People Tell Stories About The Vilest Roommate They Ever Had
15. These Roommates Were Super Toxic
“Okay, I apologize that this is really long. I wanted to give you guys the full, juicy context of this year-long roller coaster…
So I moved in with 3 of my friends this past year. They had been friends with each other for a long time and I had been friendly with them in groups and at parties for about a year. We seemed to vibe pretty well! We’ll call them B, H, G.
I did all of the work when it came time to find a house to live in near campus, within our budget, and meeting all of our criteria.
I set up all of the viewings and we found a super cute house. We were so excited to move in.
I have a lot of furniture and it’s pretty nice. We talked about who would be providing what furniture and all agreed that my furniture was the best option. I expressed that I care about the way our house looks, and I wanted it to feel like home, not like a college pad.
They all said they didn’t care and were happy to let me make the house a home.
I moved in one day earlier than they did because my apartment lease was up. They were completely fine with it. I decided to set up the living room so that the furniture wasn’t in the way when they moved in. I intended to move things around with them if they wanted to try out new layouts.
I moved all on my own; no one helped me aside from my parents. The next day, I helped them all move in. One of my roommates, B, decided she didn’t like the setup of the living room and wanted to change it. I explained I had tried a couple of ways, but the space was awkward and this was the best solution I found; however, I’d be down to move it around with her.
She just said, “No, that’s fine.”
Fast forward through the summer, I had gone home while one of my roommates (H) stayed. I came back to school and the house was a pigsty. It was never vacuumed, the kitchen was a mess, there were dishes left around the common space and trash on my coffee table. And the furniture had been moved in the living room. That bothered me, but I decided it wasn’t a big enough deal to say anything.
I have a partner, and I spend a lot of time at his place because he has a dog and it wouldn’t be fair to leave him alone.
I spent most of the day at my place, and while he was at work and first semester, I would often bring his dog to my place for a couple of hours. I didn’t think it was a big deal; he’s well behaved and they never complained about it. Technically, dogs aren’t allowed in our house, but he was only visiting. My roommate, H, has a family dog, a pitbull.
He had to stay with us for an entire month for some reason, and the landlords were showing the house multiple times a week. We couldn’t let them know he was staying there and I had to get him out of the house a couple of times because she couldn’t. I also didn’t bring my partner’s dog over for that entire month. This wouldn’t be an issue, but they then started complaining about my man’s dog being around once or twice a week.
I felt that was hypocritical, but I obliged and didn’t bring him over anymore.
The entire year, B was being mean to me. You know that thing that women do where they give you a look or use a tone of voice that just makes you feel like trash? Like they could have said something relatively normal, but you know they meant it with judgment and malice.
She was like that ALL year. For absolutely no reason. I asked her about it multiple times, asked if I had done something to frustrate her. She finally admitted that she didn’t like me. I asked her if it was something I was doing and she flat out said that she just didn’t like my personality, but it wasn’t anything in particular. I just told her we didn’t need to be friends, but we are roommates, so the least we could give each other is common decency.
She agreed, but the meanness continued.
For example, on one occasion, my partner said I could come over with my buddy earlier in the day, but he wasn’t replying later. I assumed he had fallen asleep, so I said I was just going to head over there and B said, “Are you sure he wants you to come over? Seems like you’re not respecting his space. Are you mad at him or something?” It was super judgmental and nosy.
Spoiler alert: he had fallen asleep and was fine with me coming over. Wild, I know.
Right before winter break, B said they all felt uncomfortable using my furniture because I had so many rules. My only request was to use coasters on the coffee table and for roommates to not spend the night on the couch because the cushions weren’t removable, but I digress. I said, “Sure, we can move G’s chair into the living room, but I’d really like to be a part of it when it happens.
Just let me know when and we can figure it out!” They never came to me, but when I got back from winter break, the ugly chair was downstairs and they had rearranged the furniture in the most uncomfortable way. Once again, my furniture had been moved without me after I explicitly asked to be involved.
To add insult to injury, while I was home for break, my roommates had a game night.
They invited a bunch of people, including my man, over for board games or card games and drinking. They never told me about it or gave me a heads up that they invited my partner; he told me. I wanted him to go and have fun, even though I felt pretty left out. Then I find out that B was SUPER nice to my man all night.
And the next week, she made his dog treats, when she had been complaining about him all semester. It was so two-faced.
It was so blatant that my third roommate, G, who I felt closest to, noticed it and said something about it to her. Earlier in the year, H’s now ex-partner was abusive and aggressive with G in our house and I was the only one who had her back.
I even bought a hidden camera to help her feel safe. We hung out and G was seeing my close friend; it was fun. We went bowling as a group and I always invited ALL of the roommates because I don’t like being excluded, and I was trying to be nice. They always declined.
Two days before Valentine’s Day, I invited G and everyone else to come bowling that night, and she declined saying she was low on money and was tired.
I told her I’d pay for her if it was an issue, but if she was tired, she should rest and we could go next week. The next day, she posted a picture of her, my friend (G’s partner), B, B’s partner, and H. They had gone ax throwing, which is WAY more expensive than bowling, and deliberately didn’t invite me and my man. I was really hurt, but I decided I wouldn’t say anything.
I decided that I didn’t consider any of them my friends at that point and I would be cordial but no more than that.
Eventually, H moved back home and it was just me, B, and G. I was maintaining politeness but no more than that. I was anxious and uncomfortable at home, but I mostly kept to myself and spent the nights and weekends at my man’s place.
My roommates were messy all year. We had multiple “roommate meetings” to talk about doing the dishes or cleaning the bathrooms. Every morning, I came home from my partner’s, and the sink would be overflowing with dirty dishes despite the dishwasher being empty. I did their dishes multiple times and fully cleaned the kitchen multiple times. Without fail, the next day, it would be a mess again.
I finally got fed up with it and posted a video of the dishes on my Snapchat story. I admit, it was petty, but it was the first thing I’d done all year that was negative toward them despite practically being bullied in my own home.
B decided she was upset about this and confronted me. I told her I was tired of cleaning up after them, and I got frustrated and posted it.
She said I should have come to them and talked to them about it. I explained that we had gone that route in the past and it hadn’t changed a thing. I wasn’t apologizing; I didn’t feel sorry and I don’t give fake apologies. She insisted it hurt her feelings and was inconsiderate, so I told her that going ax-throwing without me was hurtful too, but I didn’t throw a hissy fit.
She deflected and said that was irrelevant and unrelated, so I said okay, sure, and told her to get out of my room. This is when things really hit the fan. It was miserable being there. Both B and G were petty and obnoxious to me the whole time, even more than usual.
So I decided to move out 2 months early. I asked a friend if I could live in her spare room and set up a short-term lease.
I didn’t tell my roommates I was leaving; I didn’t feel I owed them that. (I’m still paying my part of rent and utilities.)
4 days later, my man and I moved my bedroom furniture to my new place and then took all of the furniture in the shared space that was mine and put it in my old room. The TV, the TV stand, the coffee table, the couch (which they broke and didn’t help fix), the side tables, lamps, chairs, shelves…
even the nice shower head I bought. I took all of my dishes and food from the pantry too. The only things they had were the kitchen table and G’s ugly chair. It was justified; they were jerks to me, so why should I let them use my stuff?
Side note: when I came in, they didn’t say anything, but when my partner came in behind me, B got excited and said, “Hey, Carrot’s partner!” He didn’t respond because he’s awesome and has my back.
She kept trying to talk to him and be overly friendly while ignoring me. He wouldn’t even look at her.
Let’s remember back to the hidden camera I bought to help G feel safe! I set that up in my room to make sure that nothing was taken. I didn’t expect anything to happen. But they just kept on surprising me! Multiple times a day, they went into my room and rummaged through my stuff.
My mom had sent me an Easter basket in the mail and G had “chucked it as hard as she could” into my room. At one point, B says she’s going to reinstall my shower head until I move out, and G says under her breath while looking through my things, “I’m going to take your stuff ’cause I know you’re rich.” I debated telling them there was a camera, but I wanted to compile more dirt.
About 3 days after I moved out, B sent me a text saying they wanted to go through my things because they thought I had taken some of their stuff.
They wanted me to come back and go through it with them, but if I didn’t want to, they would be happy to go through my things on their own. I replied that I had taken care not to pack their things in with my stuff and that under no circumstances were they to touch my personal property. She never replied.
