Roommate issues-- requesting parent perspective

Parents Forum
1

<p>I posted a version of this in the college life forum too, but I really feel like I need an adult. My mom has given me her input but I don't know if she's right. This is kind of long, but it's kind of a complicated situation I guess.</p>

<p>My roommate has not gone to class since the Wednesday before last. Instead, she spends literally all day long in bed. She gets out at 11pm to go take a shower and check facebook and then goes back. Her story is that she wakes up in the morning for class, goes to the bathroom to brush her teeth and ends up throwing up, and then goes back to bed.</p>

<p>Here are my issues with this. Her alarm is not even going off. She is not waking up for the first time until after 3pm every day. She is still going clubbing on Thursdays, and went home this weekend to go to a birthday party-- she goes home every weekend and goes out with friends and is mysteriously sick again on Monday. I have not seen her get out of bed to throw up once, and I am never gone for more than an hour and a half at a time.</p>

<p>She went to student health and they told her it was probably just stress but offered her something to settle her stomach, which she did not take.</p>

<p>She is a freshman and, as I said, has been going home every weekend-- at Umich, there is PLENTY to do here on weekends, she just won't adjust to being here. She has made no effort to make friends and as such really hasn't made any. She was really popular in high school so the idea that friends are not flocking to her now blows her mind. She had a bad break up right before school started and was so depressed her mom had to carry her from her bed to the bathroom to pee because she just wouldn't get out of bed (sound familiar?) The week before she got "sick," her parents found out she had been going to MSU on weekends to drink and she basically told them, "I AM SO SAD AND I WANT TO COME HOME AND I HAVE NO FRIENDS AND DRINKING IS THE ONLY THING THAT MAKES IT BETTER AND YOU CANT STOP ME."</p>

<p>MY guess is that right now she is either seriously depressed AND/OR trying to scam her parents into yanking her out and letting her come home. I have let her know that I am here for her if she ever needs to talk or needs a friend, when she has mentioned having a hard time adjusting here and whatnot, and I have told my RA about this. I have offered to go to club meetings with her and invited her out with me on a couple occasions, but it never ends up happening on her end-- and we have been getting pretty close so I don't think it's that. If I ever encounter her again when she is conscious I am going to mention medical leave, because she is so going to fail out at this rate and she is either physically or mentally ill right now. I don't know what else I can do without overstepping. Is there something else I should be doing here? I told the RA because I feel like if anything were seriously wrong with her, I might be the only one who stands a chance at noticing before something happens to her, and I didn't want to carry the weight of that responsibility all on my own. But RA hasn't talked to her or anything so I don't know if telling him has changed anything.</p>

<p>And as a secondary issue, how should I react to this in our dorm? She is constantly asleep and the lights are always out. So I haven't been able to study in our dorm anymore or have my friends from home up to visit like I would like, and I am still transitioning here myself and don't have a friends room to go sit in. It is making me crazy that I can never watch tv anymore or study in my room like I like or run the microwave or the vacuum or anything because she is constantly asleep-- whenever I am in the room I am sitting here in silence and in the dark. My mom thinks that after noon and before 10pm I should be able to do whatever I want within reason, but that doesn't seem right to me. I know it's not about me and it's about her getting better, whatever is wrong, but it does still affect me and I need to know how I should be behaving. I don't know what's right here.</p>

2

<p>If RA has done nothing - and I guess you should ask her first - I’d take this up a level. You are right to be worried. Your roommate needs help. This must be very hard on you. I had a depressed roommate one semester and it was pretty miserable. She ended up going home and returning after taking a term off.</p>

3

<p>This girl sounds seriously depressed. My oldest D ended up in a single room freshman year and we had no idea she was sleeping through life until THE END OF THE YEAR. </p>

<p>This RA is a lame duck apparently. Go over her head. AND… I don’t care what anyone else has to say on this subject – BUT figure out a way to get her home number and call her Mother. Unless she has said her parents are abusive (in fact, since her mother knows of her past history, she sounds supportive), do your roommate a favor and get her some real IMMEDIATE help.</p>

4

<p>Go over the RA’s head, to whoever is the next level up. This girl needs HELP - or a swift kick in the butt - but probably help. She sounds very depressed. Calling her parents also sounds like a good plan.</p>

<p>Also, I agree with your mom. Between 10 am and 10 pm you should be able to do whatever you want in your room, within reason. Watch TV, clean, study, TURN A LIGHT ON, open the blinds, etc. (Bringing a friend to the room while your roommate is sleeping might be a bit much.) You are paying for the room, so you have a right to use it and live your life there. Also it might force your roommate to re-enter the world a little bit if she isn’t always in the quiet and the dark. Seeing you live your life might help inspire her to live hers, or at least to realize the difference between a normal person and herself and realize she needs help.</p>

