<p>So I hate confrontations. Hate them. Try to avoid them at all costs. And I really like my roommate, I like living with her, we get along very well -- except for one thing.</p>
<p>She smokes out the window of our room. I'm not sure if she's immune to the smell, but it gets in our room. I left the other morning and noticed that my hair smelled like smoke. Needless to say, I don't like that. I hate the smell of smoke. I hate walking into the room and feeling like it smells like an ashtray. Obviously, I need to say something, but I'm not sure exactly how to approach it. I don't want to sound like an elitist snob "ew, I can't deal with the smell of your smoke," but I can't. My parents are probably coming up tomorrow, and if our room still smells like this, I'm not taking them up. We have windows open and a fan blasting all the time too, which we won't be able to do when it gets colder.</p>
<p>I know most of you would probably just say something, but like I said, I hate confrontations, and I'm wondering if maybe a smoker can tell me how they'd prefer to hear it? Thanks</p>
<p>That's inconsiderate of her. It's not about her being a smoker. She's a rude smoker. So if I told you how I'd prefer to hear it, she probably wouldn't take it the same way, since she isn't the kind of person who respects other people. Smokers may not respect their own health, but most at least show respect for others' health (by taking it outside). So you need to be direct with your roommate. Tell her you do not like the smell of smoke (or cancer for that matter) and would prefer for her not to allow the smell to get into your side of the room. You paid for half that room, and if you want it to be a certain way, you can demand it. Tell her to take it outside. There's no denying smoke is deadly. It's not just smelly, secondhand smoke is cancerous. She has no way to refuse.</p>
<p>Tell her you don't care about her smoking at all but you would prefer not to let the smell get onto your things. That's all</p>
<p>you don't have to be confrontational about it. just be like, "hey, do you mind if you maybe smoke outside? the smell kinda gets in the room". just say it nice...and if she's nice...she shouldn't get mad about that. now if she doesn't comply, i dunno. haha.</p>
<p>If you really don't want to be confrontational say that you are allergic to smoke and have been having trouble lately because she is smoking in the room. Tell her if it didn't effect your health so much it wouldn't be an issue. </p>
<p>If it were me, I would just throw her smokes out the window each time she tried to smoke but thats me. :)</p>
<p>"I hate confrontations" is not going to get you what you want out of life. As long as there are people in this world who will do what they wish provided nobody objects, you're going to have a problem.</p>
<p>I'm going to make the assumption that you live in a dorm. If so you have another valuable resource. Your RA. NOT to fix the problem for you; with any decent training, they'll refuse that if you ask. But RAs are trained to help people on their floor figure out how to resolve conflicts. So after reading the article above go see your RA as a neutral person who can help you role-play the discussion with your roomate. That IS part of their job. Have the RA role-play an easy conversation and a difficult one. Since you say you dislike confrontation this practice will be valuable for you, and you won't be so keyed up when you do it for real. It's like interviewing or most other novel situations; ask any senior and they'll tell you they were all butterflies the 1st one, but after a few they felt much more at ease. Since you have been avoiding confrontation your whole life you're nervous about it, and not only that I'd bet your imagination has far worse encounters than the real world will provide!</p>
<p>And if you don't live in the dorms or don't want to work with the RA, go see the counseling center. Look at their webpage; at almost every college they'll tell you that you can do drop-in to learn how to resolve problems and it's completely confidential/free.</p>
<p>If you're in the dorms, is that even allowed? i'd say just tell her you don't mind her smoking when it's not in the room, but the smell bothers you (maybe say it gives you a headache or something) and you'd appreciate it if she took it outside.</p>
<p>You are paying (most likely) a lot of money to be in that room. You should feel compelled to demand something as simple as "no cigarette smoke in your room." You deserve it.</p>
<p>I don't think she'll mind being asked to smoke outside. She probably doesn't realize that it bothers you and if you just tell her you don't like the smell of the smoke nicely I can't imagine there would be any problem.</p>