Well one day, 2 weeks after I moved out, my camera went offline.
I went over to check it out and it had been unplugged and the cord was nicely draped over the table it was on. I went upstairs to ask G about it and she said they hadn’t been in my room, so they didn’t do it. I just replied that clearly someone went in my room, ’cause it didn’t just unplug itself from the wall and drape itself politely over the table.
She still didn’t know that it was a camera; I don’t know how they didn’t figure it out, but oh well. I went downstairs to move it and reset it up. She came downstairs and told me, “Just so you know, we’re frustrating you because you’re frustrating us” which set me off.
I went off and basically called her out for all of the garbage they had been doing all year and told her that I thought she was my friend, but the whole time, she was playing into this awful dynamic where she pretended to play the mediator by telling B I was mad when I came to her asking if I had done something wrong.
I had let all that go because I knew that was how things functioned at home for G, but now on top of everything else, it’s inexcusable.
She tried to tell me the reason they were all mean to me was that I wasn’t around that much and it made it hard to like me… which? And that she tried really hard to be my friend, but I made it so difficult.
She said it hurt her feelings that I posted the dishes, and I told her I didn’t care about her feelings anymore and that I was tired of putting up with their nonsense and being the bigger person. I told her I had nothing to say to them and that I didn’t want them in my room. She tried to make the point that they all got along well enough, so clearly it was a “me problem.” I told her that the reason they all got along is that they’re toxic and they all play into this weird toxic dynamic.
I don’t get along because I don’t play into it. She had no response to that.
Honestly, I’ve never stood up for myself before. I have never had a problem standing up for others, but it has always seemed impossible to stand up for myself. This felt so empowering after a year of being treated like trash and letting things slide, I finally said something.
I went home and decided I would tell them about the camera.
I wanted to be able to move forward and focus on finishing the school year without worrying about drama with them. I sent a small clip from the camera of them rummaging through my personal items and said, “Just so you guys know, I have a couple of security cameras set up in my room. I know you’ve been going in my room. I know what you’ve been saying.
I won’t post these videos if you stay out of my room from this point on, but as you’ve recently found out, I don’t care about airing your dirty laundry. I will post these if you don’t respect my property and my space. There are plenty more of these videos.”
That was two weeks ago. They have not replied, and they have not gone into my room again. I think it’s safe to say that the drama is over, and I feel pretty good about that. I hope I never have to speak to them again.”
14. She's Too Inappropriate And Selfish
“Her name is Helen.
When I was 15, my mom reconnected with an old high school friend of hers. In the beginning, Helen was nice, but she complained constantly about her living situation. She made claims that the oldest daughter of her roommate was a vile jerk who was out to get her. This turned out to be a lie. We liked her at first, though, and my mom offered for her to stay with us for a few months until she got back on her feet.
After all, we had an extra room we weren’t using. What was the worst that could happen?
A year goes by. This woman couldn’t hold down a job after being fired from the newspaper for being too lazy to come in and calling in sick all the time. She would find work, then quit after two days because she didn’t think she was being paid enough. She steals food constantly.
Worst of all, she is trying to be all buddy-buddy with me even though I’m 16 at this point. She took me on a day trip once, only to talk about hookups the entire three-hour drive home. I was mortified. This woman is in her 50s.
She insisted on installing a bidet in our bathroom. Since she paid for it, we allowed it, but she got a very cheap one that was less than stellar.
By far the worst aspect of her personality was how much food she stole.
Every. Single. Day. And this woman would constantly come home with fast food of some kind. Sonic, McDonald’s, Burger King, Pizza Hut. She would polish off an entire pizza by herself. Something to note was that food WAS communal unless stated otherwise. One of these things that she wasn’t meant to touch was my soda. I would get a 24 pack meant to last me a couple of weeks, just as a treat for myself.
Well, two weeks turned into one, and I was definitely not drinking that much soda. If anything, I was drinking less. After my sister caught her taking my drinks one last time, I brought the package to my room. She complained endlessly about how I was being mean and petty, that it was one soda and why did I have to be such a stuck-up jerk about it? She complained to my mom, forgetting entirely that she was my parent and not just adult supervision.
The point where I waged war on her, though, didn’t come until another few months.
A friend of mine was doing a fundraiser for her band at her school by selling Krispy Kreme donuts. The nearest Krispy Kreme is two hours away, and I loved the band, so I ordered a dozen for my family to split evenly. Three donuts between everyone in the house is more than enough. I had one for breakfast before school, and when I returned, the box was gone.
I asked my sister. I asked my mom. Neither had taken them, so that left one option.
Helen.
I began to mess with her stuff while she was out buying fast food. Her giant stash of candy hidden away in her dresser drawers? All in the trash. I shook dirt into her bedsheets. I unplugged her TV, knowing that it would be a struggle for her to plug it back in if she wanted to watch her terrible shows again.
Something to note was that we bought a separate type of milk, as Helen would drink ALL of ours and never replace it.
We couldn’t afford to buy six gallons a week, so we bought 1%. Helen ONLY drank 2% milk and complained about buying her own, but it worked.
I poured an entire gallon of 2% milk down the drain. Bye-bye!
After this, she decided to give everyone the silent treatment. This was a blessing because she NEVER shut her mouth unless she was using it to eat. When my girl came to visit, she ignored her, too.
I had to reassure her that Helen was being a jerk and that she hadn’t done anything to upset her personally.
I continued to mess with her until she moved out. It was a glorious thing to witness this absolute vile woman have a breakdown over losing her food. Her not-quite partner at the time came to help her move out, and she spent the whole day complaining loudly about us. As one last screw you, she stole my mom’s mattress topper in the midst of packing her stuff. We never got it back, but we DID get that woman out of our house.”
13. She Keeps Finding Petty Excuses To Justify Paying Less Rent
“So I bought a house a year and a half ago. Only started renting rooms out 9 months ago so I could have enough cash for remodeling without getting a loan.
The house is technically a 4/3 trilevel: the main floor is living/dining/kitchen, downstairs is 1 bed/1 bath and den, and upstairs is a master with attached bath and 2 bedrooms that share a hall bath. I am currently renting out the top floor while my brother and I live downstairs (I live in the den, and my brother lives in the bedroom, and we share that bathroom).
I really have had no major issues with roommates, just stupid annoyances (like people not grasping the concept of not parking too close to the mailbox, or mail won’t be delivered… But I digress).
My only female roommate recently had 2 jobs. Normal day job and she’d coach a sports team at night. Well, she lost the coaching gig (from what I understand, through no fault of her own).
That second job really gave her a cushion, so when she lost the job, she was strapped for cash. She asked me to give her a break for the upcoming month, so I gave her $100 off rent, assuming this was a one-time deal. But then the next month, she asked me to lower it for every month forward.
While I understand that what I’m charging for rent isn’t super cheap, I was a bit insulted.
She has one of the bedrooms that share a bath, so she is getting charged the same amount as the other person she shares a bathroom with. I charge that much a month because I live in a more expensive part of town (I live on a barrier island), so the house was more expensive than if I bought one mainland. She knew that when she decided to live with me.
I even include utilities in my rent, when total utilities for me can run $350-$550/month.
She started spouting off things that, in her mind, justified lower rent… But everything she described I was upfront about. Me working on the house (new floors, new kitchen, just got a new driveway in), too many people living there (um, hello, you knew that when you decided to move in), my dogs (what the heck; they were here first)…
She even complained about her bike being left out in the rain and her chain rusted. She inherited the bike from a friend after she moved in. I never agreed to house her bike inside.
She started off at $100 cheaper then went to $50… I basically said I was upfront about everything; I already gave you $100 off the previous month. If this is really a hardship for you, then you should consider moving Mainland where it’s cheaper.
And then I said it wouldn’t be fair to lower her rent while the other guy is paying the same… to which she said I just shouldn’t tell him. Hmm.
And then she started doing petty things. Like I had boxes with blinds in them in the hallway upstairs. I planned on hanging them up in the rooms. She complained about them being there. So fine, I moved them.
Then a random cushion being in the hall closet upstairs. Okay fine, I moved that. But she was never petty before that. That annoyed me a lot, being petty isn’t going to get you anywhere. Maybe if she offered to help with other things to make up for the reduction in rent, I would have been more accommodating. She doesn’t even do her own dishes and leaves things out all over the place.
