A Cautionary Tale from a College Disaster: The Roommate Ruckus

January 15, 2009     Posted in Reality

dormroom.jpgRoommates – you never know who or what you will get. While some people live blissfully together, others get stuck in a sticky situation. So sticky in fact, the administration in my situation couldn’t even wrap their upper-hand around it to help.


By Charlsie

After first moving into my freshman dorm room that August, I anxiously awaited the arrival of my roommate, Mary (name changed). Finally, she walked in — leaving me with nervousness instead of anticipation. As I started to string my Hello Kitty lights next to my decorated bulletin boards, she started hanging her Hell Boy posters up next to her crucified scarecrow homemade ceramic creation. We were polar opposites (in an e-mail over the summer, she described herself as “stoic” while I replied with “enthusiastic” about myself). But I figured, college is a new experience and I wanted to soak it all in, so I told myself that Mary and I would work out, even if our outside appearances seemed at different ends of the college student spectrum.

But then my belongings started disappearing, and my food somehow made its way into her very own mini-fridge (we had 2 refrigerators for our room because she refused to e-mail me back throughout the summer about who was bringing what – a sign I should have paid attention to back then), and this ultimately started the downward spiral. Despite signing a roommate contract earlier in the semester, she disregarded nearly every single rule and when I called her out on it, she had no response. In fact, she didn’t really say much about anything, making our communication null and void.

One night in November of 2006, she snapped. I was doing my homework when Mary came into the room throwing her stuff down on her bed. Immediately, she started telling me, with a grin on her face, that she had thoughts of killing me and that she hated me. Repeating her thoughts over and over, I not only feared for myself, but for her because she never acted in that manner before, despite her quirkiness. Slowly marching around the room and ripping up paper after paper, Mary started to tear her stuff down while attempting to break a mirror over our rug. I thought I was a part of a college horror film, and I just started waiting for her to levitate off the bed like Regan in The Exorcist.

The next day, I followed protocol by making a report to my RA. Thanksgiving break came and went, and I didn’t hear anything from the Housing and Residence Life administration. After the night of Mary’s breakdown, the room was filled with nothing but a mixture of tension and nervousness. I wanted out. She wanted out. I complained about her. She complained about me. Finally going to talk to the head of housing myself (along with the Dean of Students), I expected immediate relief. Instead, I was pretty much slapped in the face.

Instead of help from the administration, they asked “What did you do to make her act like this?” Replying that I didn’t know that I had such control over someone’s behavior enough to put me in danger, the Head of Housing told me I was just a rude person and that if I could be more accommodating to Mary, we could work out our situation. Mary filed a report that she wanted a new room or roommate, and I followed up with the same report myself. How could it be just my fault when both parties involved wanted the same thing?

Finals came and went, leaving a fresh start in January 2007. It actually took the administration until the second week of January to finally deal with the situation, only after my parents became involved. In fact, once I got my parents involved (something that I think is outlandish considering I’m in college, and I should be able to handle things myself), one of the housing coordinators lied to my mom and said that the situation was already handled. It wasn’t. And then after she finally admitted to her bluff, only then did the administration agree that Mary would be moved out of the room immediately.

I thought her moving out would be a smooth process. But it wasn’t. It ended up being a major ordeal. While the Student Life Administration helped pack up Mary, the Dean of Students stopped by to make sure the situation was being handled appropriately, so it wasn’t stressful on Mary. While packing her up and leaving the room a mess for me to clean, the very administration that promised me as a prospective that everything would be handled respectfully no matter what the situation, was practically laughing in my face.

I was the one to blame. I was the one that made living together unbearable. Never mind Mary threatening to kill me and showing very strange behavior, it was my fault. And the administration was very clear about letting me know their opinion on this. That is when I realized that all students are not treated equally.

No student should EVER feel like a bad situation is their fault. Mary was a nice girl – we were just entirely too different, and that is okay. However, the school made it into a game of picking sides, which is unprofessional. No student should have to live with someone that could endanger their life. No student should deserve their administration doing everything except helping until the last possible moment.

If you are ever in a situation like this, demand immediately (the next day) to talk to the administration. Do not let the situation sit, even if the administration seems lackadaisical in their interest to help. And last but not least, get your parents involved or tell the administration you will because they have a harder time turning away parents than students.

