Roommates Suck

The BBQ Pit
41

You need more friends. You both do. You are too emotionally dependent on her, and therefore are taking her offenses too much to heart. (Perfectly normal, not a slam, just a fact.)

NYC has a lot of people; you can find one or two others that you like.

Go to lectures on things you know nothing about, attend professional seminars, and take a continuing education class that has nothing to do with work. Even if you don’t meet new friends, at least you’ll feel less isolated.

Oh, and go to the museums. NYC has great museums; don’t pick up strange men, though. That’s trite.

42

I agree with j666- your dependence on her and your isolation in a strange city is making this all much more dramatical than it really is. It’s just a guy- if they want each other, why does it have to be such a slap in your face? You can no more control other people’s feelings and actions than you can the weather, so let it go. This one man is worth all this? If he is, hell, give me his number, so I can put my hat in the ring, too. But I doubt that he is.

43

Okay, maybe it’s not so common. I’m not trying to say everybody should be an unfeeling robot sans attachments, and I’m not really that way either… for whatever reason, I just lose interest in guys that have no interest in me. (Um, full disclosure: I’ve been with my husband for 6 years, essentially I’m talking about dating behavior prior to the age of 19.) I dunno, I just wouldn’t instinctively think, ‘‘Better not date this guy because my friend’s into him,’’ or vice-versa. It might be more apt to say things would depend entirely on the context. I don’t think I’d jump to either conclusion right away… it would depend on the friend in question and the man in question.

I agree with this. What I find most fundamentally unsettling about the whole situation is the double standard and lack of honesty. pbbth did the right thing by informing her roommate about her decision and citing the friendship as the reason for it. Roommate did the wrong thing by not even bothering to communicate that she didn’t feel she should be held to this same standard that was nicely extended to her. I can definitely see how that would feel like a slap in the face. Maybe the roommate is not an awful, terrible person, but this particular thread doesn’t seem to cast her in a very positive light (I’ll pay you not to be angry? wTF?), so based on the little information given, I have to go with the ‘‘she’s a terrible friend’’ theory.

44

I would not have turned him down in the first place unless it was to allow her to have a clear field. That was the time to have a fight over him, if he were worth fighting over.

45

Looking at it from the outside I have to agree with Alice The Goon’s perspective here, which is that your close roommate relationship is making it tougher to deal with. I mean, sure, maybe it’s possible that boy now suddenly sees roommate for her true inner beauty, but most likely he’s just too lazy too leave his comfort zone in order to meet new women. Which probably tells you something about what kind of boyfriend he would have been. It’s a shame things had to work out like this but your friendship couldn’t keep going as it was anyhow.

You mentioned upthread that you guys do in fact have a few other friendly acquaintances – I’m guessing you two have been hanging out with these people as a roommate-couple? If so, well, now your roommie has a guy, you can start inviting these people out for after-work drinks/dinner/coffee, just by yourself. My hunch is that when you start running around solo, you’ll find it easier to meet others for coffee/drinks/just to chat.

46

At this point it isn’t about the guy, it is about the lack of respect on her part. After this whole situation you couldn’t pay me to date him. I am not fighting over him at all, I am angry with her being so rude and disrespectful about it. I don’t expect she would have asked my permission but she sure could have talked to me about it first or something. Hell, any step she could have taken to show that she respected me as a person and a friend would have been great, but there was nothing. She wasn’t going to tell me they were dating at all…I had to pick up on the behavior change and ask her point blank whether they were together or not.

I am a member of a group called The Lunch Club that gets together to do cool stuff all over the city so at least once a week I am at a museum or a restaurant or park or something with other people. I am meeting other friends without her, but getting to know people is a slow process and I can’t go out tomorrow and have a new best friend-it takes time to know people well enough to have it evolve into a true friendship. I am trying very hard to meet people in the city without her though. This Monday I have a date, Wednesday I have a poker night and on Friday I am going to a piano bar with a bunch of people. I am trying very hard to expand my social circle but I wish it didn’t take so damn long.

47

What I am hearing you say is that you’re disappointed in her, and I can understand that. Far too often, the people you expect to be honest and kind to you end up being the ones that hurt you the most. And there are a lot of women out there that will put any man before her friends, family, even her own kids. It’s like all morality and reason go out the window when a man comes along, for some women. I don’t understand it, but it happens a lot. I think she does suck for not talking to you about it before you figured it out.