She also parks her oil-leaking car in the driveway, so now I have to clean oil stains up.
But anyway, what do you guys think I should do? Should I give her a slight discount just to show I’m accommodating? Like $20 off?”
Another User Comments:
“If I were you, I’d stop renting to this girl. I feel like she’s always gonna have an excuse for not paying on time/the amount required to live there, and her pettiness shows that she feels entitled to living there without paying the same amount that the other person pays for the same sized room.” gravollet
12. The Dishwasher Is Meant For Dishes
“This was a few years ago, but I still get pretty worked up thinking about it. I moved pretty abruptly, and so I had to find a roommate quickly. I posted an ad and within a week I narrowed it down to one guy who seemed pretty normal. He was freshly 18 and had never lived alone. He didn’t drive, but his work was only like a 5-minute walk and a quick bus ride away, so the location was perfect, and he was looking for a new “grown-up” freedom…
We signed the lease and from there he got more and more insane. First off, he was super weird about the groceries. I always bought my own stuff, and I offered to get whatever he needed anytime I was out. He never offered, but no biggie; money is tight. Anyways, he would constantly throw away my new stuff, and if I mentioned it, he’d say it was “old” or “expired” even if I had just bought it a day or two before.
I thought he was eating it, which again, no big deal. But then I would find my full, opened, and NOT expired food in the trash. It was totally weird that he never asked or checked before just tossing stuff. Meanwhile, he’d have old food in the fridge for weeks, months, and if I texted to ask if I could toss it to make room he’d get super defensive and tell me I was wasteful with food.
One of the weirdest things is he would drink lactose-free, whole milk, CONSTANTLY.
Like a gallon or two a day. He always had to have like 4 in the fridge or he’d panic.
Flash forward, he has a cat that lives here with us named Salem. Salem is this old old old black cat that was chill and super low maintenance. I never even noticed him. UNTIL one day I got a text from my roommate with nothing but a picture of a cat (clearly not Salem) on MY bed in MY room.
That’s the other thing, he and his family would go into my room without my permission constantly even after being repeatedly asked not to because it made me uncomfortable.
I always felt like there was a camera watching me in my room.
Anyways, I’m reasonably very confused and annoyed that my roommate 1) got a cat without talking to me first, especially since it was against the lease not to get it registered with them first And 2) because this cat I don’t know is now in MY room unannounced.
I came home from class about 4 hours later, and there had been no litter box locked in the room with this cat.
So she had peed all over my stuff, my brand new mattress, a pile of clean clothes, on the carpet, etc. I’m a big animal lover, so I went out and got her supplies but made it clear to my roommate that I’m NOT cool with having another cat and it needed to find a new home. He reluctantly agreed and we moved the kitty’s stuff into the front room, so I wouldn’t be responsible for her accidents.
Weeks pass, and every time I come home, it reeks like pee.
This cat is clearly not potty trained, and I’m angry beyond belief that my nice, cute apartment is now destroyed by the overwhelming, overpowering, knock you off your feet smell of ammonia.
I finally say something again, and I am no longer kind. I throw a fit and demand that the cat has a week or I’m going to take her to the humane society. (In reality, I’d try to find her a new home first, but I wanted my roommate to take the lead since he’s the one who decided to take on this commitment.)
I came home the next day and went to do dishes.
I was primarily the one who cleaned, pretty awful dynamic that he just assumed right off the bat because I’m the girl, I “enjoy housework,” but I did it anyway because I wanted to live in a clean space. I open up the dishwasher, and what do I find but the cat litter box mat.
I call my roommate out and he explains that “it was soaked in pee, so I rang it out and ran it through the dishwasher.”
I am furious, hot in the face, LIVID.
I step outside and calm down, then come in and tell him to never put it through the dishwasher again and have to explain to him that it is the most disgusting thing I could imagine a roommate doing with a shared appliance that cleans the items that our food goes on.
He seems frustrated that I’m scolding him, doesn’t understand what the big deal is, tells me I’m overreacting, and am a “Germ Freak.” Call me whatever; I take no shame in not wanting cat pee on my dishes. I ask him to PLEASE never do it again and he agrees to keep the peace.
I scrubbed it down for an hour, ran 3 empty loads, used bleach to clean it, and ran another empty load.
Two days later I found the kitty pooper scooper in the dishwasher. Needless to say, I was off the lease and moved out by the end of the month.”
11. A Nosy Leech Of A Roommate
“So, I live in a student housing complex. My apartment has me and three other men. The good thing is that it’s all private bedrooms and two bathrooms for two roommates each. Anywho, only three of us have vehicles. A little about myself is that I work overnights at a grocery store. I work 40 hours or more because the turnover rate is just bad so then we’re always short-staffed.
I work hard to pay my bills to keep my priorities intact, and whatever I have extra will be for my groceries and necessities.
However, one of my roommates always seems to get on my nerves more and more. He’s the one that doesn’t have a vehicle and/or driver’s license. I always offered to help him get his driver’s license, but he never does put in the effort to do it.
He’s been my roommate for a year and I’m starting to notice that all his actions are to try and get something out of me. He quit his job because he gets money from the government which is how he pays for rent. He also gets an extra $200 for himself. The government gives him money because he was a foster child and from what he told me is that he wanted to keep the benefits upon turning 18 years old.
He just spends all of that money on booze which is why he’s broke all the time. Even when he had a job, he’d still be broke because of his bad spending habits.
I notice he would use my and my other two roommates’ groceries in the kitchen fridge and/or cupboards. He would just help himself to our things without asking and tell us later whenever he sees us in the apartment.
That led me to no choice but to buy a mini-fridge for my private room.
Also, he is nosy as ever. I’d come home, and if he hears me.. he’d come out of his room to brag about his day. He would also try to find out where I’ve been and/or where I’m going. Now I always try to sneak in or sneak out without him hearing or seeing me.
He’ll also ask me for rides to one place, and then I say “yes” and he adds on extra stops. He’d give gas money most times, but it wasn’t enough to cover all of his stops. My other two roommates that have vehicles don’t give him rides to anywhere, one of them always says “no.” The other roommate just keeps to himself and is never home.
What bothers me the most is that he would be nosy and peak in my room whenever my doors open.
Even if my door is slightly open, it’s like he’ll start a conversation with me while my door is open just to get a peek to see what I have in my small bedroom. I would say something to him like, “You trynna peek?” and his response is always an oblivious lie like, “Oh, I’m just looking at your curtain. I like how you tie it up like that.” It’s very infuriating to have a roommate like this.
Do not get me wrong, I am a very nice roommate to have.
They all tell me that I am a chill person to have as a roommate. I offer my roommates food sometimes, but that is if only I have enough to spare. I just have one of my roommates always being a nosy, inconsiderate leech. I’ll get home from working overnights and he’ll have the audacity to ask me for a ride to the liquor store and a grocery store like I’m not tired from working an overnight 8-hour shift.
Again, I offered to help him get his driver’s license so he can have his own car… He doesn’t put in the effort. Someone can’t be helped if they don’t put in the effort.
Lastly, I just don’t like people who like to leech and be nosy. That’s about my two biggest pet peeves. I also just don’t know how to handle problems like these without being violent or hostile.”
10. She's Hot And Cold And Also Absurd
“So my roommate is very rich and very spoiled and also very scary. She started off fine, but now she is harassing me and another roommate. All names have been changed. Joanne is absurd; Helen and Callie are normal.
We all knew she was absurd, but we never did anything about it because she got a good cable package and she kept buying food. (Yeah I know we are not the brightest bunch.)
Started off when it began to get cold.
It was 50ish degrees, so we started to turn the heat on just a little bit to keep warm air circulating, especially since Helen and I have fish. She freaks out – turns on the A/C and sends Helen these nasty messages like, “I know why all your friends hate you now,” “You’re ugly and fat, and this is why you’re single,” “You’re a wuss for not answering me,” and she just keeps repeating them over and over.
Helen is super passive and lets it go.
Then my friends come over for 2 nights. We aren’t super loud and it’s the weekend. Joanne and I go to buy two bottles of booze. (Didn’t think anything of it, we were all just like, “Let’s crack these babies open!”) There were about 6 shots taken from her bottle, so I expected her to take some from mine to make it even.
