<p>I believe that something could have gone down. Since D is shy, and want to make friends, something could have happen in the room and D did not stand up for her RM’s privacy out of fear that she would no longer have her new found friends or they may think that she was being up tight.</p>
<p>Marian, in D’s dorm, it was posted what time house keeping was coming to do bathrooms (no extra fee for cleaning). Students were told not to leave dirty towels on the floor. If they could not access the rest rooms for cleaning you would get fined.</p>
<p>I have to say that doing things like cleaning toilets, picking up ones own stuff and living with other people is good for most of us. Honestly, will our own precious snowflakes have the money when they are 25 and living somewhere far awayto hire a maid? I say once you can vote, you can clean the porcelain. I hope that none of the schools that my own DS has on his list offers a cleaning service, since he needs to learn to do this himself. I always thought that learning ones tolerance for filth was an essential part of college living.</p>
<p>mizzbee…agreed. And the school my son plans to go to has suites with one bath for 2 kids. And they are responsible for their own housekeeping, no maid service. But he cleans bathrooms including the toilets at home, so it is not a new chore to him.</p>
<p>D lives in a 2BR/2 bath apartment with roommate (grad school). They clean their own apt (including toilets). However, during finals fall term and at the end of the school year before leaving to come home, they do hire someone to clean the apt.</p>
<p>sybbie719, I think that is a great solution. I know that would love to hire someone around tax time (when I am at my busiest) to come in to clean, but DS has one more season of servitude to go.</p>
<p>I think not sitting on the bed of someone you don’t know well without that person’s invitation should be a common sense courtesy- I’ve had a roommate who absolutely disliked people sitting on her bed. It’s also not completely unreasonable for a roommate to request that you don’t bring a whole bunch of people to the shared room when she’s not there. After all, her bed is her private space, and she might’ve kept things lying around that she didn’t want strangers to see or go through.</p>
<p>Possible solution to the bathroom cleaning: Scrubbing Bubbles new toilet cleaning system. I stuck one in the master bathroom to try it out, and I’m sold! You start with a clean fixture, just step on the floor pump twice a day and everything stays clean. We’ve been using it about 10 days or so, and I like it. We have hard water, and this thing really works. I’d suggest RM either share the cleaning or share the cost.</p>
<p>I just asked my D a few questions about the “situation” with her RM. She said that her guests did not disturb any of her RM’s possessions. They simply sat on her RM’s bed. She saw the picture on my D’s FB page. However, she said that her RM is a “germaphobe” and the thought of people sitting on her bed upset her. That would explain why she “doesn’t do toilets” either. I recall on move-in day that her RM’s mother bought a hands-free liquid soap dispenser and a GALLON jug of antibacterial soap. Now I think I am getting a clearer picture (Felix from the Odd Couple).</p>
<p>My D said that it’s okay if she can’t have friends over. She can just visit them in their dorm room. She doesn’t mind doing the toilet either. She said that other than these two things, they have been getting along fine. I think my D needs to be more assertive, but I kept that to myself.</p>
<p>“It’s also not completely unreasonable for a roommate to request that you don’t bring a whole bunch of people to the shared room when she’s not there. After all, her bed is her private space, and she might’ve kept things lying around that she didn’t want strangers to see or go through.”</p>
<p>I am sorry, but I have to disagree with you. As a parent who is paying a hefty sum for room and board, I do not think it is reasonable for a roommate to dictate to that extent how my daughter lives in their shared space, provided the established rules are being followed. If housing allows visitors, then she can have visitors. It is absolutely an unreasonable demand to not be allowed to have visitors in a shared room for 50% of the week, just because the roommate chooses to go home on the weekends. If she doesn’t want people on her bed, that is a reasonable expectation. But nobody in the room while she is away, that is controlling behavior. If this girl needs that much privacy, she should be in a single room.</p>
<p>Just like you the RM’s family is also paying a heft sum for room and board and it would be unreasonable for either RM to be uncomfortable or to feel marginalized in their shared space. This means that RM has the right to peaceful enjoyment of their shared space.</p>
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<p>Based on your statement, it is a reasonable request not to have visitors 50% of the week because it means that they are having visitors 50% of the week.</p>
<p>Call me the opposite of germaphobe, but I don’t even see the big deal about sitting on a roommate’s bed. I would respect that boundary if asked, but I think it’s kind of silly.</p>
<p>“However, she said that her RM is a “germaphobe” and the thought of people sitting on her bed upset her. That would explain why she “doesn’t do toilets” either. I recall on move-in day that her RM’s mother bought a hands-free liquid soap dispenser and a GALLON jug of antibacterial soap.”</p>
<p>Umdclassof80, is your D’s roommate one of my old roommates :D? I once shared a room with someone who was honestly so much like what you’ve described, including the “germaphobic-ness” and the part about antibacterial liquid soap! (wasn’t automatic dispensing though) But she was wonderful in numerous ways and I think the two of us got along fine, even though she must have resented occasionally my lack of thoughtfulness. Now that we’re not roommates anymore, I think I’m starting to miss having her around. </p>
<p>A dorm common room would be a great place to meet up with friends on the weekend. Your daughter sounds like someone mature and thoughtful- I’m sure it’ll all work out for the two of them.</p>