Most of all, even if your rights are taken away, you have to know that you do have them and you need to demand them. Speak up, and don’t stop until you get what you want.

26 Comments on "A Cautionary Tale from a College Disaster: The Roommate Ruckus"

  1. Steve says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 20099:14 am 

    From my experiences, it seems that the random freshmen pairing for dorms usually works out better for guys then girls. Maybe it has to do with how women and men communicate or interact with their own gender? All the horror stories about roommates I've heard has come from women. The worst freshmen pairing I've heard of from guys is my one friend had a roommate who simply never left the room: skipped classes, played video games all the time, and just ordered pizza and delivery food.

  2. Matthew says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 20099:16 am 

    I've heard this story over and over and I am still in complete shock that this could happen in college today. You always hear about these new age programs at colleges for constructively dealing with 'situations' and you expect to have an open and useful administration. Instead, this story highlights the uselessness of a college administration and what could be seen as a criminal mishandling of a potentially dangerous situation. What if the room mate had followed through with her threat? We wouldn't have this columnist to give us a cautionary tale of a college disaster.

  3. Veronica says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 20099:51 am 

    wow, that really is ridiculous how the admin handled your situation. i don't think i would have gone back for sophomore yr if i had been in your shoes. i had a terrible roommate freshman yr too, smoked waaaaaay too much pot and stole my credit card, but at least she never threatened my life. glad you survived to tell the tale.

  4. H says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 200911:24 am 

    I seriously feel for you. I had a similar situation freshman year and the girl edited AIM conversations to say I threatened her. Fortunately, I had the conversations saved on my computer and after showing them to Student Life kicked her out of my room and put her somewhere else.

    The worst thing is the people that seem normal at first. I had another bad egg last year, but she seemed completely cool/normal. It turned out she was bipolar a compulsive liar, not to mention filthy. Girls kind of suck.

  5. H says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 200911:26 am 

    I seriously feel for you. I had a similar situation freshman year and the girl edited AIM conversations to say I threatened her. Fortunately, I had the conversations saved on my computer and after showing them to Student Life she was kicked out of the room and put somewhere else.

    The worst thing is the people that seem normal. I had another bad egg last year, but she seemed completely cool/normal. It turned out she was bipolar and a compulsive liar, not to mention filthy. Girls kind of suck.

  6. Madison says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 200911:54 am 

    I went through an EXTREMELY similar situation this year!!!! My roommate was also a thief and once (without asking for my permission) lent a clothing item of mine to ANOTHER PERSON and took pictures of it and put them on facebook. I complained and the administration handled it absolutely horribly. I would never have considered transferring (as I'm in the process of doing now) because of my roommate experience alone, but the way the higher-ups handled things was truly disgusting. After this year they can't have my diversity or good grades for their statistics, but I WILL help their freshman retention rate go down ;)

  7. Sam says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 200912:28 pm 

    I seriously cannot believe how your University handled this. I had a bad experience with a roommate last week. I went in on Monday and complained about how horrible it was and that afternoon they had a new room all set up for me. Your story just blows my mind and I'm so sorry to hear you had to go through that.

  8. d says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 20091:16 pm 

    i had a similar situation my freshman year, my roommate who was my best friend got a boyfriend who i wasn't a huge fan of considering he moved into our room. well eventually he threatened me and the school put a restraining order against him so he wasnt allowed on my floor but then my roomie moved out because aparently i threatened her or something. her manipulative boyfriend convinced her to use every argument i used against him against me which sucked. but luckily i was really close with the administration so it got handled really well.

    on the other hand, two of my friends who are roomies this year got into a fight and can't stand to live with eachother and the admin hasn't done anything about it and it has been going on since october. so that kind of sucks

  9. Jacks says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 20091:29 pm 

    Oh God, my university was the same way. They wouldn't do shit about anything until your parents got involved (they only want to hear it from whoever is paying the bills.)

  10. jessica says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 20095:43 pm 

    my friend is in the same situation. her roomate is violent, has a VERY hostile history, and steals her stuff ALL the time. the thing is, since she lives in a campus apartment, as long as she doesn't actually do anything to her and pays rent, she can't be kicked out. im seriously scared for her, and the dean of students can't do a thing about it until something bad happens. THAT is a bad situation

  11. Mazuba - Westchester says:
    Thu, 15th Jan 200911:18 pm 

    Wow.I will be transferring colleges in the fall 2009 and all these room mate stories have me freaked out.

