have kind and empathetic people around us (not completely convinced they really can't hear us but if they can im grateful for them not admitting to it!!). Complaining would do nothing anyway except upset the parents more, or make them feel guiltier or angry. They can't force the child to stop crying and go to sleep. Be kind. And maybe get earplugs.

lived in a two bed terrace with our baby and she used to cry. i apologised to my neighbour about eight weeks after the birth and she said she didn’t even know i had had my baby and congratulations!!!

this is london where people do their own thing,

i also didn’t really hear other children cry on our street and i saw quite a few young families. it’s not like a flat so probably ok to be honest

plus how much do babies really cry - maybe a lot during the first few weeks/months and then it’s usually intermittent through toddlerhood.

Yes, we'd be able to hear it, but I don't think it would bother me all that much - I'd just have sympathy for the poor parents having to try and deal with it.

We hear it. It’s just part of living in a semi.

also if people expect to hear no noise they should live in a rural detached house. it’s part and parcel of parenting to have crying babies - that’s the only way they can comminicate.

and people who live in semis and terraced should expect to hear some noise around them.

it’s not perfect no but it is what it is and i would have more sympathy for the parents to be frank.

It would have probably been background noise in our old semi, in our present one, we'd hear it very clearly - resulting in DH wanting to move before our old neighbour has to move and a family moves in!!! However, we would also hear whether the parents were trying to relax child or getting frustrated themselves, every word if we stood by the partition wall.

We live mid terrace and can hear everything. But we wouldn’t complain. When I’ve apologised for any noise they say they never hear anything either.

It would really really really annoy me especially if it went on for an hour. It it was loud enough to keep me awake it would effect me a lot. I’d feel ill with lack of sleep. I have to get up early in the morning and lack of sleep gives me migraines.

I’d wonder if there was anyway for them to minimise the noise. A baby crying for an hour sounds like a really long time.

On the other hand I would feel sorry for the child and the parents.

You can feel massively annoyed and still be sympathetic. TBH I was be extremely annoyed if it was my own child.

I might let my neighbours know that I could hear the crying and I might ask if there was anything they could do to minimise the noise but I wouldn’t be snarky or unsympathetic as it’s not possible to know the reasons why the child was crying. If the parent chose to tell me that their child was autistic or that there was something else that contributed to the crying I would be even more understanding. It wouldn’t be my business to know about my neighbours child’s health but I think it would make me fell more understanding.

We'd probably be able to hear it but it wouldn't wake us up if we were already asleep.

I am the mother of the howling for ages in the middle of the night 3 year old. We currently live in a mid terrace with paper thin walls. Neighbours are great single bloke on one side who’s barely in and swears he can’t hear anything which I don’t believe because we can hear him. Family on the other side who make a fair bit of noise during the day and dad gets up very loudly in the morning so it’s equal disturbance there. But I’m moving and with this little night time problem wondering if I should just stick to looking at detached properties or consider another attached one. Don’t want to start a neighbour dispute as soon as we move it.

Yes and it would bother me very much. I can't stand repetitive type noise and my neighbors do my head in regularly!

I very much doubt I'd be able to hear it. I lobe on an 1880s built terrace. I have neighbours with pre school and primary age kids. And occasionally hear them through the wall but very faintly. So it wouldn't bother me as I couldn't hear it.

If I could hear it tbh it would bother me because I have some health issues which make me tired. I also struggle to get back to sleep if woken. So say three times a week I'd be having a disrupted night that's quite a lot.

If you can afford a detached property, go for it. If you move to an attached house, you might be the quieter neighbour!

It's just one of those things if you live in a built up area / terrace/ semi. There will be noise.

My neighbour never minded about our baby crying and waking in the night. We never minded about her teen having mates round, being boisterous. Neighbour on the other side had a dog who'd bark loads. Especially at the crack of dawn! And a car alarm that would go off very loudly very often.

It's just part of the parcel and I wouldn't be making any comments/ complaints.

@Beebumble2

A situation like that would be stressful enough for the parents without the added stress of worrying about neighbours. I wouldn’t complain, but might buy myself earplugs.

THIS! This should be what neighbours should do.

Instead my neighbours would bang on the wall and swear and shout at us which just made the situation worse.

My DS didn't talk till he was 3. Between 18m and 2 1/2 he would wake in the night crying, and nothing we could do to keep him upstairs in bed and calm would work. I think he wanted to be near us, or a night terror had upset him, but he couldn't verbalise what was wrong. The first time they shouted abuse and banged was when he had croup and so was in a cycle of coughing in his sleep which would hurt him so he'd cry and cry until he fell asleep and so on.

I would be in tears trying to calm him down. We ended up taking him downstairs to watch tv and play with his toys. Just to keep him quiet so they wouldn't react. One of us would nap on the sofa whilst keeping an eye on him.

This then ended up with him wanting to go downstairs every night to play, but not understanding us when we tried to explain why he needed to stay in bed.

Their constant abuse made me fear my DS and his night wakings. I was in a constant state of high alert, I feared any noise that could wake him. For that year I did not like my DS.

In the last 18 months we have introduced a Gro clock, gave him a treat if he stayed in his room all night, slept in his room every night, eventually moved to only visiting him a few times a night, and now most nights he sleeps through. It's taken a lot of hard work, but I now don't fear my DS and enjoy spending time with him.

Our ndn has a small DC who cries a fair bit. We can hear him but it isn't so loud that it would wake me up. It doesn't bother me at all.

I happened to us. So we put in soundproofing and problem solved.

Well as the parent of the screaming child at the moment yes my neighbours can hear her as we've discussed it and I've apologised but they sympathise as we're not obviously just letting her cry, babies cry for a reason you know and if that takes an hour so be it🤨 the child may be teething or might be ill