roommate issues

Parent Cafe
1

<p>I’ve been having some issues with my roommate lately and would really like some help from parents who have way more perspective than I do.</p>

<p>THE NEXT POST DOWN HAS A VERY BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF OUR PROBLEM, but by all means continue reading the long version if you have the time or patience!</p>

<p>Here’s the situation: Last Saturday, my roommate and I spent all day together (it was a blast) and then got invited to a frat party by a group of our guy friends. We got ready and went (also had a great time), but once we got there I realized that I knew more people at the party than she did. She got really mad at me for deserting her at the party (I didn’t think I was–she knew the guys we came with, and I introduced her to everyone I knew, and I was only “deserting” her to take a few calls from my family), and when I asked her what she wanted me to do, she suggested we leave. “Fine” I said “I’ll get my coat.” I got my coat and started walking home. 10 minutes later, I realized she wasn’t following me, so when I made it back to our room I figured she’d probably be pretty mad which led me to believe she’d want some space to clear her mind. I decided to spend the night in my friend’s room so she could cool off.</p>

<p>I sent her a text message that said “Hey Erin, I’m really sorry about tonight. Know that it is NEVER my intention to hurt you or upset you. You mean too much to me! Let me take you out to lunch tomorrow so we can figure it out. See you around noon!” to which she replied “I don’t appreciate what you did last night, I don’t like being treated like that, so I WON’T meet up with you today.” I decided, then, to stay over at my friend’s place another night.</p>

<p>Sunday night I went back to my place to get some stuff and she was there. I assumed we’d talk about it and clear the air, but instead she handed me a 4 page letter detailing why I’m such a horrible, mean, evil person for leaving her and being a bad friend before she left the room. I again suggested that we meet up and talk about it when ever is convenient for her, but she did not respond. So I stayed over at my friend’s place another night.</p>

<p>Two days later, I still hadn’t heard from her. I returned to my room to get more stuff while she was at class, and left her a note that said “Call me when you want me to move back. Let’s get this figured out. I miss you!”</p>

<p>Later that day, she sent me a text message that said “I never told you you had to move out” So I responded “I know, but I wanted to give you space, and since you didn’t reply to anything I said, I figured you still needed it.” Her response to that was that my original text message, the one where I apologized and suggested lunch, was bossy and commanding rather than sensitive to her needs and her schedule.</p>

<p>This Saturday was my best friend’s birthday, and my roommate is also friends with us. My friend really wanted me and Erin to sort everything out so we could all have a good time together, so I agreed to meet with Erin to get everything figured out. She was 2.5 hrs late for our meeting, and when she got there she told me that she was hurt that I deserted her, couldn’t believe that I didn’t think what I did was that wrong, and really wanted me to make it up to her. When I asked for suggestions as to how to make it up to her (dinner? movies? shopping?) she became frustrated, cussed me out, stormed out of the room, and slammed the door.</p>

<p>Later that night, she told my friend that what she wanted me to do was yell at the guy that ended up walking her home the previous Saturday (he spread some rumors about her, and it’s my fault that she had to walk back with him because I ditched her), but I don’t know him that well. I told his two best friends that he should knock it off, and they said they’d relay my message.</p>

<p>I have yet to hear from her and now it’s been 10 days since I’ve been in my room. She tells my friend Lindsey what she wants me to do and expects Lindsey to tell me Erin’s thoughts. Lindsey, as you can imagine, hates being caught up in all of this. Yesterday she told me that if I don’t move back in by last night, then Erin’s moving out. I didn’t move back but don’t know what the deal is with Erin. I suggested we meet tomorrow, and still have no response back from her. I don’t want to go back to our room to confront her about it, even though it is my room too, because I think we would have a much more productive conversation when we are both prepared to have it.</p>

<p>I should also add that she originally said that she ignored my messages and texts and notes because this entire problem is my fault and she shouldn’t have to go out of her way to plan a meeting or have to beg to be my friend again (which she thinks she would be doing if she asked me to come back to our room)</p>

