I'm nineteen years old, almost twenty, and I live at home with my mom in her very nice two-story house in Virginia. I go to work at a local Subway, and it's the busiest one in the area so it's very high-stress. I don't have any friends here even though I've been living here a year; the people I work with aren't really people I want to hang out with, and I don't really leave the house to meet people and make friends, and even if I did leave the house, I'm very shy with strangers. This summer my mom found out she'd be deploying for 6 months, and it was going to be just me and the cats for the whole six months. Now, I'm pretty good on my own for a while, but I'm a definite momma's girl, so I'd be pretty depressed without her. Actually, I am pretty depressed without her, she left this weekend. I told a friend about it, and she moved up here a couple months back to keep me company.

That's where my trouble starts.

I don't know, I guess I was expecting things to go better? We'd never had problems or fights or even arguments before, I'd never even been mad or annoyed with her. Of course, we'd never lived together before, she'd just visited and I'd spend a week at her apartment when my parents were getting divorced and we were moving. We still haven't fought or anything, but I find myself constantly annoyed with her.

She leaves the lights on even after I've told her the electric bill out here is crazy expensive, doesn't close cabinets, leaves food and dirty dishes on the counter after being told repeatedly that they need to at least be rinsed in the sink because we've got ants and I'm trying to control and eliminate the problem, she goes in my room and uses my stuff without asking, and ate my German gummi bears that my dad sent me without asking (I'm sorry that just really annoys me, the only gummi bears I like and I can't get any more, I wish she had at least asked so we could share them).

Yeah, I know, it sounds like I'm whining, and maybe I am. It just really gets under my skin that I keep having to repeat myself, it's not that hard for a twenty year old woman to remember to turn off a damn light when she leaves a room, or to put a plate in the damn sink, or to close a cabinet after she takes something out of it. It's not that hard to ask "Hey, do you mind if I use your expensive perfume that you can't buy in any stores around here?" or "Do you mind if I listen to your iPod?"

It's not just me and her, either, a friend of ours that we met online came to visit a couple weeks ago, and I'm really just tired of the both of them. He leaves next week, so I'm kind of looking forward to that, there will only be half the mess to clean up after and hopefully I'll feel less like nobody listens to what I say about keeping my mother's house clean, or they do and just don't give a damn. The two of them act like a couple all the time and she takes forever in the bathroom prettying up (and also makes a mess which she doesn't pick up, leaves the window open even though it's winter and the heater's running, and forgets to turn off the light), and I keep feeling left out of things. They watch four or five movies a day, but they never tell me what they are watching or invite me to join them, even though I'm right here in the next room. :/ I'd understand if they were dating, but they aren't, and while it might sound bitchyt the whole reason either of them are here is to keep me from blowing my brains out from loneliness while my mom is gone. Them making me feel like they don't take my wants/needs into consideration really doesn't help.

He's also a lot like her as far as not listening to what I say; I came home from work yesterday to find an open bag of Doritos on the kitchen counter, which infuriates me because not only does that attract ants, it wastes food that I payed for, which wastes my money that I worked my ass off at my shitty job for.

I just feel like banging my head against a wall for even inviting either of them in the first place, and dragging her up here by plane to live with me. I mean, if it gets to where I absolutely can't handle living with her anymore, it's not like I can kick her out. She doesn't have anywhere to go except back home to her mom, which is halfway across the country. Honestly at this point the loneliness of being alone until April is looking better than being constantly annoyed and silent about it.

I've said things about the house and keeping it clean because it's my mom's house, she's paying a lot of money for it and may have to rent it when she gets back from her deployment seeing as we might be relocated, it really needs to stay nice--but I don't feel like I'm being listened to, because no matter what I say the things just keep being repeated. I feel like I'm wasting my breath.

I haven't said anything about not using my stuff or going in my room without permission or maybe asking before just eating whatever damn thing you can get your hands on (I mean, a can of soup is totally fine, but when you find candies with German writing on them you could at least ask, they've eaten two bags of German gummi bears and a bag of German cookies without so much as asking or even mentioning they were eating them so that I could share with them, when I was in the next goddamn room) because I just don't know how to say it without sounding bitchy. I mean, I don't know how they were raised, but I've always just thought it was common courtesy to ask before you use something that doesn't belong to you. I've never even gone in her room without asking, except to turn off the light, put clean laundry on her bed, and put her shoes upstairs when I cleaned the downstairs hallway. She's gone in my room and taken books, my iPod, used my makeup and perfume, even took a pair of my pants and put them on him for a joke photo shoot. My problem isn't that she did these things, I mean, I would let her use my makeup if she just asked. I just would like to be asked. I can't stand it when people use my things without asking, it drives me up the wall, I can't explain why but it does. I always ask before I use anyone else's things, and all I want is to be afforded the same courtesy.

