Hi great people. I recently posted the article how to be a good neighbor: please don’t be a neighbor from hell. After posting the article, I got numerous email responses from some of the readers. Many appreciated the article, and others narrated their encounter with neighbors from hell.
I decided to share this true story about a neighbor from hell. It’s one of the stories I received from one of the readers. I have the reader’s permission to share the story.
The aim of sharing this story is to show you what neighbors from hell look like. In addition, this post is to help you avoid being a neighbor from hell. I want to inspire you to be a good neighbor for the good of the community and for your own good.
Janet’s Encounter with a Neighbor from Hell
The lady who shared her encounter with a neighbor from hell is called Janet. Here’s Janet’s story:
When we moved into our townhouse 10 years ago, we were thrilled, to say the least. We had finally moved into our own house – no more paying rent.
My husband, two sons, nanny, and I quickly settled into the new home. My sons were 8 and 5 years old respectively.
Many of our neighbors were generally nice people and they welcomed us into the neighborhood. My two sons made friends from the neighborhood quickly. They loved the new house and the neighborhood.
Although my neighbors were nice, I noticed that the woman next door was aloof. Her name was Leah and she was probably in her mid-thirties. She lived with her 5-year-old son, her elderly mother, and a nanny/caregiver.
I later learned that Leah was divorced and had moved back to her mother’s house. I also got to know that she ran the family’s dry cleaning businesses.
I met Leah and her son many times outdoors. She totally ignored me. I’m the kind of person who doesn’t force myself on people, so, I also ignored her.
I had my first encounter with Leah several months after we moved into our new house. On that day, someone rang the bell at our gate and I went to open it. I found her standing there. She was fuming.
She told me that according to her nanny, my 5-year-old son had made her 5-year-old son cry while they were playing in the communal playground. Leah was shouting. I was taken aback by her behavior.
I called my children’s nanny from the house. I wanted the nanny to give us her side of the story.
My kid’s nanny said that the boys were playing happily together and they both fell while running. None of them had hurt the other deliberately.
Leah went back to her house and banged her gate loudly as she shut it. I made a mental note that she was troublesome. I therefore told my kid’s nanny to try and ensure that my kids didn’t play with her son in the playground. I didn’t want trouble.
A few weeks after the incident with Leah, we decided to plant flowers in our front yard and to have a kitchen garden in the backyard. We hired someone (let’s call him John) to do the work.
The flower beds were to be next to the stone perimeter wall between our house and the houses of our neighbors on both sides. The front yard and backyard were small, so the flower beds and kitchen garden were going to be tiny.
When John was digging the front yard in preparation for the flower beds, our neighbor Leah came knocking at our gate. She quarreled and shouted at John. She told him that the soil was blowing into her compound and house.
John was disturbed by the confrontation but he went on to complete the job.
After he finished planting the flowers in the front yard, John told me that he wouldn’t do the kitchen garden in the backyard. He didn’t want our neighbor to confront him again.
I assured him I would be there when he did the kitchen garden. That way, I would “deal” with the neighbor if the need arose.
When John started digging the backyard, Leah opened a window in one of her rooms upstairs. She started shouting at him. When I heard the noise, I came out of the kitchen into the backyard.
I looked up to the window and asked Leah what the problem was. She shouted that the soil was entering her compound and her house.
Honestly, it was a cool day, with no wind at all. I told her politely that John would finish shortly. I asked John to continue with his work.
A month after planting the flowers in our front yard, they started to bloom. We were excited! Our front yard was starting to look beautiful.
However, shortly afterward, we noticed that some of the flowers on the side next to Leah’s house were becoming dull and others were dying. I was very concerned and so I called John (the guy who’d planted them).
John asked me a very peculiar question after checking the flowers. He asked why we had poured salt on the flowers.
To say I was shocked is an understatement. I asked all the members of my household the same question and they all had no idea what I was talking about.
John and I concluded that the only other person who could have poured salt on our flowers could be Leah our next-door neighbor. After all, she was unhappy when we were planting them.
John climbed a ladder to have a look at the top of the stone perimeter wall between my house and Leah’s house. And sure enough, there was some salt at the top of the whole wall. The salt must have landed there as they sprayed it on our flowers.