No. She took the whole entire bottle. She left maybe 3 shots in it and then filled the rest with water. She drank two 90 proof handles of booze by herself in 1 night. Then when I asked for it, she starts telling me that I am a jerk and I am being mean to her when she has given me “everything” (I have known her maybe 3 months and I barely talk to her???) and so I go upstairs, knock on her door, and say “Joanne.
I want to talk about this. I am not trying to fight. I just want my booze back or for you to replace it.” She cracks the door and says, “I am scared of you. You will yell at me.” And slams it in my face and then proceeds to start WAILING. It was so bizarre. Didn’t talk to her for about 2 weeks but constantly heard her saying how she was afraid to live in this house….
even though everyone sleeps with their doors locked because she’s absurd.
Then I noticed Helen getting very distant from her and hiding in her room. Strange. I then get a text from Joanne, “I miss you so much. I hate pretending like we’re strangers. You are my best friend.” WHAT?! I barely know this girl. Then she asks me if I want steak or if I want to hang out.
She tells me how Helen was really angry at me the day she stole the booze and made her text me those mean things. She claims Helen wanted me to leave the house and that we should turn on her. I am definitely one to hold grudges, so I just said, “Yeah, okay, Joanne. Sorry, I’m really busy; gotta go.” She got really weird and was like you’re just going to disrespect me like that? I apologized to you.
So I just left.
My partner comes to visit, we go inside after getting dinner for 15 ish minutes to go to the bathroom before we go drive somewhere else. I hear Joanne running down the stairs (she always runs in a weird pattern) and go outside. I hear her run in while I’m still in the bathroom and then slam her door. No big deal, she must have ordered delivery.
We start driving and my partner’s car starts pulling more and more to one side and it starts shaking. We get out and see AN ENTIRE HOLE IN THE SIDE. No nail, just a freaking gauged hole. We were just driving for 20 minutes!!! How!!! We think it was Joanne.
Then it’s Thanksgiving break, and I text Helen and say, “Please, let’s talk.” (I wanted to smooth things over and say there is no bad blood, and I wanted to say I’d appreciate it if my problems with Joanne stay between me and Joanne because I had no issues with her.) She didn’t want to talk in person, so I just texted her and she responds apologizing for something I’m not even talking about.
I just told her, “Listen, we really need to talk.” She comes downstairs, and I’m like, “Joanne told me you were trying to get me kicked out,” and she just shouts, “JOANNE KEEPS HARASSING ME, AND SHE TELLS ME YOU THINK I’M FAT AND YOU HATE ME.” I’m like, “What? Girl, I don’t even talk to Joanne.” So we both let loose and tell each other what Joanne has been doing.
She put sticky notes ALL OVER the bathroom saying that Helen was a fat jerk and how everyone hated her. What. I say, “I’m sorry. I’d never do that,” and she says, “Yeah, I didn’t even talk to her during the booze stealing night.”
That same night, it was time for Helen to ask for people to send her money for the electric bill. Joanne responds and says, “Screw you, Helen.
I’m not paying anything.” So I responded and said, “I’m going to take it up with the landlord if you do not comply.” She says, “Go ahead; they won’t believe you.” I tell her I have screenshots and she says, “Good. I mean what I said.” Then starts sending more harassing messages to Helen. She enjoys picking on the weakest one, and Helen is very insecure and lets her in on all her weaknesses.
I finally told her I would call the police if she didn’t stop.
Then she started doing the wailing thing again and her partner came. She screamed, “I’M NEVER LEAVING. I’LL POOP OUTSIDE THIS WINDOW IF I HAVE TO.” He just books it and runs out the front door leaving it wide open. Not sure what happened with that.
Anyway, this isn’t even half the crazy stuff she has done, and I don’t know what to do. Helen is a mess. I am not much better and this environment is toxic. She keeps leaving bloody napkins and tampons everywhere, and she won’t clean up the trash all over the bathroom.”
9. Living With Your Bestie Isn't Always The Dream
Moving in together can either make or break a friendship.
“I moved in with my best friend, and things have not been going well. We moved in together about 7 months ago, me, my best friend since middle school, and her long-term partner.
It started out fine, for about a month, then she just stopped talking to me, ignored whatever I said. When I asked her man what happened, he said he doesn’t know, but she was mad that I cleaned out the litter boxes (we have 5 cats – 2 mine, 3 theirs) and put new litter in them, I guess? I don’t know.
Anyway, we never talked about it, despite my many attempts. One day, she just acted normal, was talking to me normally, so I thought nothing of it and moved on.
I’ll backtrack a little. We had been talking about moving in together for over 3 years. I had moved far away (7 years) from our hometown for college. About a year before our move-in, she decided that, yeah, she wants to move and get away from the place.
They relied on me to find a place, which was no problem since I was the one already up here. I got a place 3 months before move-in. They then told me that they won’t have enough money and asked if I could help them with the deposit and first month’s rent. I was hesitant but agreed. They asked me to come down with my truck and trailer to help them move up here, and I agreed.
Her man asked me if he could borrow a vehicle to drive for the next month while his car got fixed since I had my brothers, which I was helping him try to sell. I agreed.
With all of that, they ended up owing me well over 3 grand. I would remind them at least once a month that they owed me this money and I was always met with glares, eye rolls, and the excuse that they didn’t have enough, not even enough to slowly start paying me off.
Then the next day they would go out and buy $100+ worth of cat stuff or computer parts or whatever stupid nonsense. The month of borrowing my vehicle was extended without asking. When brought up, the partner would say he doesn’t have a car yet and doesn’t know when it would get fixed. I ended up having to buy my brother’s car (at a discount, but still, I didn’t want the car).
I told him he could borrow my truck as long as he took care of it: oil changes, check transmission, etc. Last week, after he couldn’t get my truck started, I checked on my truck, and it turns out, he hasn’t been putting much fuel in, running it on nearly empty, and the fuel lines froze. The oil life is also 800+ miles past due to change.
I told him of this and he shrugged it off.
I also ended up taking care of all the bills and hounding them for money to pay me back. Same responses. They would let me pay and pay me back whenever they had money left over from buying whatever they wanted. When I did get my money back, it was ALWAYS thrown at me. Like I was the bad guy for paying for bills and asking them to pay me back.
I gave them so many breaks because I felt bad, felt like they couldn’t afford it. But they both had jobs before they moved up here. The BFF has a higher-paying job than me too. But still being the doormat I was, I let them get by with it.
Because I assumed they had money troubles, I got the partner a second job, doing some cleaning where I work.
It started out ok for 3 days. But now, he has made my job a living nightmare. He does everything with half effort, tries to cut corners all the time, and has made me have to work twice as hard doing my job and cleaning up after his job. It makes me feel terrible that I gave such a good recommendation to my bosses for him.
He was hired over a more qualified person who had experience because of my recommendation. When I mention that he needs to do better, he tells me that I am being unfair to him. He sprouts lies left and right to cover his lazy self and that I should be nicer since he has anxiety. I have given up on trying to get him to do his job correctly that I know he thinks he’s getting away with cutting corners.
I have since given my boss a review of him and also retracted my recommendation. They are going to act on this by the end of the year.
They then began to shut me out of their life. They treat me like their live-in maid, who is only a guest. I cook and offer them food. They order food and never offer me any or if I’d like to get food with them.
I clean up after them constantly. Our apartment is only livable because I can’t stand letting a mess go for that long. I tried only cleaning up my messes. And let’s not forget that I take care of the bills. So you could say I was the mother of these two but had no authority.
The straw that lays on the already broken-backed camel happened last night.
They smoke, which I told them I don’t want to be done in our apartment. They agreed since it is against our lease. But they did anyway, and to cover it up, they doused our apartment in air freshener, thinking I wouldn’t notice. Any air freshener smell will give me migraines, which it did. I couldn’t get to sleep until 2 am, 2 hours before I needed to wake up for work.
I also had a final this morning. I went to bed at a reasonable time but was up for 6 hours fighting that migraine. So I had to go to my manual labor job and take a very important final on 2 hours of sleep.
I want to be done. I want to move out. I want my name taken off the lease and I don’t see a point in salvaging this friendship.”
8. Just A Non-Confrontational Person Living With A Narcissist
Not a good combination.
“After I graduated from college, my roommates regrettably moved to be closer to their families. I wasn’t sure if I would have a solid job or not as I was waiting for my school to get back to me about an office position (I was a work-study and already part of the team), so I was looking for a roommate so I wouldn’t have to move because my apartment is awesome.