<p>She thinks that since I’ve avoided our room, I’m avoiding the situation and proving to her that I’m a bad friend and don’t care about her. I’m wondering, what has she done to show me that she cares about me and our friendship? It’s frustrating also because I probably wouldn’t really care if she moved out, but since she and Lindsey are rooming together next year, I don’t want to feel awkward or out of place if I go visit them at their apartment.</p>

<p>I don’t really have intentions of creating our friendship again because I do not want to be best friends with someone as volatile as she is. I don’t want to live in my room with her if she’s going to be so ridiculous about such a trivial issue–I mean really, I left you at a party where you only knew 5 people. Sure, it wasn’t nice, but is it really worth destroying a friendship over? I don’t think so. I’ve talked to a few of her friends from high school, and none of them are surprised that she handled this problem this way.</p>

<p>I suppose my questions for you guys are:</p>

<li>What should I do?</li>
<li>Am I being unnecessarily stubborn for waiting this out?</li>
<li>In the future, what should I do differently?</li>
<li>How can I arrange a meeting with her if she perceives specific attempts to be bossy and vague attempts to be unfair because she doesn’t want to beg to be my friend again?</li>
<li>She suggested she moves out of our room. Secretly, I would like this to happen. I don’t know how I feel about that.</li>
</ol>

<p>Sorry for the long and probably scattered post. This has gotten out of control.</p>

<p>And before you suggest “Talk to your RA who can be your mediator,” our RA has a MASSIVE crush on my roommate (yes, we’ve exploited this to our advantage before) and does not do well with conflict resolution, and our other RA is extremely quiet and meek–if she were to mediate our conversation, she’d basically just be another body in the room. Therefore, I do not think RA intervention would be helpful in this case.</p>

<p>Thanks in advance for all of your help!
Kristin</p>

2

<p>Wow, I was unaware this post is so long. </p>

<p>SYNOPSIS:</p>

<p>My roommate is not handling a conflict between us very well. She won’t respond to any of my attempts to fix things and has unfairly blamed me for everything that happened. I want to be civil with her but don’t have any intentions of being best friends again.</p>

<p>The last time we met, she refused to hear my side or believe anything I said. I don’t know what to do, and getting our RA involved isn’t really an option.</p>

<p>She suggested she moves out. Secretly, I want this to happen. </p>

<p>What should I do?</p>

3

<ol>
<li><p>You should stop avoiding your own room. This has exacerbated the problem. If you hadn’t avoided the conflict perhaps it would have blown over. Move back in immediately. </p></li>
<li><p>If your presence in the room doesn’t spark a conversation or resolution then you need to start a conversation about one of you moving out. </p></li>
<li><p>You are both being stubborn.</p></li>
</ol>

4

<p>I am puzzled how you managed to leave the party without noticing your roommate wasn’t with you, or why you didn’t go back to the party to get her - you knew she was feeling out of place there. I can’t figure out for the life of me, why at the point you then chose to spend the night with another friend, or why you haven’t been back to the room since. </p>

<p>It’s your room too, so use it. Sooner or later I imagine if you stop avoiding your roommate you’ll talk. </p>

<p>Entirely too much drama for me.</p>

5

<p>Wow…</p>

<p>If you cannot work it out, ask your RA to help you work through things together, in the same room, not via text message, voice mail, or e-mail. It sounds exhausting, and your other friends will be glad to have you in your own room in your own bed. </p>

<p>Good luck.</p>

6

<p>Your room is your room. Go back to it and talk to your roomie. If you’re telling the whole story, I don’t think you did anything wrong, but we don’t always know the whole story.</p>

7

<p>I didnt get through the whole thing, but assuming your side of the story is perfectly accurate, she’s one of “those women”. Room for her as long as you have to, then find someone else.</p>

