In what has become an extension to Neighbor unhappy with the fact I asked his kids to return our toys
My wife has just called me in tears because two of my neighbours felt it appropriate to yell at her because we ('you and your husband') 'tell their kids off'.
Now, if we were in fact telling them off for a range of things unrelated to us I would understand at least the displeasure, if not the uncivil nature of its communication. However these are the incidents they are referring to:
- Neighbor unhappy with the fact I asked his kids to return our toys
- Child kicked ball into my kids head, apologised and we said "it's ok, just keep an eye out next time"
- Asking them not to let themselves into our porch / cupboard / garden
And this specific case:
- Child pointed a Nerf gun at our 2yr old daughters face (after shooting someone else who wasn't playing) and my Wife said "shes not playing, its not nice to shoot people who aren't playing", at which point they shot my wife in the face instead and my wife went to the parents and told them what had happened.
My wife was then treated to 2 grown females shouting at her saying "Don't tell our kids off, if you have a problem with our kids, come to us", which I'm pretty sure is largely what we have done. Now one of those neighbours is the first neighbours friend, but up until this point, we thought had no problem, and ironically tells the other neighbours kids off all the time.
Honestly at this point I feel the only recourse is to move but I feel thoroughly disheartened to be effectively bullied out of my home. My wife doesn't want me to speak to them in case it escalates further, but I don't feel I can simply leave things be. Surely not addressing it is worse?
What actions would people recommend for disputes with neighbours like this? It has an element of walking on eggshells, as I don't want it to turn into "you should parent like this". Like this questions:
How can we ask neighbours to be more quiet without escalating?
Ultimately I want to address the tension between us in the most sensible way that wont lead to violence (I will probably repeat the tactic from the previous answer linked to). But I also would like to get a feel of options beyond that, I'm thinking some of the options in here are possible, but I'm not sure where to start....