I met someone on social media who had mutual friends, was from my hometown, and was starting at my school, so we agreed that she could move into the vacant room upstairs.
After I got my job at school and knew my income, I offered to pay internet, electricity, and $50 more than her for rent since she was a full-time student and was a dealer who’d give me access to her stash.
This actually worked well for a little while as we’re both big smokers and bonded by smoking together. Of course, eventually, she ran out of stuff and money, and I ended up providing stuff for a while, including up to now when she’ll run out and then ask me. There were a few months (MONTHS) where I paid all of the rent because she was fired from her new job after skipping to attend a concert on her birthday, letting me know I didn’t even need a roommate.
Throughout her first year here, I tried to be thoughtful of her lifestyle of being super extroverted and having friends over.
However, I’m extremely introverted, and instead of balancing each other out, she started stepping on my toes and disrespecting me. Her 30-year-old now ex-partner (9 years her senior) who was self-centered, a terrible housemate, and a total creep was over every single weekend from our hometown to spend time with her. He always left a mess, not to mention a smell of poop by taking a dump before leaving our house every Sunday without using the fan in the bathroom, used my bath towel constantly because he forgot to take one to the bathroom with him, exclusively took baths for some reason, and openly talked about how he wanted to sleep with me (which is so creepy!!!)
After she finally dumped him, she constantly had people in the house.
4-5 days per week, sometimes every day of the week, and this includes letting people just live at our house for days on end. The last time this happened was after winter break when she brought her friend back and he stayed for a week straight with no consent from me. This same friend came to “take care of her” after her wisdom teeth surgery a few months ago and then stole something from my roommate, so I think she’s canceled him as a friend now.
I’ve watched her ruin so many romantic and platonic relationships in the last 2 years, including her relationship with me.
She also started doing stick n poke tattoos for money after quitting her serving job in preparation for her busy senior year (though she did this a whole month before school started and quickly hit the bottom of her savings), and soon after she got all of her supplies for this, I found multiple needles just loose in the house, including one sticking point-up on the stairs where she, I, or my cat could have stepped on it.
She also tried to run her tattoo business out of our apartment (again, without asking me). When she told me she was having someone over for a tattoo (she already had her then hook up buddy, now also canceled by her, over), I had to go upstairs and cry at her for her to cancel it. I was grieving at the time and I had to clarify the next day that I wasn’t ok with having people in and out for tats even when I wasn’t in mourning.
She seemed surprised about the fact that, in April of 2020, I didn’t want people in the house. In hindsight, I wish I’d just let her do it so I could give my landlord a reason to evict her.
Some additional grievances:
• Has broken/ruined multiple cups of mine (I’ve only broken one of hers while I was juggling pots and pans SHE left in the sink), not only through accidents but by microwaving a glass and putting a heat-sensitive mug in the dishwasher.
• Uses my mugs and cups in general even though she owns more than I do.
I don’t trust her with my things for obvious reasons.
• Puts dishes in the sink, even when the dishwasher is completely empty.
• Puts pots and pans in the sink and then leaves them for days. Instead of washing them before making more food, she just keeps piling them up until a week has passed. I hound her to wash them (and she’s not very good at washing pans for someone who claims to be a seasoned cook), or I just do them.
• Just leaves garbage everywhere.
The top of a frozen package she cut off, the stopper of her almond milk cartons, old napkins, food, etc. Doesn’t matter that there’s a garbage can 2 feet away; she just abandons garbage wherever.
• She’s left dirty underwear on the kitchen counter. When I sent a picture of it to her, she said, “Oops, lol,” like Jesus, show some shame, you nasty.
• Treats the washing machine like a laundry basket.
• Always talks about herself, her accomplishments, her life, how she thinks this song is about her, how much she’s KILLING her profession despite constantly saying, “Man, I have no money,” tends to interrupt me or ignore me entirely.
• Calls herself an empath.
As time goes on, I feel more and more that she’s actually a narcissist.
• Threw a huge fit when I told her not to have a huge birthday party at our place this August or to just wait until the day after when I went to my mom’s house to move stuff out (this is the same time period of my mourning and her tattoo nonsense).
She later apologized for acting this way, but seriously, why do you care so much about your 23rd birthday? I stopped caring about my birthdays at like 19.
• I told her I couldn’t take having people in the house all the time anymore for my own mental health (I wanted this to lead into a “you need to move out” statement, but I was too scared to say it).
For a little while, I at least didn’t have to deal with that problem, but she had people over a lot last week and I had to tell her AGAIN to stop bringing people over because this is my space and she can get her social interactions elsewhere.
• Is generally loud, heavy-footed, annoying, and oblivious (unsure if it’s intentional or if she’s just stupid) to people who aren’t sleeping with her.
She tends to loudly play TikToks and other things while we’re both on the deck smoking, even when I politely turn videos and music off when she’s there.
• Just a couple of hours ago, I pulled out the toaster oven tray which still had dirty tinfoil on it. When I took off the tinfoil to throw it away, I found old toppings from a pizza she reheated DAYS ago, totally scorched and glued to the surface of the tray.
Cool.
This isn’t even everything. I don’t know why I’ve let her use me like this for so long, but I’m so scared of confrontation. I have plenty of people from friends and family to my BOSS offering to back me up, but I feel like a child asking someone to hold my hand while I tell her to leave. In all honesty, I need a therapist really badly, but all the sessions are online and I wouldn’t feel like I actually have privacy to talk about it in this nightmare house. It’s already difficult just talking to my psychiatrist once a month (meetings have increased this year because of my roommate, lol). Now I’m just waiting for her to finally graduate, so I can tell her to get out without feeling bad about kicking a student out.”
7. She Thinks She Can Clean, But She Can't
“The few weeks I’ve been here, my best friend and I have been working and switching between chores. His girl, on the other hand, only works at a local Petsmart for around 6-8 hours on average as part of the salon section (not a back-breaking job since I’ve had an ex-partner who worked on oil rigs). She comes home and never does anything, and when her dog pees on the carpet, she just leaves it for a while then throws a towel on the spot of pee that’s already seeped into the foundation.
She’s a feminist and not the good kind, and she constantly groans about how men are jerks and how much of pigs we were when my friend first went out with her. I allowed them into my home rent-free for 5 months because they got kicked out of their duplex, and her man supported her for 3 years when she didn’t have a job. (Also, what’s with feminists and dyed hair color? And why do so many of them choose red intentionally? Is it a sign they are triggered? Lol, the last one’s a joke.)
Anyways, she belittles us, despite her being the one who relies on us, and we have tried to be reasonable with her and she doesn’t get the gist.
We all work and pay for the apartment and want to keep a clean home. Let me list what her behavior boils down to:
・She doesn’t rinse or put dishes into the sink.
・Fails to clean up after her dog
・Doesn’t even keep up with her own hygiene
・Has the cleaning skills of a 5-year-old
・When someone doesn’t do their dishes, she gets mad.
・Can’t seem to organize like a human
・Has the attention span of a Koala, so water flies everywhere
・Can’t do laundry
Weird portion of the rant, but every day she talks to me, and I have to tell her that her breath smells bad.
And she just laughs. Like that’s funny. I’m sure you’re reading this and going, “She sounds awful. She’s probably below average of appearances,” and if you’re thinking that, you’re being awfully nice. She’s extremely below average that her only ideal trait that’s even worthy of anyone’s attention is her butt, and I’d give it a 3 out of 10.
(Yeah, I don’t like this girl a whole lot.)
(Back to Main Topic)
Her dog peed on the carpet, and she makes the smallest effort into cleaning.
So I asked her, “Do you always clean her pee like that?” and she replied, “Yeah, why?” “You’re supposed to scrub it with either soap or bleach, so it doesn’t leave any smell behind.” She said, “I only do that once a month.”
So when her dog pees on the floor, she just gets a towel and calls it a day ’cause scrubbing with soap and rag is so hard that she can only do it once a month.
God, what a lazy piece of mucus. Can’t even make a decent effort to clean.
Another piece, the way my brother and I grew up, the person who cooked is the person who cleaned. This is so everything was fair. You make a mess, you clean it, sorta Montara. So we explain this to her and she just tells us to clean up when she’s done. Like everyone in the house agreed because it means you’re responsible for your own mess. She doesn’t like this rule because it means she’d have to put in effort.”