One more piece of advice- don’t ever have a good friend for a roommate, or work with a good friend or a roommate. Your home is supposed to be your safe haven, your comfort zone. When nasty situations like this one pops up, and they will because people disappoint, then you can’t even relax in your home, and it’s tense. I hate that. Room with a stranger, and keep it that way.

48

Nuts to that! From now on I am living by myself. No one should have to deal with this kind of thing in their own home.

49

Well, yeah, a no-roommate situation is always best. If you can afford to do that in NYC, well, you’re a lot better off than I am! :slight_smile:

Wait- do you live in NYC or did I just make that up?

50

People do stupid shit when romantic interests are involved. Between that and being horny 20-year-olds, I really would let it pass. I wouldn’t necessarily totally excuse it, but puppy love really makes people act irrationally sometimes. I also would have taken “I know you’re interested in the guy, so I won’t go out with him” as a green light. But, then again, I’m a guy. I also think the guy was just going for a sure thing when he started macking on your roommate, after you told him she’s totally into him. Unless your roommate is totally repulsive, what guy wouldn’t? (And, yes, I know there’s some guys who wouldn’t, I’m just speaking in general).

51

It’s probably already been said as I am too lazy to read this whole thread but if neither one of you had dated him yet and you wanted to ask him out; than you should have, or at least accepted the guys invitation to ask YOU out.

And if your room mates want to cry because he likes you more than her? Well, boo-hoo thats fucking life. get use to it.

So basically you got burned for being over-sensitive to your friends feelings. This is not a horrible thing mind you but maybe you should toughen up and realize it’s also not a horrible thing to think about yourself every once in a while.

BTW, this guy TOTALLY wants a threesome.

52

I do indeed live in NYC. I make huge amounts of money at a job I don’t really like, so I am in the process of trying to keep the money while finding more fulfilling work, but I would have no problem living on my own here in the city. I brought my roommate with me for 2 reasons, because I didn’t want to move someplace so foreign to me without someone to provide emotional support and because she needed to get the hell away from her living situation in Texas. I wish I had just left her behind to fix all of her own bullshit and worried less about being alone in a new city if this is the way she is going to treat me. Is it wrong of me to hope that he has some sort of VD? :stuck_out_tongue:

I know it is wrong to think that way. I don’t actually wish illness upon either of them. Well, I don’t wish it much…

53

Yikes, Rooming with Friends! I had heard that it was always a disaster, but I didn’t believe it until I roomed with two friends (and two strangers, plus another friend unofficially, who was dating one of the friends on the lease). Of those three friends, I lost two rather bitterly, and the only other friendship survived only because of how exceptionally close we had been beforehand–but there were some times during that period when we despised each other.

There’s always that. If you’re super close with some other girl, and you go everywhere together, it shouldn’t be surprising that you can’t meet a guy and take interest in him without the other girl being present too. I’m currently on the other end of this problem, sort of; one girl in my English class may be into me, and I’m into her, but her friend goes everywhere with her and clings mercilessly to her, and vice versa. I can’t separate them, so I can’t get to know the one I like.

54

[QUOTE]
Originally Posted By fetus

*I’m currently on the other end of this problem, sort of; one girl in my English class may be into me, and I’m into her, but her friend goes everywhere with her and clings mercilessly to her, and vice versa. I can’t separate them, so I can’t get to know the one I like.[/*QUOTE]

Well you could try going up to the one you like and saying, “Hey, you seem really awesome and I would like to go out with you sometime.” If her friend isn’t harboring feelings for you her response will probably be something along the lines of, “Squeeee! How cute! Omigod, where do you think he will take you?” And then if for some reason she doesn’t go out with you and you go out with her friend instead be prepared for anger and possible testicle loss for being a douche.

55

OK, I went back and read the whole thread. Which made me remember the few times (that I know of) that I got turned down because said girl had a friend who was into me too.

Jeez! Where the hell do I sign up to get my “Gender Preference Change operation?”

56

OK, I’ll add my 2 cents, FWIW.

I was in a similar situation myself, but not with a roommate and over a much longer period of time. I’ll try to keep this short.

Tom and I had a history going back a few years- dated briefly, were friends, then later sorta-kinda dated again. Friends with benefits would be fairly accurate. From a lot of talks we had about this, it boiled down to- I liked him a lot, he liked me a lot, he was freaked out about his ex-girlfriend who completely betrayed him and he was afraid of a serious relationship. So we kinda-sorta dated, nothing exclusive.