I reported the matter to the estate’s security team. They came over and inspected the perimeter wall and the flower beds. They could not accuse Leah of killing our flowers – nobody had caught her in the act.
I called one of my good neighbors and told her what happened to our flowers. We ranted and raved as loudly as we could about how evil some people were. We didn’t mention her name but I’m sure she knew that we suspected her.
We replanted the flowers and she didn’t interfere with them this time round. I guess she decided to take a break.
There were many other incidents between us and our neighbor from hell.
For instance, she always quarreled about the leaves from the Croton tree next to our gate falling into her compound. She would sweep the leaves from her compound and throw them over the fence to our compound.
When the situation got out of hand, we confronted her. We reminded her that the tree was not in our compound, it was on the outside. We asked her to contact the necessary authorities and ask them to cut down the tree. The tree was never cut.
She would also throw cigarette butts into our compound. She used to smoke, so I was sure she was the culprit.
She also used to complain about our visitors parking their cars on the pavement outside our houses. So, one day, she decided to place a huge flower pot on the pavement outside our houses. We had no idea why she put the pot there. We thought it was because of her love for flowers.
A few days after she’d put the huge pot on the pavement, our uncle and his family came to visit us. It was a Saturday. Uncle parked the car on the pavement outside. Since he felt like he might hit the flower pot, he moved it a bit. Our visitors stayed long at our place.
At around 9.00 pm, we heard a commotion outside our house. My husband went upstairs and looked out of the window facing the road. He was shocked to see people outside our gate – they were surrounding our uncle’s car.
When we went out to find out what was happening, we discovered that our neighbor from hell had called a towing company to tow away our uncle’s car. She claimed that part of the car’s body was on her side.
That’s when we realized that the pot she’d placed on the pavement was to mark the boundary of the pavement! Our side and her side.
To make a long story short, our uncle went berserk, literally. He is an attorney. He argued that according to the law, the pavement outside the houses is public property. That it belongs to the local government or municipality. So, anyone can park there as long as the car doesn’t block somebody’s gate.
The guys from the towing company took off in a huff.
Our uncle told off our neighbor from hell using the strongest terms possible. He then gave her a week to write him an apology letter. If she didn’t, he’d take up the matter with the necessary authorities. She wrote the letter.
She was a real neighbor from hell!
Approximately one month after the car incident, we heard loud screams in our neighborhood. It was 2.00 am. We woke up in a panic. We discovered the screams were coming from Leah’s place.
My husband said we should go back to sleep. He didn’t want to know what was happening to our neighbor. However, I told him it was important to find out what was happening. What if it was something that could affect us?
Then someone rang the bell at our gate frantically. When my husband went to check, he found the nanny of Leah’s son. She was crying hysterically. She said that they needed help urgently. Leah’s mother was unresponsive.
My husband is a doctor. He however didn’t want anything to do with Leah and her household.
The screams and wailing from Leah’s house became louder and I convinced my husband that we should try to help them.
By now, the estate’s security team and some neighbors had gathered outside Leah’s gate.
My husband went back into our house and picked up some of his equipment. He then entered Leah’s house with the security team.
He checked Leah’s mother. He could not get a pulse. He tried to resuscitate her in vain.
A few minutes later, an ambulance arrived (I guess someone had called one). They checked Leah’s mother’s condition. They confirmed she was dead. They asked the security team to call the police. The ambulance left. Apparently, ambulances don’t transport dead bodies.
I don’t know the details of what followed after the death of Leah’s mother. None of my other neighbors knew anything either. We all didn’t bother to stand with Leah during her time of need. Reason? Because we didn’t feel like she ever needed us.
A few months after her mother’s demise, Leah moved out. I have no idea where she went.
Deep down, I felt sorry for her and her son. Although she was a neighbor from hell, I would not have wished her to leave the neighborhood that way.
I hope she is a better neighbor in the neighborhood she moved to.
Oh, and by the way, the people who later moved into Leah’s place were wonderful neighbors.
Conclusion
So, what kind of neighbor are you? Are you one of those neighbors from hell or a good neighbor? I urge you to be a good neighbor – it pays.
What’s your experience with neighbors from hell? I’d like to hear your story. Kindly email me (click contact us) or comment in the section below. Cheers!
Also read: How to Make New Friends Easily