5

<p>Is this the same roommate who was going out with her friends from high school all the time at the beginning of the year?</p>

<p>First, talk to the Resident Director (above the RA). If the RD does nothing (she should probably be talking to the roommate and then contacting the counseling center), then I imagine, based on you description, that your roommate will flunk out after this semester or at the very least end up on a leave of absence. </p>

<p>I actually had a somewhat similar situation over 20 years ago when I was in college. My roommate fell for a guy (not in college) who she was working with, and then when he switched to the night shift, she switched too. She then, of course, started coming in after 3 a.m. and stopped going to classes. She did, in fact, flunk out that semester and was thus not allowed to stay in the dorms. I tried reasoning with her and she would have none of it, although I can’t remember if I talked to the RA or not (who probably would have told me there wasn’t anything she could do anyway since it was not a depression issue and she wasn’t at risk of hurting herself expect for flunking out of school).</p>

<p>I hope things work out for your roommate. Meanwhile, I would probably go elsewhere to study, but if you can’t, I see nothing wrong with turning your desk light on to study during the day and early evening.</p>

6

<p>I don’t know if Modadunn is right about calling roomie’s mom, but you should definitely talk to an adult at college about this. Since the RA is not, apparently, responding, I suggesting calling the counseling department. This girl needs help * now*.</p>

7

<p>Wow. </p>

<p>Clearly, your roommate has significant issues but there is a difference between sympathetic and making her issues your issues. This is your life and your happiness too. Roommates can run the spectrum from lifetime friends to the complete muck-ups. Your situation would be the latter. </p>

<p>It’s time to have the straight talk conversation with your roommate. Lights need to come on, sunlight needs to come in, and normal activity needs to resume. This isn’t her sanctuary of silence, this is your room. If she can’t handle that, tough. If she doesn’t cooperate, elevate the problem until the problem goes away and I mean quickly. RA asleep at the wheel, ask him what the next step is because this needs and deserves resolution. Whether that means she or you needs to be reassigned dorm rooms or she needs to a leave of absence - it needs to be dealt with. </p>

<p>Don’t feel too bad for her. She is taking advantage of you as we speak. The thought that you’re tip toeing around her while she plays dead is sickening to me. That doesn’t mean that I don’t get that she may have serious issues of depression or the like, it means her problems should not be your problems. And no, it is about you and … you are being used. </p>

<p>If she is sick or depressed, there are others older and wiser and more experienced than you to deal with her. Hope that helps.</p>

8

<p>Twisted,</p>

<p>I would also talk to your roommate when she’s awake and tell her that between the hours of x and x, you will have the light on, friends over, etc. This is your college experience too and she’s being selfish…on top of depressed. It may also help her see that there are other things going on around her and she can’t keep hiding her head in the sand.</p>

<p>good luck.</p>

9

<p>No advice to add, just wanted to say (as a mom) I appreciate your maturity in this situation.</p>

10

<p>TK- you are being extremely understanding about your roommate, however you have rights too, so I encourage you to follow the suggestions of the above posters, for the sake of roomie, and yourself.</p>

<p>The sooner the roommate gets professional help, the better. Hiding under her covers is only aggravating her condition, feeding the depression.</p>

<p>Do try raising the shades, turning the lights on, and getting on with your dorm life. You are enabling the roommate by tacitly conforming to her desires. If you have friends in, turn on the music, or do homework, she may actually get up and emerge from her shell. Good luck.</p>

<p>cross-posted w/ cty and chuckle^^.</p>

11

<p>You have gotten great advice…
Your mom is right about the 12p-10p being able to use your room etc…
and getting an adult at the school (up a level–in the housing or student dept ?) is a good idea.
Your roommate is having trouble–and you are good to offer her help.
Be sure to know where her responsibility for herself lies…meaning you can offer friendship, and alert an adult to check this out…but you aren’t responsible for her or her chocies.</p>

<p>You are being very compassionate and wise. Good job!</p>

12

<p>If this is a large University (as I know it is), I think there are going to be a lot of cracks for this girl to fall through as you move up the chain. However, I will offer this idea as well. My son’s suite had an intervention with one of their roommates earlier in the semester. It seems to have worked.</p>

<p>Maybe flunking out is what’s going to happen to this girl, and maybe calling her Mother might seem reactionary, but the fact is… it isn’t that she isn’t going to class, it’s that she’s not living. The school will be in a difficult position in that they, as an institution, cannot violate her privacy with her family. If it were my kid, and as I said it was, I would have appreciated the phone call. She held it together over Christmas break but now, six years later, she was just going deeper and deeper. I will forever wonder how much faster she could have bounced back if anyone had cared enough to inform those who loved her best.</p>

