'I won't change anything': My neighbours filed a noise complaint against my toddler

“Unless I put her in a straight jacket, I cannot control how often she walks around and how she plays.”

Mum Hayley Becker has been hearing from her neighbours a lot lately. Mostly, a series of complaints about "noise and footsteps" coming from their apartment. After multiple visits from the downstairs couple, Hayley received a formal complaint from building management, and took to her TikTok account to vent. 

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"The footsteps are our daughters walking"

The couple with their 16-month-old and dog have been living in their apartment for four years and had never heard anything from their neighbours before. 

"We are not heavy-footed people! The footsteps are our daughters - we can't control this," the mum shares in her video. 

After some back and forth between her husband and the neighbours, the mum says that the couple just really “weren't grasping the concept of [them] having a toddler who walks and plays. That's just the way it is.”

Things came to a head when the new "young couple" put in an official complaint with the complex’s management.

The downstairs neighbours have been tapping on the ceiling when they hear footsteps. Source: iStock

"They walk around, they play - we understand"

Becker explained that she tried to get ahead of the complaint and speak to the front office herself, reminding them that she had a toddler-aged kid.

“I just said, ‘Hey, this is what's going on. We have a toddler. Unless I put her in a straight jacket, I cannot control how often she walks around and how she plays. And I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to prevent my child from exploring and walking around the apartment and living. It's just not happening'.”

She continued, “And I told her on the phone: 'My daughter wakes up at seven o'clock in the morning. She goes to bed between seven and eight o'clock. She's not bouncing off the walls at midnight'.”

She offered to keep the music down, control their dog, and even make sure their own footsteps weren’t too loud, but she would not compromise on how her daughter chooses to spend her time in her own home.

"They walk around, they play - we understand," said the building manager.

“I'm not going to plop my daughter in a corner and tell her to be quiet and to walk on her tiptoes and to ‘sh-sh-sh.’ I'm not going to create those habits. And also I'm just not doing it. I don't feel bad. I just want to make this clear. Like I don't feel bad for the neighbours. Nothing's going to change. I want to make that very clear. And I made that very clear to her in the front. We're not going to be able to change these behaviours and these noises. It's just impossible. And as parents we're not doing it,” she explained.

Hayley believes as her new 'footstep-averse' neighbours don't have children, they cannot understand why there it's hard to control the movements of a toddler. 

Most of the TikTok users who came across Hayley's neighbour dispute understood where she was coming from.

“Property Manager here. They need to be reminded it's apartment living. Office should offer another unit, if declined, they should terminate,” one user wrote.

Another said, “It’s called communal noise. They need to buy a house.”

One user echoed, “It’s so unrealistic to ever expect low/no noise in communal living ESPECIALLY when you have upstairs neighbors! Especially with kids!”

"We just got a notification AGAIN today that they have called to complain 13x in the past 3 days," Hayley wrote in response to all the comments.

Hayley's neighbours keeping tabs on her every movement. Source: TikTok

Would someone please think of the neighbours!

Some users empathised with the downstairs couple.

“Our upstairs neighbor lived here first, their 3-4 y.o. jumps off their furniture from 5:30-10:30pm…. The kid is just being a kid, but it does get old,” one user wrote.

Another said, “Unpopular opinion here. When you rent you don’t get to know who lives above you. Nothing you can do about your kid, but they are now frustrated.”

There have been six updates since the original video

Hayley has since posted five additional videos to share updates on how her neighbour-situation is going. The downstairs neighbours have continued to file complaints, with many TikTokers commenting to Hayley that she needs to "control her child" and other people shouldn't be "suffering, because you chose to have children!"

Hayley also reiterated she doesn't want (and can't!) "control" her child - she has boundaries, and regulated, but she is allowed to play freely in her own home. 

Pregnant with her second baby, Hayley admits it has been extremely emotional, with one update saying,"my 24lb (10kg) daughter walked across our apt 3x and they just banged on the ceiling multiple times back at us."

"We feel very targeted by them, they are tracking our every move and our daughters every move," which was relayed to the couple via the building management. 

As it stands, after the downstairs complainers went through all the legal channels, it was found that the family weren't breaching any noise barriers. The couple will be moving out early next year when their renovations are finished.

Originally published as 'I won't change anything': My neighbours filed a noise complaint against my toddler