By Macey Lavoie
I love to hear the stories about college roommates who become best friends and help each other through the trials of life. I really do. But the troubling fact is that when it comes to college roommates sometimes they can be your heroes and sometimes your villains. I had that one roommate who taught me how important it was to take care of my mental health and myself. She was not good for either.
In retrospect I should have known things would be off between us when I arrived at my new dorm room to a power drill boring holes into the expensive wall, and my roommate exclaiming that she didn’t have enough space for her clothes. My mother raised an eyebrow but said nothing as we shuffled my things into the room. As she hung her clothes on the impromptu closet, I took a deep breath. I told myself this year was going to be fine.
I believed that remaining conflict-free with my roommate was the best way to handle our differences. As she blasted her Celtic music, I would discreetly put headphones in. I would cover my head with my pillow as she stayed up late, laughing at her laptop screen. Above all, I did my best to give her the space she asked for.
What I didn’t stop to think about was what this tension filled lifestyle was doing for my mental health. I slowly discovered how important it is just to have a safe space you can call your own. I would tiptoe around my room, my grades suffered and I would make the two-hour trip home way more then my poor college budget could afford. Everyone could tell I was running away.
It wasn’t until mounting tension and her more dramatic demands that I began to realize I had to stand up for myself. She would complain about wheelchair tracks my friend had left on our rug. She taped a list of rules to the back of the door dictating such things as appropriate nap times and how the trash by the door could never be used by anyone but her. I was not consulted when these rules were made.
At last, I realized that these rules and circumstances weren’t just about avoiding conflict but standing up for myself as well. My mental health demanded that, above everything, I take care of myself. The final straw came when our third roommate had too much to drink one night. I helped her and made sure she had access to water. When I turned around, our roommate stood in the door with a sneer on her face. She was intoxicated herself, so I knew her problem wasn’t with the alcohol, but with us.
The next day she came into the room screaming about what a horrible roommate I was. The sheer vehemence she threw at me was surprising and the idea that to her I was the inconsiderate roommate that made her uncomfortable. It was the first time I realized that no matter how much I tiptoed around the room and made myself scarce, it wouldn’t matter.
I realized that I had as much right to inhabit that room as her. As an only child, I had to learn the difference between compromise and dictation when it came to my living situation. My mental health always should have been the number one priority.