  12. snarktastic says:
    Fri, 16th Jan 20094:13 am 

    i'm not entirely sure why you waited until the next day to do something. if she was threatening your life, you should have gone to your RA and had campus safety called. extreme? yes, but so is threatening your life. the one thing i learned working with admin is that sometimes you need to be a pain in the ass. they weren't accommodating you because you allowed them to walk all over you.

    that's a horrible situation and it's good that you got out, but if it's as bad as you say, that's not something to wait until the morning.

  13. ALLY says:
    Fri, 16th Jan 20096:15 am 

    reslife ain't doin' shit for me.

  14. mal says:
    Fri, 16th Jan 20098:42 am 

    so ive never had my life threatned by a roomie, and i dont live on campus, but yeterday my roommate asked me to light a match for her because she couldnt do it on her own. she was "scared" of them. What the fuck?! like, really? really? so i dont have horror stories per se, but im super annoyed with her alllll the time. This doesnt discount the fact that she also spilled water all over my computer and did nothing about it. my computer soaked for god knows how long in water, while i was in class. Like, she lacks common sense… ugh. it could be worse i suppose…:)

  15. sara says:
    Fri, 16th Jan 200912:26 pm 

    I had a roommate that threatened my life too! She was posting threats to bomb the school and kill me in my sleep all over facebook, and as soon as I saw that I went to the room, locked all my shit in my friends rooms and dipped out. Thank god for futons. The administration I felt didn't take the threats seriously since they were online, and I couldn't get a restraining order for that same reason. But they were DEATH THREATS. Um, I'm sorry, but no one should have to deal with that. If Housing is a bitch about it, call the police. IMMEADIATELY. That's what I did, and that got results.

  16. oomph says:
    Fri, 16th Jan 20094:15 pm 

    I had a similar experience in a suit-style residence with a mentally ill roommate. The administration acted as though she had more rights than we (her roommates) did. Because of her illness, it was necessary that she be accommodated in every way possible. Nevermind that her self-destructive behaviour was making living in that dorm hellish for the rest of us. We complained to administration for months, but the most they ever did was suggest WE go to counselling to learn how to better deal with HER. She was eventually removed from residence, but not by an act of administration – her mother put her in a psychiatric treatment facility after her second suicide attempt.

    Needless to say, I live off-campus now.

  17. TAnya says:
    Sun, 18th Jan 200910:36 am 

    I went to a boarding school where a similar problem occured. Administration did the same thing like in the story and needless to say I went to another boarding school. Never went back………..

  18. C says:
    Sun, 18th Jan 200911:59 am 

    I had a similar horrible experience! (At least no death threats…) My first semester, I had constant problems with a roommate I think had some mental issues. She slept with her baby blanket and used to sit on her futon (Which took up the whole room and she didn't allow anyone to sit on, BTW) for what seemed like days, watching kids TV programming, not moving at all. She used to stare at me while I was trying to sleep and she was DIRTYYYY (we got bugs in the room three times because she wouldn't take out her trash). I moved out eventually, but it was really difficult because it seemed like none of the administrators could do anything! Luckily, my next roommate was really awesome. I just try to avoid that girl now. (unfortunately, we wound up in the same class once… Another story entirely!) I'm so glad I live off-campus now!!

  19. Tiffany says:
    Sun, 18th Jan 20092:13 pm 

    Wow…and I thought my old roommate was bad!

    The only problem I had with her was that she would masturbate…loudly, might I add…every night. No joke. I brought it up once, asking her if she has to do it EVERY night, and she acted like she didn't know what was going on.

    Me and my neighbors…who I resorted to talking to about the situation…came to the conclusion that she was doing it in her sleep.

    Regardless, I wanted out of there. Seriously; who wants to deal with that?!

  20. Charlsie - Hollins U says:
    Mon, 19th Jan 20099:05 pm 

    All these roommate stories have been so crazy to hear. I think that bad roommate situations are everywhere, but school's often cover them up so it's something that student's don't worry too much about when they enter into the college.

    Roommates seem to be something that you never know what you will get until it seems too late to tell, and I wish it wasn't like that – especially during such a time as freshman year. But I will admit, dealing with the roommate situation helped me prepare myself for future bumps along the road.

