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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/sushikat323 on 2023-09-07 12:03:22.

So, my daughter was born over 3 months early. She’s doing ok but she still have periods where she Bradly desats (braddies) where she stops breathing, oxygen saturation drops in her body and goes bright blue. She does this at least once a day and because of this, she is still in the NICU with no current projection for when she’s coming home. The only thing I can do to help her is to give her cuddles and provide her milk, which means expressing for 20 minutes minimum on each boob every 2 to 3 hours, including over night.

I have also had problems with flees in my home (they’ve been awful for everyone in my area this year), so I’ve torn up all carpets and thrown away my sofa and mattress, so I’m currently sleeping on the floor on a blow up mattress with my fiancé. This means that any noise that I make, no matter how much I try to minimise it, carries downstairs to my neighbour.

I express milk over night, once at 11:30pm, 1am and then at 6:30am. My neighbour downstairs knocked on my door this morning and complained about my 1am alarm waking him up. I apologised and told him that I can’t turn that specific alarm off because it’s the expression that impacts my milk flow and doing that expression will prompt me to produce more milk over the day. I’m already under enough stress that my milk flow has already been impacted ( I was producing around 100ml and I’m down to 50 to 70 ml). I need the alarms because I cannot miss my expressions, I already feel guilty enough that I’m not producing as much as I was.

I explained all this to him and he still said that it wakes him up and that he can’t sleep after it wakes him up. I again apologised and said to him that I can set my alarm between 1am and 3:30am, and he can choose from between those times. He said I should just turn the alarm off and I responded that I can’t, because I can’t afford to sleep through my expressions times. He then said that I should express after 5am, which isn’t possible because the hormones that help produce more milk are at their peak at between 1am and 4am.

He complained about it waking him up again and I angrily responded that “My daughter is premature, she needs my milk and I will do everything to make sure she’s got as much as she needs, including waking you up at 1am because I need to express! She is my priority, not your sleep.” I closed the door in his face.

I just spoke to one of my friends and she’s telling me that I’m the asshole because my daughter is eating every 3 hours and I’m making just enough milk every time for at least one meal for her, so “it won’t hurt to not express the 1am expression” but it honestly IS the most important expression for milk production.

So Reddit, AITA for not stopping expressing at 1am even though I know it wakes up my neighbour?

ETA: many people have suggested I put the phone on vibrate, which would be a fantastic solution if it wasn’t for the fact that I have slept straight through having injections or having a cannula put in (I was awoken long enough to give permission to have it put in). I’m open to solutions, but putting my phone on vibrate isn’t going to work.