6. I'm Always Stuck Doing Their Responsibilities
A classic type of bad roommate.
“I really like my roommate, as a person. However, they don’t really do any cleaning around the house. They do their dishes so that’s good! They also sometimes reorganize the cabinets and pantry and make it look really nice! What makes me upset is that they don’t do much else. I’m always the one to take the trash out. If their cat pukes it sits on the floor for days on end unless I point it out or clean it myself.
I don’t expect them to help clean every time, just some of the time would be nice considering we’re sharing the space.
I clean the bathroom and vacuum my room, the living room, and the kitchen floor once a week. I feel that doing these things once a week or every other week is a reasonable amount, especially since we each have a cat. Plus there is no ventilation of any kind in the house so it’s often hard to breathe, and vacuuming makes it better.
It only takes 20 minutes at the most to do this when it’s just me, it would probably take 10 if my roommate did one part of the cleaning.
I would ask them to help clean on a specific day, which is what I’ve tried in the past, but what really happened was me cleaning the whole place while they spent 30 seconds sweeping and that was it.
I’ve also asked if they were okay with helping clean the living room on a certain day at a specific time, and they said yes, but then I came home and they were in their room, and they didn’t leave it until the next day. I find it easier to just clean myself instead of always asking someone to do their part, it feels like I’m parenting them if I do that.
Then there’s their cat, for whom I feel I’ve done most of the emotional care and discipline.
They do little to no playing with the kitten, which has caused her to behave badly due to having no outlet for her energy. I suggested playing multiple times. Nothing changed.
My roommate also cleans their cat’s litter box twice a week at the absolute most, and this kitty’s litter box is usually unusable because of how much stuff there is. It smells and there’s litter all over the floor and pieces of poop surrounding the box.
It gets full to the brim before my roommate will scoop it, and then they throw the big bag of cat pee in the kitchen trash can, which stinks up the kitchen and living area.
The other day I found brown slime that had built up on the bottom of their cat’s bowl from months of it not being properly changed. I checked because their cat was only drinking from my cat’s bowl which stays clean.
I want to be friends with this person and we’re living together next year too.
I don’t know if there’s any way to explain how I feel without it coming across as a personal attack, even if I word it gently. Subtly hinting at things won’t get the point across. Plus, I am not this person’s mom. I can’t control what they choose to do or not do, they’re an adult. I am an adult too and feel like maybe I should just take charge and do everything, though that can easily lead to being taken advantage of.”
5. Sharing A House With A Crazy Cat Lady Is Too Much
“I’m a F19 and I rent a room in a house. I only share the house with the landlord M50 who is barely ever home but has a private room on the third floor, and the dreaded cat lady F40. I work full time and go to university full time as well but I still keep the house relatively tidy. Cat lady is a Caucasian woman with- you guessed it- two cats.
Before she came here everything was really peaceful, but then after she got here, really bad stuff started to happen. Here are all the facts.
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To start off she was sleeping with my landlord. Yeah. And then they broke up.
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She’s from Alabama. She’s a massage therapist and is super I-worship-the-moon-and-burn-sage-so-the-world-will-only-send-me-good-vibes. I’m literally not kidding, every other day she burns sage, and one night I came home and she was wearing a long black dress and I was like, “Oh, are you going somewhere?” And she was like, “Oh no, tonight the moon is full, and I’m doing a ceremony,” and I was like okaayyyy.
She has vertigo and takes checks from the government.
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SHE’S DIRTY AS A PIG IN A PIGSTYE. So after one month, the house started to get really messy. She never cleaned her plates, took out any trash or swept or vacuumed or mopped, and she let her cats roam around the house and they would get in my room and break all sorts of antique vases my landlord has around the house.
(She wasn’t allowed to have the cats by the way, but my landlord made an exception for her, and look how that turned out), so cat hair was everywhere, the house smelled of something decaying and I was basically losing it. So I confronted her, and the first couple of times, she’d clean for about a week and then go back to being messy.
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Then, the bugs came.
Cockroaches, maggots, flies, a horde of mosquitoes, and this is what got me. BEDBUGS. I lost it. I could not for the love of God live with her. I don’t know how I could survive. Eventually, I DIY cured my room. And they’re gone now, but who knows when they’ll be back.
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The cats. So I love animals so much SO MUCH, and I don’t really have a problem with the cats besides the cat hair but…
I’ve seen the inside of her room. They live in filth dude. Like bugs crawling all around clothes on the floor. She never takes her trash out so it’s just all stuffed in her room, it’s literally so packed that when she opens the door stuff comes falling out and she has to kick it back inside. The smell holy heck the smell is so bad like you can smell it coming up the stairs.
And when she opens her door it doesn’t go away for 30 minutes. Bugs crawling all over her door. I don’t know what to do, man. I mean I know she feeds them and loves them, but while she was here, she let her cats sniff through chemicals and then got mad that we didn’t stop them (or when we told her about it she would blame us), and then one of her cats even had surgery because it ate like a needle string or something that ripped through its stomach.
Apparently, it’s not the first time one of her cats had surgery. It was the third. And the animal hospital told her this was the last time they would do a cost-deducted surgery for her. I feel bad for them but don’t know what to do. Does this count as neglect?
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She’s violent. She tried to attack me I was telling her that she can’t live like this and expect a 19-year-old girl to take care of a 40-year-old woman.
I told her I was removing my stuff from the kitchen as I no longer wanted her to touch my stuff, especially cause she never cleaned it. So she lost it and tried to attack me. Y’all. I grew up in NYC. Straight out of Queen’s Bridge. I might look like a cute, lil mixed Asian, but I have no fear and I really know how to put someone in their place.
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She stopped paying rent.
Yep, so it’s been about 7 months since she’s paid rent. She never paid a deposit. And while I don’t have to pay her share apparently it is stopping the landlord from making repairs.
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She’s broken so much stuff. She broke her window, she broke her door, she broke her bed frame. She broke cups and plates and lots of stuff that wasn’t hers and most of which were done during her rampages where she screams and runs around the house slamming doors and punching things.
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She got the eviction notice in August and an eviction process is finally happening in JANUARY.
She went to court and now she’s fighting a case against my landlord or something. However, she is still living here being foolish as ever. Every morning, I wake up to the smell of booze, she rubs it all over her clothes and sprays it on her jacket. When the house doesn’t smell like her room, it smells like booze.
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I’m losing my mind. I don’t know what to do.
I am the housemaid. I clean. I scrub. I mop and sweep. I vacuum. I dust. I throw away the trash that isn’t mine. She steals anything I leave out: toothpaste, toilet paper, ramen, bread, earrings. I don’t know what to do. I just live confined to the only real purple Fabuloso smelling clean space, my room.
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She blasts music and weird movies all night long. I have to leave for work at 3:30 am as I open up a coffee shop in the city and so I’m in bed by 9 and up by 2.
I swear I can’t live like this and I would move, but the rent is really cheap and I love the location, and that’s hard to find in NYC.
She’s getting evicted and my landlord is promising to do a thorough cleaning and repairing of everything, but I feel like this is taking forever, and she’s never going to leave!”
Another User Comments:
“I’m no lawyer or anything, but I’m sure there is SOMETHING that can be done. I would first request that your landlord let you break the lease, and if he doesn’t, threaten to sue him for forcing you into unlivable conditions.
Take lots of photos and videos and have lots of evidence. Get a lawyer. Maybe if you can put on a big enough sob story about how you have no money to move out and break the lease, someone could take your case pro bono.
Whatever the case, get out of that house. You are never going to fix this woman. And while you’re at it, surrender the cats to the humane society.” huixing_
4. She Lives With Me, Yet Wants To Act Like I Don't Exist
Like, okay then…
“So I moved into a space when the previous roommate decided to move in with her partner. I found this post on Craigslist and the price + location makes it an unreal steal. The place is huge with bedrooms and living, dining, and kitchen areas plus a spare room for storage. There is a back porch that connects to the posted room with a clear amazing view of the city skyline.
It was posted for an October move in during the end of August, so a full month before they had to make a decision. I interviewed with the one I’d be living with and the girl moving out. They were both very nice and the conversation was easy. I let them know right away I’d love to move in if they thought we’d be a good fit.
That week I was told I’d gotten the spot and could not have been happier.