Whoa - and will the roomie try to ban your D from her own room when your D catches a cold? This roomie needs a reality check and the sooner the better and having to clean her own toilet mess and tolerate normal visitors to the room would be a good start.</p>
<p>I have a thing about people sitting on my bed too. The idea of someone possibly sitting on a dirty floor, grass, or whatever dirty surface before sitting on my bed, reallly grosses me out. I don’t have allergy, but doctors have advised people with allergy to take a shower before going to bed, so no “dirty” would get on pillow or comforter. Since I have such a phobia myself, if I were OP’s roommate, I would put a cover on my bed before I go home on weekends.</p>
<p>D1 had a roommate (best friend) for 3 years who was very obsessive about neatness of their room. Everything had to put in the same place, and nothing could be out of place. She would actually re-arrange D1’s dresser so her hair brush, makeup would all be put in the right/same location. She would put away D1’s shoes, books, clothes. D1 tried to do the best she could initially, but at one point, she said to her roommate that it wasn’t ok to touch her stuff. Some how those two compromised and worked everything out. By end of 3 years, they were like a married couple.</p>
<p>Not wanting to clean toilets, and expecting your RM to clean the toilet always because you “don’t do toilets” is two different things! If cleaning service were available, that would be ideal. But it does not sound like it is.</p>
<p>Exactly. The RM is essentially saying, “I’m too good to clean the toilet that I use, but you’re not.”</p>
<p>Those words from the roomie are very telling…this is a princess. If she offered to hire someone to do it, that would be different.</p>
<p>* In some instances, if the students live in a suite with a shared bath or if an individual room has its own bathroom, housekeeping personnel do not clean that bathroom because they would have to go through student rooms to get access to it, and they’re not allowed to go into student rooms. *</p>
<p>Exactly. When there are community bathrooms, then the bathrooms are cleaned by a service. When students choose “en suite” bathrooms, the schools often do not provide cleaning. Perhaps the students can hire a service, but the schools are often reluctant because the service would have to go thru bedrooms.</p>
<p>My D had a strange roommate freshman year, and D would loved to have had friends visit her in her room … but mostly she went to her friends’ rooms. They understood. D’s room did not have a bathroom, but it did have a sink. D was the only one who cleaned it - it would not have been cleaned, otherwise, as D found out when she waited to see if her roommate would take a turn. D was pretty passive in this situation … she would not put up with things the way they were today, but it is four years and a lot of growing up later.</p>
<p>OP, since your D’s roommate does leave every weekend, it makes sense for her to have friends over. They are not disturbing the roommate when the roommate isn’t there. I would suggest buying several folding lawn chairs for the friends to sit on. They won’t take up much room - they can be stored under the bed or behind something. The fact that they are there will signal to the roommate that there will be adequate seating in the future.</p>
<p>If the issue is that the roommate thinks someone will go through her personal items. she might want to get a locker to store them in!</p>
<p>What I find so unreasonable is the demand that no one come over to the room when she is NOT there. I can understand a roomie saying she does not want guests in the room when she is studying or sleeping…but when she is not even on campus? Even if she is a germaphobe…she is not there to be exposed to any germs. And is the D allowed to have friends over when the roomie is present? That will definitely expose her to germs!</p>
<p>I can certainly understand a preference that no one touch her stuff, especially her bed, and that wish should be scrupulously respected.</p>
<p>But both girls are entitled to equal enjoyment of their shared home. And it’s not fair for one girl’s outsized fears to totally eliminate the other’s right to enjoy the space on a reasonable basis.</p>
<p>I feel the same way, but I don’t necessarily think it is a silly request. Then again, never ran into this issue as all my roommates tended to be pretty casual with that stuff. Good thing as I tend to be on the slobby side(piles of books/printouts on floor)</p>
<p>I’m wondering if there is a gendered factor in all this as I have noticed serious stigmatization of boys/young men who were extremely neat and/or germophobic on other more mainstreamed campuses. This was further underscored when a younger friend visited my shared post-college apartment, he insisted on thinking I lived with a woman because one of my roommate’s rooms was so neat, tidy, organized, and tastefully decorated that he couldn’t believe that room actually belonged to a male. His jaw dropped when the roommate in question came back and he was ACTUALLY a he. :D</p>
<p>Fold-up camping chairs at Walmart – under $20. They come with a storage bag. I have bought them for HS graduation presents and S2 took one of our old ones to school this fall.</p>
<p>OP’s D should acknowledge to her RM that it was inconsiderate for D’s guests to cross over into the RM’s personal space, and use this as an opening to renegotiate visits and common-area chores (i.e., the bathroom). </p>
<p>I was an RA in college and a parent called the head of the dorm to complain that their D’s RM had visitors on the weekends while the D was back home in Atlanta. Mind you, the RM in question was very quiet and I hardly ever saw her, much less any visitors, so it’s not like the place was a party palace when the D was absent. Heck, <em>I</em> had a RM move out freshman year because she didn’t like that my BF drove up to visit twice during the quarter and sacked out in a sleeping bag on the floor. And he didn’t even sit on her bed!! :eek:</p>