8

<p>Let her move in with the love-struck RA?</p>

<p>I didn’t read most of your post because my head would probably have exploded, but my advice would be to focus on your schoolwork and enjoy the company of your non-crazy friends, while being as peaceful as possible with the roommate as long as you live together. Even if <em>nothing</em> is your fault, apologizing to her will ease tension. Blame it on stress from classwork. God, I’m glad to be a guy.</p>

9

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<p>Here’s where I think your problem began. If you really cared to help her not feel socially isolated, you would have left with her and walked home together. She doesn’t usually walk 10 steps behind you, right? So were you walking iwth another “friend” and she was to follow way behind you but didn’t? That is not protective of her friendship and feelings if she’d had a bad night. </p>

<p>I question whether you are truly responsible for her bad night, BTW. She has responsibility to either make new friends at a party OR leave herself and doesn’t need you as an escort necessarily, right? So she’s not taking ownership of her response to the party and making it your problem to solve. Why is that? Is there more to that part of the tale, or is she just not able to function where so many people are new? That’s a social skill to develop. OR SHE CAN LEAVE SOLO, too. </p>

<p>So I commend you for caring about her emotional welfare then although you didn’t have to. That’s probably because you were (and might still be) a good friend to her.</p>

<p>I’m assuming you said, “Fine” in a fair, not hostile way.</p>

<p>When you went to stay elsewhere that night, did you not have a cell phone to call her? I think you had a chance to go elsewhere that night and that’s why she’s really jealous and hurt.</p>

<p>All of your subsequent attempts to make a make-up meeting sound pretty fair to me, from your description of the texts and so forth. </p>

<p>If she’s iinto writing four-page letters, she might be hiding behind the written word. A lot of pent-up anger there, and from here it’s impossible to figure out if you’re really a bossy person by pattern or she’s a drama queen and self-centered by pattern.</p>

<p>Could you enlist a mutual friend to sit as a threesome to try to work it out together? That’s a tall order, I realize, but she might feel better than trying to face you now about it.</p>

10

<p>Move back into your room. If she wants to avoid you, let her leave. Otherwise being together may force a needed conversation.</p>

<p>BTW, not to be mean but I do think you bear some blame in this. How can you walk for 10 minutes before realizing she’s not with you? You really were not paying attention to her when you left (even if you left with a group of people, which is the only way your story makes sense). If you left because she felt bad, you should have been WITH her and aware of where she was.</p>

<p>Regardless, this won’t get resolved unless you talk, and you can’t talk if you’re avoiding your room. Sleeping in a friend’s room makes it seems like you know you did something wrong and you’re avoiding her.</p>

11

<p>If the other friend you stay with is a romantic relationship, she might really be faulting you for being newly neglectful of her platonic friendship to pursue a romantic relationship.</p>

<p>I lost a best friend once, at your age, over that kind of thing. She picked at me over some social slight, but was really unhappy because I had found a romance and she hadn’t. Our timing was out-of-synch and she accused me of not caring enough about her. I was preoccupied, sure, but I still cared about her as much as ever. Her jealousy was a bottomless pit, and although I tried repeatedly, I just couldn’t stay friends with her.</p>

<p>Because we couldn’t face the real issue between us, we talked about the small slights instead and couldn’t straighten things out. </p>

<p>I wonder if that’s relevant to your situation here?</p>

12

<p>move back in and just get through the end of the year…as for “leaving her” wel…both of you messed up the exit…but that wasn’t a big deal…and the “gossip” stuff…do college kids even buy into that stuff anymore?</p>

<p>Its time to be grownup, move back and both of you need to stop playing games.</p>

13

<p>ps- there is more going on with roomie than meets the eye…not sure what, but there is something</p>

14

<p>Thanks all for your replies. It’s great to get insight from more than just my friends. The impartial ones are often the best! I have a lot of studying to finish up, but I plan on replying to some specific questions tomorrow afternoon. Thanks again for all your help!</p>