I hear from a mutual friend that Tom has started (really) dating Katie. Katie is a friend of mine, who knew the situation and knew that I had feelings for Tom. Mutual friend basically forces me to call Katie, who sobbingly apologizes when I tell her I know about it. I say, don’t sweat it, I’m a little upset* but I don’t want to ruin a friendship for a guy.

So, a couple months go by. Katie, on more than one occasion, asks me for relationship advice with Tom. I try to be supportive and offer unbiased advice. Well, things don’t work out between the two of them.

Several months later I found myself hanging out with Tom again, and things happened. I fully intended to tell Katie myself, but a mutual friend (bitch, more like) found out and spilled the beans. Katie was pissed. She never spoke to me again.

I couldn’t understand it. She had broken up with him, she knew of our previous situation, was it that shocking that I might again pursue him? I felt that I had done the right thing by stepping aside and wishing the two of them the best (even though I was upset by the situation), but she couldn’t extend me the same courtesy? I knew that I should have told her myself (which I was planning to do but was slightly distracted by celebrating my 21st birthday, in fact the whole thing happened on my 21st birthday, I thought it could wait a day), something that she hadn’t even done for me (they had apparently been dating for a couple of weeks before the mutual friend decided that Katie wasn’t going to tell me and I needed to know). She wouldn’t hear any of it. Oh well, she sucks.

So that’s when I realized that while some people value friendship quite highly (yours truly being one of them) others do not. I have chosen my true friends carefully since then, and while I may have fewer, I know that petty disputes are not likely to destroy our friendship.

I second the advice of others. Make new friends, find distractions and reasons to get out of the apartment. Now that you know how your friend behaves, be prepared to find a new roommate or new apartment.

*Completely, totally pissed and heartbroken would be more accurate.

57

I think every man who reads this is going to have the same general reaction, partially because of men’s understanding that dating someone your friend is interested in isn’t a betrayal of them, but also because of an innate empathy for the gentleman in this situation.

He’s spending tons of time with the two of you, and has expressed interest in one of you. You shoot him down, what’s he supposed to do? By the fact that he continued to hang out with you guys (to the point where you’re the “Three Musketeers”,) he’s obviously going to try to get with one of the two of you. It can’t be that huge of a surprise that your roommate gave in to his courting when it was such a difficult thing for you to do in the first place, right?

Had you made it clear to the boy in question that you weren’t dating him because of your coalition with your roomie?

58

Yes. Absolutely, crystal clear. In fact he talked to her about it and had long moony discussions with her about how much he was into me and how sad he was that she was the reason he and I weren’t dating.

59

Now that’s funny.

I now think that the mistake was yours; when your friend asked you not to date him, you should have just re-assured her that she could have him when you were done.

Borrow her favorite blouse, spill red wine on it, and call things even.

60

It almost seems to me that whatever you guys worked out prior to this new problem was really more of a band-aid than a fix. It can be really hard for women to mend fences once one party is seriously hurt. It’s obvious you still care about her a great deal and that you are worried about her future well-being without you…as you were worried about her home life back in Texas. Other than this situation, is she the same friend to you that you are to her? Does she listen when you have problems, or only give you hers to share? Does she support you and lift you up as a person or is she bringing you down? I think it may be worth it for you to analyze what about your relationship with this girl really is, because it sounds to me like you are angry at her about more than this. Not that this isn’t a valid reason all it’s own, but it’s a feeling I get from reading your posts.

From my point of view, I wouldn’t have been interested in the guy if he were first interested in my friend, and I think my friends all feel the same. That’s the really strange thing about this story. (semi-related side story) Once my friend and I went out to go dancing. Some random guy came up and asked me if I would like to dance but I didn’t want to dance with him and politely declined. He immediately turned to my friend and asked her to dance. She also said no and I could tell by the look on her face that she was offended that he would ask her, as if she were a second place prize instead of the person he really wanted to dance with. His intentions may have been good, but it certainly didn’t seem like it to either of us from the way he acted.

Nothing is less flattering to a girl than being second-best and you can bet that if he wanted you so badly in the beginning and didn’t want her at all, she’s still feeling that way even now that they are together. Your relationship with her will suffer further from this and THAT is the best reason against her dating him in the beginning.