Dealing with the trauma/drama of strangers

[Depression = 72% of members]

I live in a nice, safe apartment complex just outside a major city, where every day I see people from every nationality. I've had a difficult time getting to know my neighbors, partially because many of them do not speak English or Spanish (which I have a little working knowledge of.) Something just happened that has left me physically shaking.

I have, once or twice in the past year, heard loud and angry-sounding voices coming from the apartment across the hall. Since they were in another language, it was difficult to tell if it was a television show or movie or something. I’ve kept alert for sounds of children crying, because I’ve seen the family coming and going, and they have two toddlers. I see the mother occasionally and we’ve exchanged smiles. I see the father occasionally; he smokes once or twice a day in the open-air stairwell and usually issues a polite nod or hello in response to us.

But fifteen minutes ago I heard what sounded like pleading and sobbing from a woman, and it was in our hallway outside the apartment doors. It kept going. I opened my door and walked out, saying mildly, “Do you need help?”

The young mom was on her knees in the hallway, facing her open door, clasped hands together and talking rapidly and tearfully in a distraught, high-pitched voice. The young dad was standing in the doorway, along with an older woman whom I can only guess is the young mother’s mother, who had a placating hand extended to each of them. I’d never seen her before. As I approached, I repeated, “Do you need help?”

The older woman turned to me with a pained and, it seemed to me, embarrassed look. She held her hand out and shook her head at me, but the young dad said, “Yes, yes, call the cops. I just want to go to work and she (pointing to the young mom) won’t let me.” He grabbed a backpack and jacket from the corner and stepped over the young mom, who was ignoring me and trying to retain the young dad’s attention. I paid no attention to him as he brushed by me, but kept asking the women, “Can I help you?” They said nothing in English, but the young dad called back from the head of the stairs, “Yeah, you hear voices like that, you can call the cops.”

"Hold on," I said. "Why don’t YOU call the police?"

He stopped for a second like he didn’t understand what I said.

"You are bigger than both of those women," I continued. "If you want to call the police, I don’t think they can stop you. I will call the police for someone who can’t call on their own. I will not do it for someone who is able to. If you need the cops, YOU CALL THEM."

I waited in the hallway until the older woman had gotten the young mom up off the floor and into their apartment. The way she was holding her made me think they were related. I don’t know. I know too much about toxic families to even have the assurance of a good theory on how to help with this event. For all I know, that young woman is a manipulative basket case and she and her mom make that dude’s life miserable. For all I know, he’s a moral reprobate and she was trying to stop him from going to see someone he shouldn’t. I don’t know what their story is. But I do know that I’m glad I said what I said to him.

I didn’t hear their kids making any noise. I hate the thought that they’re probably too used to hearing that kind of turmoil to react by crying.

I don’t even know what language they speak.

I want to curl up in a ball. I hate the overflow of pain I just stepped in. I want to force whoever is most responsible to get help. I want to protect those little kids from the scariness of parents out of control.

[claudiaduffy]

I live in a nice, safe apartment complex just outside a major city, where every day I see people from every nationality. I've had a difficult time getting to know my neighbors, partially because many of them do not speak English or Spanish (which I have a little working knowledge of.) Something just happened that has left me physically shaking.

I have, once or twice in the past year, heard loud and angry-sounding voices coming from the apartment across the hall. Since they were in another language, it was difficult to tell if it was a television show or movie or something. I’ve kept alert for sounds of children crying, because I’ve seen the family coming and going, and they have two toddlers. I see the mother occasionally and we’ve exchanged smiles. I see the father occasionally; he smokes once or twice a day in the open-air stairwell and usually issues a polite nod or hello in response to us.

But fifteen minutes ago I heard what sounded like pleading and sobbing from a woman, and it was in our hallway outside the apartment doors. It kept going. I opened my door and walked out, saying mildly, “Do you need help?”

The young mom was on her knees in the hallway, facing her open door, clasped hands together and talking rapidly and tearfully in a distraught, high-pitched voice. The young dad was standing in the doorway, along with an older woman whom I can only guess is the young mother’s mother, who had a placating hand extended to each of them. I’d never seen her before. As I approached, I repeated, “Do you need help?”

The older woman turned to me with a pained and, it seemed to me, embarrassed look. She held her hand out and shook her head at me, but the young dad said, “Yes, yes, call the cops. I just want to go to work and she (pointing to the young mom) won’t let me.” He grabbed a backpack and jacket from the corner and stepped over the young mom, who was ignoring me and trying to retain the young dad’s attention. I paid no attention to him as he brushed by me, but kept asking the women, “Can I help you?” They said nothing in English, but the young dad called back from the head of the stairs, “Yeah, you hear voices like that, you can call the cops.”

"Hold on," I said. "Why don’t YOU call the police?"

He stopped for a second like he didn’t understand what I said.

"You are bigger than both of those women," I continued. "If you want to call the police, I don’t think they can stop you. I will call the police for someone who can’t call on their own. I will not do it for someone who is able to. If you need the cops, YOU CALL THEM."

I waited in the hallway until the older woman had gotten the young mom up off the floor and into their apartment. The way she was holding her made me think they were related. I don’t know. I know too much about toxic families to even have the assurance of a good theory on how to help with this event. For all I know, that young woman is a manipulative basket case and she and her mom make that dude’s life miserable. For all I know, he’s a moral reprobate and she was trying to stop him from going to see someone he shouldn’t. I don’t know what their story is. But I do know that I’m glad I said what I said to him.

I didn’t hear their kids making any noise. I hate the thought that they’re probably too used to hearing that kind of turmoil to react by crying.

I don’t even know what language they speak.

I want to curl up in a ball. I hate the overflow of pain I just stepped in. I want to force whoever is most responsible to get help. I want to protect those little kids from the scariness of parents out of control.

[Turkish]

I think you did well to stay out of it since you didn't witness an actual crime. It's traumatizing to live our peaceful lives and have to witness such dysfunction right next to us. Twice in the past few months, I've been at home in the morning and outside over the back fence and one house over, I heard a man yelling abusively at either a female child or probably a SO. Selfishly, I thought, "thankfully they don't live right next to me!" But then I was straining to hear if I could listen for the sound of a beating or screaming, at which point I would have called the cops.

You have this happening right next to you, and you have interacted with them. I've spent so much time being a hermit to escape drama, that I also feel triggered by "drama" (so funny, I elected to stay with a SO who was often an angry person  and happened to cause drama more often then not

[claudiaduffy]

I've seen enough suffering at verbal abuse (my own childhood, and others) that I will step in even before I have evidence of a physical altercation. But I won't do it guns a-blazin' unless I have something physical to go on. I'm going to make sure to keep going out of my way to smile at the mom. Maybe even drop her a note. If she CAN'T speak English, she can probably find a way to translate a note. I want to make sure that if she needs help, she has a way to get it.

[Pingo]

That is troubling.  Especially when you cannot understand the language.  I have a similar situation here, my neighbour is an older lady who has raised her two grandchildren since birth and the boy is now a 19 yr old and he's in to drugs, beats his gf and spits in his grandma's face.  I've had to shelter her a few times when he's losing control and I've called the cops twice.  I now am worried he'll retaliate since I got him arrested the second time, he's back living at grandma's under probation.  I think you did the right thing reaching out, at least if she is being victimised she knows there is someone nearby who could help.