15

<p>FOLLOW UPS:</p>

<p>I didn’t notice she wasn’t following me because I was on the phone with my sister. She was explaining a complicated situation and my mind was elsewhere. My roommate now knows that this is why I didn’t know she was with me, but still finds it hard to believe. I wish it were a better reason for not noticing, but I just…looked past it. I assumed that since she suggested we leave, she was leaving. Looking back, I should have double-checked. I will next time.</p>

<p>jack: Your answer provided some much needed chuckles over this situation. THANK YOU. </p>

<p>p3t: You are correct in noticing that she has not taken any responsibility in this situation. She has told me that since she’s the one that’s emotionally hurting and I’m the one that caused her that pain, then I’m the one who needs to take the entire burden of making our friendship work again and that I am completely, direct quote here, “at her mercy.” I suspect that her refusing to acknowledge that her reactions and actions have played a part in our dispute have contributed very much to the reason why I haven’t moved back in: I have zero desire to live with someone that handles problems the way she has handled this one. Also, your comment about her perhaps being jealous that I had somewhere to go could also be spot-on; she does have very few new friends and I wonder if that is indeed the cause of her problems. I’ll have to explore that one more.</p>

<p>I also believe that there is definitely more going on with her than meets the eye, which is another reason why I called her friend from high school. She confirmed that this is a recurring pattern for dear ol roomie: when she gets mad at someone, she creates a grudge against that person, and that often takes months or years to lift. Usually the incident in question has little to do with the feelings, but the friend is the scapegoat. I do not like being her scapegoat, nor do I appreciate being treated as such.</p>

<p>To add to whatever problems are going on, consider these two developments: I updated one of my close friends on our floor about my feelings on this situation, and he proceeded to tell Erin everything I said (I have yet to verify this because I haven’t talked to him, but Erin did mention it in a response to an earlier message this afternoon). I really hope this isn’t the case, because I did trust him to keep that information private.</p>

<p>Next, I just found out this afternoon that due to some changing family plans for Easter, I have to leave for Spring Break/Easter tomorrow afternoon instead of Friday night. This means I don’t have the opportunity to move back in with her before next week. While I think an extra non-school week will give both of us a break and some more perspective, I really just want this problem to end.</p>

<p>This is stressing me out.</p>

16

<p>I agree with those who have pointed out that there are two sides to every story. </p>

<p>In answer to your questions:</p>

<p>1) Move back into your room ASAP, and be civil to your roommate while she’s there. If you must choose between arguing with her or not speaking with her, don’t speak with her. Stop sending her messages, texts, and notes, and if she hands you any more letters, hand them back. Stop discussing (gossiping about) this incident with others at school, and definitely stop going behind her back and calling her high school friends for “inside” information about her. </p>

<p>2) I think you are wasting your time, because your friendship with your roommate sounds like it’s over. Let it stay that way.</p>

<p>3) In the future, when you and another person plan to attend a social function together, make sure that you and the other person set ground rules with regard to conduct before, during, and after the social function. If the two of you attend as a dating couple, then social protocol requires you to arrive together, socialize together (within reason), and leave together. If the two of you attend as “just friends,” then social protocol allows you to arrive separately, socialize separately, and leave separately. However, if it would be physically risky for either of you to arrive at and/or leave the social function alone (or in the company of a stranger), then common courtesy requires the two of you to agree upon a reasonable time to arrive and/or leave together.</p>

<p>4) You can’t “arrange” a meeting with your roommate until she’s ready to “meet” with you, and that time might be never. Don’t try to set up an “ambush” meeting with her. Don’t involve the RAs (unless RA input is required if your roommate decides to move out), and don’t ask anybody else to act as a go-between. Let this situation cool down ASAP.</p>

<p>5) If your roommate decides to move out, wish her well, and say goodbye. If she decides to stay, remain civil. Whatever she decides to do, arrange to room with someone else next year.</p>

<p>My most important advice is: Roll back your relationship with your roommate to “first week of school” level, when you and she were strangers, and you were both on your best behavior while getting to know one another. In the absence of friendship, civility is better than conflict.</p>

<p>Best wishes.</p>