I really need to sit down and talk with her about this stuff before it makes me so angry that I start to hate her, but I can't figure out how to do it without going into some rant that sounds selfish and bitchy, and I really hate confrontations.

I guess the TL;DR of this is my housemate is driving me insane, I can't kick her out, how the hell do I sit her down to talk about it without some big confrontation?

I am in college and I have four roommates and we used to fight about everything. Finally we all set and had a talk and it got better. You are going to have to just start out nicely by asking her if you can have a talk. Maybe go to a quiet sort of restaurant or cafe or something so that way you know you wont get bitchy or hateful and make a scene while you are in the restaurant. Just tell her that she needs to ask you before taking those things and that it is really getting on your nerves that she isnt. Explain to her that it is your moms house and you need to keep it clean for her. Tell her all these things she is doing is disrespectful to you as well. Tell her like you explained to us only try your best to be nice about it. Make sure that she knows that you are serious and not joking around. Tell her that those German candies are very hard to come by and you can't find them anywhere else and that you don't mind sharing but please ask first. And that there is no reason to eat ALL of them. If this doesn't work then I would kick her out and send her back home. She doesn't seem respectable to your mom's house and seems a bit immature. If she is 20 then she knows that lights aren't cheap. Ask her if she would treat her moms house like she is treating yours. Tell her you aren't her flunky and you don't have loads of money to spend on food, which is also very expensive. If you can't find a way to kick her out then label all of your stuff with 'do not eat" on it, put a sign on the lights that say turn off when done. you will just have to get bitchy with her back if she keeps it up after that. Treat her like she is treating you. I hope this helped you. I wish you luck with talking with her.

Sometimes you just don't get along with someone that you normally would if you didn't live with them. I knew this moving into the house I'm in now. My housemate, let's call him Kyle, pulled a really dick move on us when we looked for housing off-campus last year. He decided he didn't want me and my then-boyfriend (Steve) to live with everyone else (three other people) because "we might break up and it would be awkward" (which I think was just a cop-out since Kyle had just gotten out of a failed high school relationship that everyone else saw was not going to last from day one). So, last year Steve and I lived with some other people who we weren't that familiar with, and it was alright. Then the end of the lease came around and the four people in the other house (including Kyle) were all "oh we want you guys to live with us because you're awesome" and Kyle was all "yeah that was a bad choice I'm sorry I was a dick" (which I didn't really believe was sincere. I sat down with Steve and his best friend Bill (who had lived with Kyle) and basically said I didn't want to live with Kyle because he's a dick and annoying as fuck and a total hypocrite. Bill pretty much said that Kyle was a nightmare to live with, and I told Steve that we had no reason to let him live with the rest of us, but Bill and Steve are nice people and said they couldn't do that to Kyle.

Fast forward to... well... three or so weeks living with Kyle. Everyone is tired of him. But, we're bound by a lease, so we're stuck with him until May. I'm trying to get Bill to move out next year with Steve and I (who are now engaged, take that Kyle), but Bill doesn't want to move again even though he's absolutely miserable and the only thing that keeps Bill sane is Steve and myself.

Steve and I have been looking for a third wheel to help keep bills down in the next place we live in. My very close friend and almost brother, uh, Chad, volunteered to live with us, but recently he's withdrawn from school and is enlisting in the Navy. If the Navy decides not to pay for his schooling, he won't be coming back next semester or next year. So Steve and I are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

My advice: if they annoy you now, they won't stop annoying you, so get 'em out as soon as feasible. Unless you're twenty kinds of awesome ('grats if you are!), this might not be a situation that you can keep plugging along in.

Thanks for the advice about going out somewhere Poppy Yukia, I would have done it at home and probably bungled it up. I'm waiting till after the guy goes home on Tuesday, but I'll take her out somewhere Wednesday and try to sort it out.

Keyori, I really really want to try and make this work before I kick her out, just because I was the one who brought her up here in the first place and I'd feel really dick (and also stupid, 800 dollar plane tickets) if I just turned her around and gave her the boot after only a few months. But I've already talked to my mom about this and she says if things don't get better and we can't sort it all out, I should kick her out. I mean, I don't want to just kick her out because we've been friends a long time, and I don't make friends easily, but I keep getting so pissed off over stupid little stuff. But I'm definitely keeping it in mind as my end option if things get too tough. That Kyle situation really sucks and I hope that all works out with finding a third person.

Sorry, I guess I got kindof caught up in my rant :sweat:

Yeah, if you feel that you can work it out, go for it. But, if it doesn't, you shouldn't hesitate to sit her down and tell her that it's not working out.