“I filed a noise complaint about my neighbor’s baby – she thinks I’m selfish”

A woman has admitted to filing a noise complaint against her neighbor because her baby keeps her up at night crying – but she has been accused of being selfish

We all know that a newborn baby can disrupt your sleep schedule, but if your baby tends to cry at night, chances are it’s waking up your neighbors too.

And while most neighbors would understand the difficult situation you find yourself in as a parent, sometimes the noise can become too much – leading to noise complaints being filed.

That’s exactly what a woman on Reddit was doing when her neighbor’s baby started “crying” every few hours, leaving her completely unable to sleep.

She works as a resident in a medical profession and is often exhausted even without the extra noise that keeps her from sleeping, the woman explained, which is why after a while she decided to talk to her landlord about possible soundproofing.

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in the her postshe said: “I live in an apartment. I am established in a medical profession and work 100 hour weeks plus many extra hours for study and paperwork. I hardly sleep as it is.

“My downstairs neighbor had a baby last month. I haven’t slept all night since she came home from the hospital. I get woken up by the baby every 1-2 hours and this baby is crying.

“I know the mother is trying her best – I’m sure she doesn’t want to be woken up either. But I lose my composure. My boyfriend encouraged me to file a complaint because it’s not fair that I can’t sleep.”

The woman said she tried speaking to her neighbor first before contacting her landlord, but couldn’t because the times she tried were times when the baby was actually sleeping.

But after speaking to her landlord, the woman received an angry visit from the mother, who called her “selfish” for reporting her and her baby.

She added: “I tried speaking to my neighbor directly to ask if she could stop walking around her whole apartment or maybe some soundproofing could be done. But every time I had a chance to go to her apartment, she has a note about the sleeping baby and please don’t knock.

“So I spoke to my landlord on Friday night. I was very clear that I’m not trying to blame this woman, I just wanted to know if soundproofing or something could be done. The landlord said they were looking at options.

“Well, Saturday I had a day off. I slept and woke up pounding and screaming. The mother was angry with me and kept yelling that I was selfish and trying to kick out a single mom. Neighbors were watching and I kept trying to explain but she just kept yelling.”

Eventually “the woman lost” and yelled back – telling the mother to move out of her apartment if it was “not soundproofed”.

And now she has admitted she “feels awful” about her actions but doesn’t know how to move on when both she and the baby’s mother are struggling with exhaustion.

She said: “I lost it. I’m totally exhausted and just screamed back. I told her her baby is so noisy it could cost me my job and that I can’t function because of her and that the soundproofing isn’t right end of the world. If she cannot soundproof herself, she should be considerate and bid farewell to apartment living. She started crying and left.

“I feel terrible about it. I know I shouldn’t have screamed. I know that makes me an asshole. But am I the asshole to file a complaint? My impression was that the landlord would fix the problem of not kicking them out? I dont want that.”

Commenters on the post were quick to note that neither the wife nor the mother were wrong in the scenario, although some pointed out that noise comes with living in an apartment and should be expected.

One person said: “You have chosen to live in an apartment, which means you will hear noise. It sounds like the bigger problem is that your schedule doesn’t match your living situation.”

Another added: “I definitely understand both sides.”

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