  21. Alluv Tyler says:
    Sat, 31st Jan 20099:09 pm 

    Just to clarify some things, not everyone has lovely experiences, and although we would all love to have things go our way, schools are usually responsible for the better of the student body as a whole. Although I am sorry for what you experienced, you can't strictly blame the administration, no matter how disrespectful they may have been. I've had a horrible roommate too, that stole everything from food, shampoo, clothes, money, and I would come back to my dorm to find things broken. Some people are just generally jerks, and being new to college and living on your own is harder for some to adjust to than others. I'm glad you took the matter to a higher authority, even if it wasn't handled correctly, but it sounds like you are still bitter about the situation, and if you just let it go, life would be so much easier!

  22. maria says:
    Sun, 1st Feb 20098:43 pm 

    good god I hated my roommate from last year. it was not as bad as your personal story but I came to college thinking that I would really be able to blossom…. make new friends, learn, and really turn my life around. but it was nothing like that. she was the bossiest, bitchiest, shithole around and i'm gladd I don't have to see her anymore. I'm living on my own next year.

  23. tina says:
    Thu, 26th Mar 20097:45 pm 

    What happened to you is terrible! but i'm glad that you were able to get out of it. I lived with a pathological liar last year who lied to me about everything and stole my things (and subsequently lied when i confronted her) and it drove me insane (literally). And I went up to my RA about it and then she directed me to the Resident Hall Advisor who told me to 'talk to her about it because that's what adults do' and basically told me there was no way I could switch my rooms. So, I 'talked to her about it like adults would' and i thought everything was okay. After winter break, everything was the same again with the lying and stealing. It drove me to the brink and I had to go get therapy after living with her.

    I'd say to anyone who is currently in such a situation to not let others deny you the right to change your room. Don't let someone tell you what they told me. I was naive and didn't know what to do but now I know I should've pushed on and spoke to a higher authority so I wouldn't have to go through such trauma living with my roommate.

    So don't be afraid to speak up and do anything possible to get yourself out of the situation because no matter how bothersome or long the process may be, as long as you don't have to forcefully endure it.

  24. Ace says:
    Mon, 23rd Nov 20094:55 pm 

    My current roommate seemed ok when I met her, but I knew deep down something was off. I ignored it cause I was desperate, but the first day she was in the apartment I walked in to find her wearing my favourite earrings. Things didn't stop there, her interesting stories became completely outlandish and one night my other roommate and I(at the urging of several of our creeped out friends) google the symptoms of a pathological liar, we literally could have written it. Since then I've confronted her about the stealing(which has continued) she vehemently denied it despite my finding my stuff in her purse. At this point, I'm just trying to avoid her, I've never had such an uncomfortable, shitty situation.

  25. Lauren says:
    Wed, 9th Dec 200910:12 am 

    It doesn't happen to just freshmen… I'm a junior…

    I'm dealing with an extremely similar situation myself… My room-mate seemed nice as could be at first, but then things changed after the room-mate agreement was signed. Given I live in the "Coastal Empire" of Georgia, it gets hot and humid here… She often would jack up the heater to 85 degrees on hot days, would call a CA if I so much as tried to alter the thermostat, or made any sort of noise that bothered her (typing on my laptop, having a coughing fit… you name it, she would complain)… Housing at my college sides with her everytime, despite the evidence I have against her lies. I have tried to be mature about it, requesting mediation hearings to resolve the situation peacefully. But to no avail. She also has been known to make veiled threats against me, one of which is currently being handled by the campus police… It's really sad how much colleges choose to pick sides, rather than play a neutral party. But I do have the police and witnesses on my side, so hopefully things work out. I do not hate her, but what she has become. I would rather not kick her out, as I try to give her chances to change her ways. *sigh*

  26. Andreea says:
    Sat, 21st Apr 20125:49 am 

    I am a Ph.D. candidate in Comparative Literature at University of Toronto, famlee, Chinese. I have booked a room at La Quinta Inn & Suites, Warwick Providence Airport. I will take a bus from the Airport to downtown Providence to attend the meetings. The bus ticket is 2$/person. I will check in on March 29th and check out on March 31st. The room rate is 62$/night on March 29th and 65$/night on March 30th. I am looking for a famlee roommate who would like to split the costs of these two nights with me. If interested, please email at . Thank you!

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