I Don't Like Any of My Roommates

By Domonique Brown on June 21, 2017

I had a friend who would always complain about her roommates. This was a normal occurrence among my friends and I. Most of us merely tolerated our roommates, peaceful coexistence if you will. There are very few people who end up being best friends with their roommates.

However, this particular friend, let’s call her J, year after year, would find something wrong with her roommates. First, they were cool, and then it was something small that happened — an apartment mate doesn’t follow the chore chart, or someone babysat a pet, and she hates pets, or one roommate always comes back too late, eats too loud, lets their alarm ring for hours … the list could go on and on. She would transfer rooms, move to a different apartment, and then call me again talking about the stresses of her new roommates.

It finally dawned on me that though I loved my friend, perhaps she was not so easy to live with. Granted, that doesn’t mean there is anything wrong with you if you are like J. Living with someone is a very personal experience. You’re literally sharing your space with someone. You have to make compromises, put up with annoying things like maybe Sarah has the most annoying chew, or Pharrell’s “Happy” is still her alarm after three years? which is entirely normal; people are annoying (including me). However, it is important to remember that the key is, it isn’t just your space, it’s both of your space, and that means the word that no one likes to hear: compromise.

College is a unique time. You’re going to have roommates that you cannot stand as people but are easy to live with and people that you love that are hard to live with. Take it from me: my junior year, I had a roommate who was very nice, until three of the four apartment mates decided we needed to create a chore chart; she then wrote all of us off the rest of the school year and would walk through the entire apartment moping if someone would bring up that she failed to do her chore that week.

Needless to say, I didn’t get along with her as a person, but she was easy to live with, she stayed out of the way, she would complain, but she would comply. I had another roommate, who I loved, and even hung out with multiple times, but she was not easy to live with; she was, in fact, dirty and never did her chores. I compromised with both of them, one, with her complete lack of cleanliness, and the other, her attitude.

Whether you’re difficult like J or not (I’ll be nice), the most important thing of any roommate situation is to learn to create boundaries but be reasonable. It helps if you don’t look at yourself like you’re the perfect roommate. For me, that meant that even though I was the cleanest, I knew that I wasn’t perfect because my showers were about 20 minutes (which in an apartment of four girls in the morning and one bathroom, is an issue).

We all deal with things we don’t like from our roommates, but as long as it is reasonable and you two have set out rules in the beginning that you both honor, and you try to have open conversations about what bothers you, and you’re not being nitpicky and the “difficult one,” then you can survive these dreadful few years of random roommates until you can finally get your own space!

pexels.com

Follow Uloop

Apply to Write for Uloop News

Join the Uloop News Team

Discuss This Article

Back to Top

Log In

Contact Us

Upload An Image

Please select an image to upload
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format
OR
Provide URL where image can be downloaded
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format

By clicking this button,
you agree to the terms of use

By clicking "Create Alert" I agree to the Uloop Terms of Use.

Image not available.

Add a Photo

Please select a photo to upload
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format