'Infertile' Neighbors 'Demand' New Mom To Hide Her Baby Because It Makes Them Feel Bad

Sep 27, 2021 by apost team

Being a parent is a tough job, but it’s one that many people decide to take. Unfortunately, not everyone that wants to be a parent is able to actually live out their dreams. Sometimes people have health issues that prevent them from getting pregnant or carrying a pregnancy safely to full term. Infertility is challenging and can be incredibly emotional to deal with. Although there are plenty of other options to enter parenthood, it doesn’t always feel the same for people who have been longing to have their own children the way they had always envisioned.

A woman and her husband recently had a baby and spent plenty of time caring for him and playing with him. This was especially difficult for their neighbors to see since they realized that they were unable to have a baby of their own. However, the woman couldn’t just stop being a mother since she needed to take care of her child and continued to go about her days like normal. Her neighbors constantly got angry with her and went over to her house, demanding her to move to another room where she wouldn’t be seen playing with her son.

It all got to be too much for the woman, and she went off on one of her neighbors but has started to regret it. The woman eventually went to Reddit on Sept. 12, 2021, to share the issues she had been having with her neighbors and asked for advice on how she should deal with the situation moving forward.

At the beginning of her Reddit post, the original poster (OP) explained that she and her husband had been living in their neighborhood for five years, the same amount of time that they had been married. They now have a 6-month-old son together. Their previous neighbors were an older couple that they had a good relationship with and were even sad when the couple moved away. When OP was two months pregnant, her new neighbors named Paul and Anna moved in next door. “We weren’t friends but we would say hi to each other here and there,” she explained.

OP enjoyed her daily routine of sunbathing, something she had done since childhood until her new neighbors moved in. Even though her backyard is fenced, the fence isn’t very tall, meaning the neighbors are able to see the entire yard and main part of her house from their second floor. “When I was 5 months pregnant Paul told my husband that my sun bathing was making them uncomfortable,” OP said. “I sunbathe in shorts and tank tops, nothing out of the ordinary, I just ignored them and kept my routine.” 

However, Paul came over the next month to complain again, and the problems didn’t stop there. OP explained that after returning from a walk with her husband during her eighth month of pregnancy, Anna saw her and immediately stormed inside and slammed the door. “The following day Paul came to our house and told us that they have fertility problems and seeing me pregnant was making her heavily uncomfortable, and I was an insensitive bit**,” OP said.

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Since OP works from home, she typically keeps her baby close to her in a playpen in the living room. There is another one outside on the back terrace. Seeing the baby has continued to make Anna uncomfortable, resulting in Paul coming over to tell OP this. OP explained, “I was in the living room playing with the baby when he knocked, he asked me to move from the living room because his wife could see me from their balcony.” She asked them to leave her alone.

Most recently, OP was outside with her husband in their fenced yard when she started to breastfeed her son. Anna had seen them and sent Paul over to confront the family, but OP had had enough. “When he finished I told him to leave us alone, don’t knock on my door again, and if his wife is so upset over seeing a baby she needs therapy and not him harassing my family,” she said.

However, OP’s mom had also struggled with infertility and told her that she was out of line for not being sympathetic toward the other couple. Reddit users were on OP’s side, though, and encouraged her to press charges if her neighbors kept bothering her and looking into her home. Since then, OP updated her post and explained that she is installing a taller fence and cameras. 

She continued, “About the restraining order, we called our lawyer, he told us to get a few footages, because until now we only have our word and our other neighbors’ testimony.” The family was instructed to record Paul if he came over again and call the cops on him every single time to help get a restraining order against him.

Do you think this mother was right to work on getting a restraining order against her neighbors? Or should she have been more sensitive about their situation? Let us know, and be sure to pass this along to your friends and family members to find out what they think, too.