What To Do With A Problem Roommate
 

So, I live with 3 girls in a townhouse in residence. I've lived here for 2 months and we've had a big problem for the past month.

My one roommate isn't doing her dishes or any cleaning up around the house. In fact, her dishes have been sitting for almost 2 weeks. Dirty dishes. Now, she's been talked to more than a few times and still, her dishes sit. Her excuse; "I don't have as much time as you guys."

My attitude is we live in a communal area and that I shouldn't have to clean up after her everyday just so I can eat.

Now, there's been a few more issues with her but they really don't involve me so I won't go into it. But she has a history of extremely explosive behaviors when she's confronted.

So, even though I feel stupid posting this problem here, I was wondering what I should do, or what we should do as a house?

Last night I highlighted a section of the rules and put it on the table just as a reminder of what we all agreed to (and yes, it was a little cheeky). Today on the message board was a note reading: "DO NOT enforce one rule when you know fucking well none of the other ones are being enforced"

So, any advice?

are any of the other ones that aren't being enforced encroaching on someone else's being? ex you used is not being able to use the sink to clean veggies if there are dirty dishes in it.

is it possible to use paper plates and cups to minimize the dishes in the sink?

I'd put a towel down on her bed, and put the dirty dishes ontop of them, with a note saying "make time".


Can't let it go on forever, it will get worse and worse.

"I don't have as much time as you guys"??? Bullshit.

Everybody has 24 hours in the day, and we all have to make our own decisions about how we will use our time. Picking up after oneself is included in the bargain when you live with other people and that's that. Whatever it is that leaves her less time to do her dishes was her choice. If she chooses not to have time for basic courtesy in a shared space, then she'd better start paying somebody to clean up after her because it certainly isn't your responsibility. Better yet, you should tell her that if she wants to overlook basic cleanliness in order to save time, she should stop showering and use that time to do her dishes. I'm sure she'll love that suggestion. :rolleyes:

Enforcing the rules isn't a matter of principle in this case; it's a matter of decency. Nobody likes to live in a sty but a pig. Good luck in dealing with her.

So...she has the time to make something to eat, to pick out the dish, to put the food on the dish, eats it, and puts away but don't have the time to rinse it before putting it in the dishwasher or something?

Tell the roommate to start getting her shit together, she's [insert age] and she should know most people at her age don't even have to be asked to clean after themselves

Plus, when your roommate makes a message saying that some of the rules aren't being enforced, perhaps you guys should sit around and discuss what the problem is and how to resolve it. Stuff like this ain't gonna get better over time, its better to deal with it right now before it gets worse later.

First, its dishes and later, it'll be something else

Take the dishes, wash them, put them in their place, and put a padlock on it and only give a key to your decent roomate. When the roomate can make time to do dishes, she can use them again like a big girl. Until then, they are off limits. I do the same thing with my daughter's toys. If she cleans them up when she's done with them, she get's praised and rewarded. If she doesn't clean them up for more than a day, she loses them until she can earn them back. She accepted the system and now puts everything away without incedent.

In fairness to her, all of the rules should be enforced equally and fairly. I'd reccomend you buy your roomate a milkshake and the two of sit down to discuss which rules aren't being enforced. Then agree that if she'll clean up after herself you'll make sure to follow whichever of the other rules she thinks you're not following.

It's not stupid to post about this here. You're dealing with the crux of many problematic living situations. Definitely address this before it becomes more of a problem.

But it also sounds like she has a lot of issues if she gets explosive when confronted. If she gets defensive and angry, then she's dealing with insecurity. But that's not your problem.

All rules should be enforced equally and you should not be expected to clean up after your roommate unless you have a prior arrangement.

If she's complaining about a lack of time, unless she's working 16 hours a day, has a 2 hour commute and goes to school, I don't want to hear about it.

The other rules she's talking about are cleaning bathrooms and cleaning the living room. Nothing is every said about these things because they get cleaned twice a week. Nothing has to be said because they're always done.

We don't have a chore sheet (it was her responsibility to make one) and that's about the only thing on the rule list that isn't being done.

And something must have happened because her dishes are done now. ;)

So, is it time for some positive reinforcement?

Yea I think a little operant conditioning is in order.

Just make sure your positive reinforcement doesn't sound patronizing. Sincerity is appreciated, patronizing isn't.

We used to kick bad roommates to the curb. It was a PITA 'cause we'd have to make up the rent money until we could get a replacement. OTOH, I'm not one to talk about washing dishes.

Not that I'm proposing this, but when my wife was growing up, she and her 3 sisters had a "chore chart". It consisted of a sheet of paper with a pie chart that had a list of chores more or less evenly divided, like "wash dishes", "dry dishes", "clean floors", etc. In the middle of the chart was a circle that would rotate. It was divided in 3 sections like the chart. Every Sunday, the chart was rotated 1/3, so you might wash dishes and clean the bathroom one week, and clean floors and do laundry the next. That way, nobody got stuck with any one thing.

Just thought I'd share.

Are you suggesting that we make her roomate salavate every time she hears a bell?

When I had lazy roommates oh so long ago, what use to do was subtract my time cleaning from my part of the rent. Worked like a charm. Helps if the rent/utilities are not in your name. I had a part time job so i charged the rate I got at my job, if I did the dishes, it may have taken me say 15 minutes but deducted a full hours pay from my rent money. Pissed my roommate off big time, he quickly started to do the dishes.

Just an fyi, if your having this trouble with a roommate, just becareful if you share any bills in your name..etc. Its always a good idea imo to never, NEVER have any utilites or the apartment in your name. Too easy for roommates to skip out of.

That's classical conditioning.

And its college residence, sooo nothing's divided up except having to share most of the house.

And on another note, she apologized today, so I thanked her for doing her dishes. And hopefully they'll never sit for 2 weeks again

Sounds like you have the situation under control then. Just make unhappy noises if she messes up again, and dont forget the praise (dont overdo it of course) to make her realize you've noticed. You'll be the mommy and daddy she should have had growing up *wink*

Speaking of conditioning, a bunch of us got together and decided to condition our teacher in various ways. For example, we had him using only the left side of the whiteboard at one point of time, then after a week or so switched to the right side. How we did it was pay less/more attention depending on which side he was on *snicker*. Good times.

Lol, I always thought that was an urban myth. The students get the teacher to move to the left and backwards and eventually he ends up in a storage closet. :lol:

In the future, perhaps you could take it to whoever's in charge of college housing if she won't pay any attention to you? Hopefully it won't come down to that as it's much better that you resolve it between yourselves as you did, but just in case things get really bad they should have some rules in the contract about hygiene in communal areas, and as it could encourage flies and rats, they'd probably be able to enforce it by threatening to terminate her contract. Not the nicest way to solve it, but if it happened again then it's not fair to you or the other roommates to live with someone else's mess.

SuppleCow said it best. I have dealt with my share of sloppy roommates, and it was never fun... that said, I think things always worked out better when there was a system, and when there were consequences for choosing to ignore the system. Being passive-aggressive in return for her laziness is not the answer; but setting up clear consequences that everyone agrees on, may be more effective in the future. Yeah, it sounds like dealing with children instead of full-grown adults, but what can you do. She's acting like a child.

Btw, I thought SirLance had a great post about dividing up chores and preserving variety. If I had not been so undisciplined (my mom cleaned up after me), and if I had not been an only child, I would have respected that system a great deal. Will have to remember that for the future w/my own family.