Then I move in and the things I thought you normally talk about in a shared living situation turned out to be a real struggle for conversation engagement. Like where appliances should go or where my common area furniture should be. Which items I had that were ok for community use (electric kitchen equipment, tech entertainment, etc.), and if there was anything out I shouldn’t use.
The entire time I was moving in, my new roommate would not come out of her room. I had to go to her door to talk to her. My previous roommate (and now friend) was helping me move in. He admitted that it was awkward and she seemed really antisocial. That’s when I started to get worried and knew I wasn’t crazy.
For the first months now, I have noticed that my roommate does everything in her room: watches shows (which is weird to me since we have a tv in the living room that is hers) and eats there too.
Like she will make her meals in the kitchen and take them to her room even though we have a dining room. Anytime I talk to her, she has a look on her face like she’s in pain. I say hi and goodbye on arrival or departure and she does not even respond. When I text her, it’s about a 50% chance she will respond at all.
At one point, I asked her what her previous roommate situation was like, and she said she generally liked people that keep to themselves. I get that (or I can respect it), but is it really too much to ask someone to just be polite in a very basic way if we live together?
At first, I thought she was just an introverted person but I have since seen her with 2 friends she’s had over (without asking – but I don’t care about that), and they introduced themselves because she pretended I didn’t exist while they were there.
It disturbs me that they were more polite to me than she’s been the entire time I’ve lived there. It also made me genuinely hurt to also see she was fully involved in a conversation with them and smiling without that look of pure disdain she reserves for me when I talk to her.
This has manifested in me trying extra hard to get her to be nice – I regularly do all the dishes/put them away, buy supplies for the place, clean common areas.
It’s like I’m trying to figure out why she doesn’t like me and trying to do everything I can to get her to.
I think this would be less strange to me if it weren’t for the fact that my previous roommate and I had been complete strangers when I moved in as well and became fast friends. We got along great and would have meals together or just hang out in the common areas.
I was really sad to move, but my room there was tiny and had no closet, so most of my stuff was in storage which was a real pain.
I don’t necessarily expect the same thing or need to hang out with her, but I am seriously starting to feel like a leper in my own home. I feel like she deliberately avoids me and is trying to distance herself by being unfriendly.
I try to engage her in conversation once in a while (taking full note that she probably doesn’t want me to be a friend, so I’m just trying to be polite like I would with a coworker or acquaintance), and she will flat out not respond or give one-word answers. I might be sensitive, but I feel like it shows a real lack of respect when someone can’t give you the courtesy of a simple hello.
We live together, we aren’t strangers on the street.
I know I will need to address this cause it is slowly chipping away at my emotional state, but I don’t know how to ask her. I know it could be much much worse, but I also don’t see why this can’t be better. I don’t think I’m asking for much and it especially hurts that I’ve seen that she is capable of being friendly with others; she just chooses to treat me like this.
I just don’t want to make it worse.”
Another User Comments:
“I think you need to redirect your energy to other people. Being roommates doesn’t equal friendship and she doesn’t have an obligation to be your friend. I used to have roommates I wish never talked to me. But I do also enjoy knowing and having fun with people I live with. She could be dealing with depression or anxiety or many things.
I ignored some girls I used to live with because I was in an abusive relationship (long distance so none of my roommates met the guy). I’m sure to them, it seemed like I just stayed in my room and didn’t do anything. The reality was I had such anxiety and was constantly in fight or flight mode. I could not even imagine talking to my roommate, let alone become friends with them.
I would suggest asking her if you can set a time to talk about basic roommate stuff. She may say no and that is okay. You will have to adjust your expectations. And if that relationship isn’t what you want, you will have to move on. I would see it as a blessing. You have a house to yourself essentially. Not everyone wants to be friends and that is okay.
She has the right to ignore you and you have the right to ask her questions when she is out of her room. But I think you will have to adjust. She isn’t your old roommate. She is her own person and may just want to be left alone. I know roommates I’ve had that talked way too much and didn’t get the hint I did not want a relationship or friendship or even a roommate ship.
Decide if this is a dealbreaker for you.
Can you get your emotional needs filled with other people? Can you adjust to living essentially alone? If this is a dealbreaker, I would move on to another place. But no one can guarantee you will get along or not. I think it’s important to label your needs and you can express that to her. But try to respect her boundaries as well. It looks like she doesn’t want to be friends and that is nothing to do with you. Like I mentioned before, we do not know what she is dealing with. I hope you are able to figure out what you need from this situation and make it work for you.” theravesholm88
3. He Had A Relapse
“I had a roommate my freshman year of college at a Christian university who was quite the character. Rehabilitated, he decided to become a youth pastor.
The first couple of weeks of school were fine. Then, one night on the dorm floor, a couple of the guys decided to bust out boxing gloves. I took one hit to the face, and I was done. I don’t like pain and have no issue not suffering it when I don’t have to just to prove something.
But this guy, with a bit of an ego, couldn’t back down from showing everyone how good he was at fighting. Unfortunately, at 5’5″ and 135 lbs, he was fighting a guy very literally close to twice his size.
They grappled a bit and then WHAM! The big guy lands one punch to his shoulder that knocks him against the wall.
CUT TO SPRING SEMESTER
The roommate was recovering after getting surgery.
He was sleeping through his classes and generally failing out of school. He’s also started growing “lavender” in the closet under a desk lamp. Oh yeah, and he got a job working at a jewelry shop at the mall, so he’s not a complete failure.
Spring break comes along and I go on a trip with my family. When I return, having lived near the school, I came back early.
Before I even got to my room, people were stopping me in the other buildings asking me if I’d been back to the dorm yet. When I got to my dorm hall, the guys on my floor were incredibly flustered.
“The Residence director is looking for you.”
“Security raided your room.”
So, being the innocent, good-natured, formerly homeschooled 18-year-old that I was, I went to the residence offices.
They sat me down.
They told me there had been a report of illegal stuff in my room, so they had to search it.
I genuinely didn’t know what they were talking about.
So they believe that it wasn’t MY stuff and say “Look, can you go through your room, and if you find anything odd, let us know.”
I re-ransacked my room. I opened a drawer in one of the dressers and, in it, I find $10,000 worth of jewelry in the form of a number of different rings, earrings, and necklaces all still fitted with price tags.
“That’s odd,” I think to myself, and report it to my RA.
About a week later, I’m studying at Starbucks the next town over when I get a call from a guy on my dorm floor telling me to come back ASAP because the police are there questioning my roommate.
When I got back to campus, he was in the room, in tears, freaking out.
Loss Protection had caught on to him stealing and was giving him through the weekend to return everything. Only, he couldn’t find a pair of earrings. (I later learned he pawned them.)
As you might expect, the school expelled him and he went to jail. As a result of his surgery, he had relapsed on stuff. As a result of his hospital debt, he had started selling stuff (confirmed by other students later) and committed jewelry theft.
One punch can destroy your life.
Somehow, he still had the guts to use me as a reference on an employment application later on as they called me to ask what I thought of him.”
2. She's An All Around Bum
“In October I (32F) got a roommate (54F). She seemed nice enough. We chatted often and we also video chatted. We did not meet in person because she lived far away but she was coming here to finish school. I asked her if she has dependable income and she said she did (and thankfully she did).
So she moved in. The first thing I noticed was very little she moved in with.
She literally had 2 boxes. That’s it. I thought it strange a middle-aged woman had literally no furniture at all. She said she was going to buy some furniture. Ok. No problem.
The apartment I live in is nice. I take pride in it. I have put so much money into it to make the place enjoyable and comfortable. Sofas, TVs, awesome kitchen appliances. I really worked hard to get to where I’m at.
And our counters are super huge, so my roommate has a TON of room to add her things….but if she didn’t, then she was more than welcomed to use my stuff. I’m pretty relaxed when it comes to that stuff as long as you clean it you can help yourself to it!
First Red Flag – Sofa as Bed
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I noticed she was sleeping on my couch. A lot.
Using the decorative pillows as sleeping pillows all the time. The first couple of nights, I figured she fell asleep watching tv. Then it became habitual. Long story short, I forced her to buy a cheap mattress on Amazon and put it in her room after two months of doing this. (She initially had an air mattress, but she would sneak into the living room when I fell asleep to sleep on the couch every night.)
Second Red Flag – Smoking
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I came home early one day from a leadership conference.
