<p>Ok, so my school never had a roommate preference questionnaire and I got matched with a roommate completely opposite of me. He does no studying, fails his classes and just sits in the room all day on the internet. I tend to go to bed around midnight, and even though both of us have to get up around 8 am every morning he goes to bed around 2-4 am. He is reasonable enough to turn the lights off, but his computer screen still brights up the room pretty heavily, so I just sleep with an eye mask on and ear plugs in. However, after he goes to be at 3 am and wakes up at 8 am, he goes to his first class and then comes back to the room and sleeps all day. Sometimes i am not in the room, but sometimes I am and have my small desk light on doing work. Say I go to the bathroom or step out of the room, I come back to find all the blinds closed, dark and he turns off all my stuff including lights. Is this reasonable for him to just turn my stuff off like that (even when I am in the room) because he wants to sleep in the middle of the day? I don't complain when he is up until 4 am some nights with the lights on.</p>
<p>Have you tried talking to him about it? If you’re gone for more than, say, 10 minutes, I wouldn’t blame him for assuming you’re out and wanting it darker. Maybe you can get some sort of system in place, so he knows when you’re coming right back and when you’re going out. Alternatively, you could suggest he try getting an eye mask if the lights are bothering him, he’d sleep better and you’d get more light.</p>
<p>I’m in a similar situation currently. All my roommate does is sit in the room playing on his computer and sleep. He goes to sleep around 2am, skips classes, fails classes, etc. and sleeps literally the entire day.</p>
<p>Your roommate shouldn’t touch your belongings, whether that’s your desk lamp or anything else. It’s breaching your boundaries, and I would speak to the RA about your issues.</p>
<p>You should talk to him about this. My roommate doesn’t have an eye mask and tends to go to bed an hour or two earlier than I do, usually. But on weekends, she often stays out late at parties, whereas I tend to go to bed earlier to get an early start on my next day - and the moment she walks in, I wake up and it takes me hours to fall back asleep. After we talked to each other about our sleeping schedules, we not only felt more comfortable with each other but also figured out how to respect each other’s sleeping hours. If I wanted to stay up studying later, I would go to a study lounge, or some other space, so she could keep the lights off. And she would try to come back at a reasonable time if I texted her on the weekends, letting her know I’m going to bed. Communication is the key. Are there any spaces you guys can study, other than in your own room? Could he surf the web elsewhere? If, after you guys talk, there are still problems, perhaps go to your RA for advice.</p>
<p>Whether or not your roommate is doing well in classes, I think what matters is that you’re uncomfortable with him touching your things and staying up late with the computer screen on. The best thing to do is just set up a system and tell him that it bothers you. I’ve had horrible roommate issues in the past and they’ve been due mainly to communication problems. If you don’t speak up, it will just build up over time and that is NEVER a good thing.</p>
<p>Parent here. I would agree with the others. You need to talk to your roommate about the things that are bothering you. You can’t solve problems without communicating. It makes no sense to go to the RA until you have a talk with him.</p>