This is a bit of a different post for Bambush, but hey... I'm all for sharing home truths. My last post was about homeowner anxiety, which lends itself perfectly to my experience of getting jacked. Someone stole my extendable ladder from my garden, and I didn't even realise until the other day.
It was an item I probably would have never used and hadn't touched since moving in. It was left by the previous homeowners, so I didn't even notice it had gone until the first day of June. I then started looking at pictures I'd taken of the garden and realised the ladder was there right up until the end of April. By May, it was no longer visible in the photos, so the theft had to have happened during that period.
I started racking my brain. Had I had any contractors come around? Had anyone worked in the garden? Maybe they took it by mistake, or tried to use it during a service. But then I thought, no. I didn't have anyone working in my garden throughout May. The only person I had in my garden in May was someone to remove a dead bird from the side of my shed. But even in that picture, because I was recording a video at the time to share with my IG followers, the ladder was there. And it was there the day after as well. So it wasn't taken then. It was taken some other time in May, and I didn't have anyone else come around.
Who did have service providers and contractors, though, was my neighbour.
Now, the fence splitting our gardens is three foot high on her side. For some reason, she only replaced the first three panels, the ones that sit between our respective windows. As soon as I moved in, she changed those from three foot to something taller, because originally she used to be friends with whoever lived here before me, and I imagine they had a close enough relationship that a low fence didn't bother them. When I moved in, though, that changed quickly.
The trouble is, she only did that for the first three panels. The rest of the garden is still three foot. And right at the very end, there's a panel missing altogether, which gives a direct path of entry to my garden from hers. It's a security risk. When I asked her about it, she said she'd get to it eventually. I let it go after a while because there wasn't much I could do about it.
During May, I remembered she had different groups of workmen in her garden at different times. On one particular occasion, she'd left them unsupervised because she'd gone off to work. She clearly trusted them, but I found them odd because they were watching me as I came in and out of my house that day. I caught them looking over into my garden.
The thing is, where the ladder was located can only be spotted by standing directly in her garden. You can't see it from the alleyway because it's tucked so far into the far right corner of mine. There's no way you would have spotted it unless you were opposite my garden. They had a direct line of access where they could have walked straight in and grabbed it.
I don't have the facts. I don't know for sure if they stole it, and there's no way of telling. But what I do know is that I need privacy, and I need security. So here's what I've done since finding out I'd been burgled.
CCTV
I ordered CCTV cameras, but I also had to research the laws around them first because you can't place cameras in positions that pick up pedestrians, other people's property, or public areas. So I had to come up with an alternative plan. I've decided to put one camera in the conservatory section of my house, which gives a full view of the garden, and another one in a spot that directly faces the kitchen. The garden will be covered, but both cameras will be indoors.
If I put them outdoors, I'd have to position them low enough to stay within the law, and then someone could just fly kick them off the wall. Keeping them inside means they can still monitor the outside space without that risk. Any movement detected at the entry points or throughout the garden will be picked up. I went with Tapo cameras and paid around £79 for two of them.
Garden security
I still have to work out the full plan here, but currently I'm thinking about using tall trellis planters, around six foot, to give me a degree of privacy. With fence laws, you can't tamper with your neighbour's fence without their permission, and honestly, I feel like it's past that conversation. I'm going to do what I need to do to secure my space, regardless of what she ends up doing.
I'm going to put in some tall planters, some trees, palm trees, and play around with layering plants. I'm also thinking about putting a pergola at the back section of the garden, one with sides, which will block off the access point so that there's no longer a clear walk-through from her garden into mine. These things cost a lot of money, so I'm going to take it bit by bit.
I've also added privacy screens to my gate because you can see straight through to parts of the garden from the street, direct eye contact. And because her fence is three foot, I'm putting structures on my side that will obscure the line of observation and close off that clean path of entry.
In summary:
It has affected me. I feel violated, and I'm frustrated. Even though I didn't buy the ladder and probably would never have used it, it's the principle. I'm having to come up with solutions to feel secure in my own space, and it's just annoying that this is where my energy has to go.
If I'm being honest, the ideal scenario is that it was the workmen who took it, because the alternative, someone taking an extendable ladder with the intention of burgling this house or others, I genuinely don't know how I'd cope with that. There's no excuse for theft either way, but I'd rather it was opportunism during contracted work than something more deliberate.
I've been a bit slower posting recently because I've been dealing with things like this alongside some severe health issues, and I'm just trying to manage at the moment. But this is all part of the process, and I'm going to share as much of it as I can because that's what this space is for. An honest look into homeownership and everything that comes with it, while trying to make it a place of peace and safety.
We try the best we can.
Author: Kei Maye
Hey I'm Kei, the founder and creator of Bambush. By day I'm a digital education specialist, and the rest of the time I'm a surface pattern designer, an artist and an obsessive cosy sanctuary maker. Because we need more safe spaces!
IG: @kei.maye