She had assumed I worked a normal day (out of the door at 9:30 am and back home at 10 pm). However, this time, I walked in at 2 pm. She had a stranger in the house with her (remember, she’s from many states over), and the apartment was full of smoke. I told her she can’t be doing this because our complex will kick both of us out and how she is lucky we do not have a downstairs neighbor.
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The dishwasher broke and a mechanic came to fix it (a couple of weeks later).
I received a complaint that my roommate reeked of smoke and so did the kitchen when he was installing the dishwasher.
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New neighbors moved in. Three weeks after they moved in, I received another notice that my roommate was still smoking. The neighbors smelled it coming from our vent system.
At this point, I decided to work from home. For now, I had to babysit a 54-year-old woman because her screw-ups would land me in trouble too.
Now, back in January, I had a private discussion with my leasing office.
They told me they did not put her name on the lease. They told me when she came into the office to sign the lease; they opted for her to take a background check and fill out the occupancy form instead (her smelling like smoke again gave my landlord a better judgment. This happened back in October when she signed the papers before I know this woman was foolish).
So we made plans for her removal.
Long story short, we can’t remove her. Thank God she’s still paying rent though. She gets social security and as I said before, she doesn’t have an issue with that. But I noticed other things.
All my plates and silverware started to disappear. One day I opened her bedroom door to see if I can find any, they were all there.
Third Red Flag: She’s gross.
I say this because she has not showered in three weeks.
She has not washed her clothes in two weeks. She still has the same travel-size tide pod bag she came with back in October (so that tells me she has washed clothes less than 9 times since October).
She smells like socks, pee, and fish. I am stuck with her.
So to recap:
54F Roommate:
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Monopolized the sofa as a bed for two months
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Smoked in the home after repeatedly telling her not to
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She baths about once a month.
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She has never cleaned any part of the common areas of the apartment (never ever).
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She smells like fish, socks, and pee.
She literally believes she is a Generation Z (she doesn’t want to hear about how it’s impossible).
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She still does not have any furniture. The only thing she has to her name is a coffee pot, a $100 Amazon mattress, and a couple of suitcases (she’s still borrowing my lamp).
And the awful thing? I have another roommate who is ready and willing to move in now. And I vetted out of him. He seems ok enough.”
1. She Made Me Feel Anxious In My Own Home
“My personality has completely changed. I’ve always considered myself a chill and easy-going person. But my roommate’s aggressiveness, micromanaging, hypocritical-ness has completely changed me. Sometimes I’m uncomfortable standing up for myself, but I have NEVER felt someone use me/walk all over me in this way before. I feel anxious 24/7.
I am moving out in 2 and a half weeks, but I don’t think I’m going to feel magically better once I leave.
I’m worried that these tendencies that I’ve developed around her have leaked (a little bit) into other relationships.
We were casual friends prior to living together. We were looking for a place at the same time, so we decided to look together and we found a BEAUTIFUL two-bedroom apartment.
There were some red flags. I knew she had a very jealous/angry side to her. For example, she once told me that I “ruined my life” when I broke my nose because I have a slight bump on it now.
It sounds bad, but she will make these comments in a sweet voice and laugh. If you call her out for something she says, she’ll tell you you’re “too sensitive”/”it was just how she was raised.” She was also OBSESSED with finding a partner at the time and would make comments about how “girls are all competing for the same men” and “that’s why we’re so mean to each other.” She was going on 3-5 romantic meetups a week and would become emotionally distraught when a man didn’t immediately want to go out with her.
It’s my own fault for not recognizing these red flags, and I did know that there was always something “off” about her personality, but we both got along great in other areas and had a very similar lifestyle between schools/sports/studying.
I definitely overlooked the bad stuff.
In the beginning of us living together, she would do little things that were “off.” If I left a book in the living room, it was moved to my bedroom. If she thought the temperature in my bedroom was too warm, she would go in while I was in the shower and change it. When I spoke to her about changing the temperature in my bedroom (to tell her to stop), she fought it a bit saying that my temperature was “wrong,” but she stopped doing it.
I’m still shocked that there are people who think that is normal behavior.
Things around cleaning slowly started escalating. I would get texts while I was at work telling me to clean the kitchen or bathroom. This was not (initially) a big deal to me at all. I’m a very clean person, and to be honest, I was happy that I was living with someone who also cared about keeping spaces clean.
But then I noticed something strange: she would NEVER clean. I would come home and her dishes/food would be everywhere, water all over the floor in the bathroom, chip crumbs all over the floor. When I began asking her to clean (in the exact same manner she would ask me), she would point out things that I had done wrong that week, such as not putting the garbage out when it was full (which I don’t even think I actually neglected to do).
To this day, a year later, she has not deep-cleaned the apartment ONCE but has stopped asking me to do so.
Things got worse when she got a partner (21M). Immediately, it was like he lived at our house. I had a problem with this—I spoke to her about it, and ended up asking for no more than three nights a week and to give me a heads up when he was coming over.
(She had previously asked me not to have guests over on certain nights; I always respected this.) She thought this was fair and agreed but never followed through. I reminded her about our agreement over and over again but was met with excuse after excuse. Finally, she admitted what she had been thinking the whole time: our lease has no information about guests, so she’s free to do what she wants and it doesn’t matter how I feel.
She also accused me of being jealous because I’m single.
At this time, she also dropped out of school and switched to part-time work so that she could spend more time with her partner.
At this time, I also learned that she was gossiping about my personal life behind my back. I only learned this because her partner’s family/friends would always come over, and they would ask questions about VERY personal things that they shouldn’t have known anything about.
She would constantly text me while I was in class or at work with things I needed to do.
Sometimes simple things like putting out our recycling… but it was always strange because she didn’t work very much and I was already taking care of the cleaning around the house, so why was she texting me a list of chores? It got to the point, though, where if I didn’t respond (I keep my phone on do-not-disturb during the day), she would blow up my phone.
I would return to multiple missed calls/texts. I always explained to her that I don’t check my phone while at work, but this behavior never stopped.
Now that we aren’t friends, things have gotten worse. I was good about sticking up for myself. I’m generally a pretty easygoing person, so I don’t mention things unless they bother me and are easily fixable. In retrospect, I think I should have told her to stop micromanaging me around the apartment and questioned why she held me to different standards than herself, but it wasn’t until all of her little behaviors piled up that I really started to see her character.
Things escalated when I stood up for myself about a month ago about a new issue.
She and her partner always hog the living room—they watch TV every evening, and sometimes even all day when he’s over. They will make out and whisper to each other and generally make it impossible for me to be in the same room—I expect they do this on purpose. One night, I had some free time to watch a movie and she asked me to go to my room, so THEY could watch one.
I said no (obviously), and she got angry/aggressive and ended the conversation by telling me that I was no longer allowed to touch any of her furniture in the apartment. I finished my movie but was legitimately so confused about the conversation, so I brought my TV into my bedroom so it wouldn’t be on “her” TV stand; she has since put her bedroom TV there.
Everything in the living room is now “hers” except for the armchairs (we bought the couch together).
When we moved in, we split things as equally as possible. She did bring in some of the larger furniture pieces (such as the dining table and desk); while I brought things like the microwave, toaster, dishes, etc. Although the things she brought into the apartment are physically larger, I’m confident that the price of these items is pretty equal, especially because I have also purchased the majority of the cleaning supplies/hand soap/paper towels/etc.
Of course, I confronted her about this and explained that if she didn’t want me to use anything of hers, she should move those things into her bedroom.
She said no. I said that she couldn’t touch my things either, then, to be fair, and that’s when she gave in, followed by an off-handed comment about how she should charge me whenever I touch something of hers.
In all of my roommate situations prior to this one, I have NEVER fought about whose stuff was whose. Things in the common space were simply shared (within reason).
And to top it all off, she was unhappy that I started working half the day in the living room.
She thought I was spending too much time out there. Now that SHE is working from home, it’s completely okay for her to work in the living room all day.
It has gotten to the point where I don’t feel comfortable in my own apartment. I’m anxious 24/7. I can’t stop thinking about how hypocritical she is. It is so mentally draining. I spend all day in my bedroom and listen for her to go outside/into her bedroom before I use the washroom or grab food (80% of the time). She’s made me feel like the apartment is not mine (even though I know it is just as much mine as it is hers). When I do need to leave my bedroom, I walk past them in complete silence because it’s so awkward.”
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