A mother who posts housecleaning videos says the police were called to her home – by trolls who reported her for “child neglect”.
Nicole Austin, 25, regularly shares clips of her messy home to highlight the realities of keeping a tidy home with four children.
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But she says the plan quickly backfired when police officers showed up at her home to check on her children.
Apparently, the Trolls reported her for having a messy house – which they claimed was child neglect.
Nicole, a full-time content creator from Worthing, West Sussex, said: “It was traumatising.
“I was so scared, so upset and so shaken.
“None of my children went to bed before 10pm on a school night because the police were our home.
“They had to check our cupboards and fridge to make sure we had food in the house.
“After all that and having to talk to the kids – they were here for about two hours!”
Nicole has been creating content online since the beginning of March and quickly gained 17,500 followers.
With the trolling that comes with posting videos of their lives online, Nicole says she wasn’t surprised when the police showed up at her door.
She said: “I kind of knew it would happen, but I didn’t expect it so soon.
“Even though I expected it, it was still scary, as you can imagine.
“I was just worried about what they would say or if it would escalate.
“I do content creation for a job, so I panicked that the police would ask me to stop.”
After a grueling two-hour visit, the police concluded that there was nothing in the report and apologized for appearing out of nowhere at night.
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Nicole said: “The police were very reassuring but said they expected this to happen again given what we published online.
“They also said they would call ahead if they received another report to avoid causing further concern to the children.”
This isn’t the first time a troll has reported Nicole.
The week before, Nicole received a call from social services saying they had been referred for child neglect.
She said: “We received some comments from trolls saying they were going to report us.
“We responded to them to let them know that our house isn’t always this messy and that the kids were okay.
“But days later we got a call saying social services had received a referral for child neglect.
“The social worker was great and told us that if we needed any help in the future that we could call them and then they closed the case.”
Police say they only comment if someone is accused of a crime.
Where to get help if you’re experiencing mental health issues
There’s no shame in struggling with your mental health, but the best thing you can do is talk to someone about what you’re going through.
If you feel you or someone else is in urgent danger, call 999
You can also speak to the Samaritans at 116 123
Mental Healthy Charity Mind also provide support on 0300 123 3393 who can provide details of treatments near you
Previously, Nicole revealed that she was fed up with the state of her home, but that mental health issues were getting in the way of maintaining it.
The mother-of-four said: “It happened again. Our house looks like a bomb site.
“I don’t want to be defined as the dirty family at City Council in terms of benefits.
“This is far from who I am inside, but for some reason we just can’t figure out this mess.”
In the clip, the mum took viewers around her two-bed council house and showed there was dirty laundry covering the entire hallway and toy boxes dumped in the front room.
It was traumatic. It was horrible. Neither of my children went to bed before 10pm on a school night because the police were at our house
Nicole Austin
Although Nicole’s husband helps with the kids, he also works full time, so it’s obviously difficult to stay on top of everything.
Because the couple lives in a high-rent area, they also receive benefits to help them with the cost of living.
The mother was waiting to be judged by her house, but many praised her for showing the reality of parenthood.
Although Nicole was clearly stressed about the mess in her home, many parents took to the comments to show their support and thanked her for sharing the real-life reality with the kids and mental health concerns.
One person wrote: “Finally! A real video. It’s so refreshing to see a house as it really looks… and not everything came to wipe that crumb off the side of my kitchen with me.”
Another commented: “People don’t understand how quickly it gets like this when you have kids!!
“Sometimes things get complicated. You don’t need to explain it to anyone. It’s your house,” wrote a third.
Meanwhile, a fourth said: “This makes me feel so much better, I thought it was just me but my anxiety sometimes doesn’t motivate me.
“Honestly I get it, I don’t understand how people can keep up with this,” said a fifth.
Someone else added: “It’s so easy to do this when you’re struggling, it’s so hard. I’m exactly the same. Thank you for being so transparent.”
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This story originally appeared on The-sun.com read the full story
