Neighbour noise contributed to me having a nervous breakdown. Seriously. So I know how serious this can be.

I agree with Cary - move.

LW your confidence right now is shattered, but considerate, QUIET neighbours exist in droves. I have them now. It is such deep bliss. I lie in bed at night listening to the quiet. I can do this for hours. It makes me happy.

Keep looking LW. You will find a quiet home.

Too bad there aren't any editor's stars, because they should go to Tagger and bethesdagirl on page 5.

Tagger's post was cute and creative, but bethesdagirl's was a great short story in the making.

Hoping to get a star from the teacher for being the best kid in the Salon class. This place always reminds me of a school for precocious middle class teenagers. Almost makes me nostalgic for the days of corporal punishment.

...I couldn't sleep owing to barking dogs, you know the yapster variety. Taiwanese put them on the balcony on the porch in a cage for the night. There was one Japanese home left on the block, right across the alley from where I lived, and those people raised larger dogs which roamed the courtyard. Once they started barking, well a whole chorus quickly got going.

I asked my Chinese landlord and landlady, a retired couple, what to do. "Don't go over and say anything, if something happens to one of the dogs they will think you are responsible." Harmonize with it seemed to be their response. When the rainy season started, that quieted things down a bit.

It is hard is you must endure the noise of others while generating none of your own that would ever disturb them. You feel it's unfair because there's no way to fight fire with fire. I would recommend seeking out a top floor apt, which I have always done since my experience living under a noisy family, since the extra rent is worth it to you.

The elderly woman upstairs can't get out of her recliner without literally jumping out and landing on the floor with a thud. It bugged me when I didn't know what the sound was, but now that I know it's much easier to take. I suspect that part of the problem is that you can't explain why these noises are occurring, and maybe you subconsciously feel that the upstairs neighbor is intentionally making your life miserable. I would bring it up to him under the guise of being concerned for his welfare. You might prompt him to modify his behavior, or you might learn what these sounds are and be able to cope a little better when you realize that it's not something he's doing on purpose.

When my Mom would come out to visit me in high-density LA she would invariably comment, "I heard something honking at 5AM, how rude!" That was easy to harmonize with and a time check since it was an alert someone's ride to work was there.

Far better than the guy whose car wouldn't start and it was "Shoe, u, u, u,..." at least three times followed by gunning the engine for a few minutes in a carport that echoed. Yet all of these people were trying to make a living and improve themselves. I've been far less forgiving of college students who don't have to get up and trudge off to a job partying into the early morning hours.

In my final apt, which I vacated earlier this year, I could hear what sounded like a wounded animal or perhaps someone who'd had to much to drink and fallen into a ditch (except there weren't any). It turned out to be an old lady who suffered from dementia that a relative had moved in and put next to a window. What could you say? That could be any of us in the future.

Also you might try sleeping with a fan, or an air purifier, or another suitable source of 'white noise'. I don't think I'd be able to sleep without one. It helps to create a baseline level of noise, so that the unexpected noises aren't as jarring.

Irony of ironies that I'm writing this after two hours of sleep. But that's due to work issues and health issues, so it doesn't matter how ideal the sleeping environment some nights. By now, my early 30's, I'm used to getting little sleep one or two nights a week. I think it just comes with the general condition of being unsatisfied with life.

...was converted officer quarters on a former Marine base. It was never intended for families and the walls were paper thin in four-unit buildings. There were no shortage of "wee ones" around and I tried to be considerate despite the fact the amount of noise I generated was mimimal. For example, I always ground my coffee beans the night before.

But I had acquired a cat and someone complained she was sitting on his car and leaving footprints on the windshield. What could I do about it? She's roamer and an avid hunter so I didn't do anything. Then one day she disappeared and I was frantic he had taken matters into his own hands, grabbed her and driven somewhere else and dumped her out the window. She reappeared later than day and I emphasized to him we were moving out at the end of the month and could he accept the situation until then? He did. You do have to work with people.

Do you want a medal for holding it together and making it through or sympathy for how awful your day to day life is? You can't have both.

Get a fan, and take a tylenol pm or similar non-addictive pill. It will help you ignore those sounds and fall back to sleep if one wakes you. I used to live in the city with sirens going off on the street outside my apartment along with all the other noises that come with apartment living in the city. The fan and pill gave me great sleep. Now I live way out in the country on a farm, but I still use the fan to drown out the coyotes.