13

<p>You have been a thoughtful and generous roommate. But what is being done/not done is not working. At this point, I wonder if you shouldn’t lay out all your cards to the roommate, telling her you are concerned about her, and since what has been done to date (her student health appt., your talk with the RA, you tip-toeing around in the dark) hasn’t seemed to help, you are going to change how things are being handled.</p>

<p>First, sunlight can help a lot, whether you are dealing with depression or everyday Midwestern life during daylight savings time. Tell her that for both of your sakes, you are going to open the blinds and turn on the lights all day every day in your room. </p>

<p>In addition, get the issue out in the sunlight. Tell her you are going to get her some help, and ask if she has a preference as to whether you talk to her parents first or the residence hall director – or if she would rather make (and attend) an appointment with a mental health counselor at student counseling service. Act on whatever her preference is, calling to make the counseling appointment for her if that is her preference. If she says none of the above, call her parents or visit the residence hall director with your concerns. (If it’s the residence hall director you end up talking to first, state that you believe your roommate is extremely depressed and you are concerned – and are sure the university would be concerned, too – about the possibility of suicide. Make sure you put your concerns in writing, and email and deliver them in person to the Residence Hall director. My guess is that any university now is extremely cognizant of the need to act on concerns about a student being suicidal.)</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

14

<p>Do not be afraid to get in touch with your roommates mother. Chances are, even if it makes her angry with you forever more, it is still the right thing to do. So, maybe a gentle call to her mother that you are concerned, that it appears she is sleeping more than anything and not making it to class, week after week.</p>

<p>I believe that even if you go up the chain, the college cannot call her parents even when they ought to.</p>

15

<p>ReadytoRoll: Yeah, same girl. I guess it was just one high school “friend” that she didn’t know very well and all the kids that girl had met, and when her and my roommate realized they don’t get along at all my roommate gave up and started going home every weekend to see friends that went to community college. She leaves Friday morning after class and doesnt come back til Monday morning. After the drinking argument her parents told her she couldn’t come home every weekend anymore, and she stayed for one weekend, but this weekend she went home again.</p>

<p>I am just sort of afraid to take further action because she is so adamant she just has the stomach flu. I haven’t suggested anything else but keep asking how she’s doing and she’s really sticking to that. I’ve never had any sort of stomach ailment for more than a day or two at a time and the circumstances are all so strange, but I dunno, maybe she is just sick. It just seems so suspicious, but at the same time, we’d be in for a very awkward semester if she ended up having to see the school counselor because I freaked out over stomach flu-- it has come up how much she detests therapy, apparently she has a history of depression (which makes me even more concerned). I’m just afraid I’m overreacting, maybe a week and a half isn’t that long, maybe all the “evidence” I am considering is circumstantial. I just don’t know.</p>

16

<p>Stomach flu, eh? Could she be pregnant?</p>

17

<p>Thats complete BS. Mental health can also affect physical health. Don’t buy it. A week and a half is an extraordinarily long time when it comes to missing classes. My son missed two days and has said the best thing was that he had a weekend to get better (all in all he was down about 4 days). The flu doesn’t last 7 days and if it did, she’d be dehydrated and in the ER. Just saying.</p>

18

<p>TK, I don’t think you are overreacting. If she is genuinely sick than she isn’t well enough to go out drinking. I would talk to her head on whenever you can catch her awake. It is hard to evaluate from a distance whether you should be calling her mother. BUT you definitely need to talk to her. Explain that you are concerned and that her sleeping all the time is affecting you in a negative way. As others have pointed out you should be able to use the room during the day and she needs the sunlight and interaction with others…</p>

19

<p>ellemenope, I had the same thought…</p>

20

<p>It is great that you are so concerned with her feelings. You are handling this in a very mature way.</p>

<p>I think you get to say something like the following: I am concerned that you don’t feel well. But this is my room also, and I’m having trouble studying and socializing and just carrying on with my life because of your need to sleep. So either we work out a compromise where we have quiet time from 11 pm to 9 am but we can use the room for other purposes at all other times, or let’s go talk to the head of housing about your need for a medical accommodation. Maybe you could use the infirmary to sleep in until you feel better- but I can’t go another week not being able to hang out in the room in the afternoons. She will resist taking this to a higher court- but you should feel confident that getting someone other than the RA involved is the right thing to do regardless of the source of her problem.</p>

<p>You can’t and shouldn’t feel responsible for her getting to class, doing her work, flunking out, etc. If she’s seriously depressed a real grown up needs to get involved. If she’s just trying to find a way to get her “get out of jail free card” and go home- that’s her issue, and you can’t make college better for her. And just in case she knows she’s starting to spin downward- she is better off if you tip off the housing/medical folks than if you leave her in bed for another week.</p>