My Flatmate Keeps Bringing Her BF Over

LegacyUser

My flatmate gives out about others flaunting restrictions but she keeps bringing her BF around. He shares a room with 2 others so its not that he is isolated. She and another flatmate had a go at me about two separate things which tbh I had rectified weeks previous but I guess they just didn't notice. So I'm not exactly popular in the house right now. I don't fit in at all and the disagreement bought things to a head. I think if I was to bring it up I would be crucified. I really am not an argumentative person and if anyone even criticizes I tend to let it go or play dumb cause I just cant do conflict and the odd time I have tried to defend myself it winds up with me not being coherent or unable to make my point correctly. Im rubbish at it. Anyways my point is I ma not in a position to ask her to stop and I dont think anyone else in the house is bugged by this and I would just end up being the bad guy and making a tit of myself.

Am I being unreasonable being annoyed by this, I never see him, but I see her a lot. IDK maybe I am over reacting, or being unreasonable, maybe I should just let it go. I am not in the house that long, and everyone hates me here anyways. But the rent is the cheapest I will get by far. IDK, any advice.

Bigdig69

ProblemsHouseMate wrote: »

My flatmate gives out about others flaunting restrictions but she keeps bringing her BF around. He shares a room with 2 others so its not that he is isolated. She and another flatmate had a go at me about two separate things which tbh I had rectified weeks previous but I guess they just didn't notice. So I'm not exactly popular in the house right now. I don't fit in at all and the disagreement bought things to a head. I think if I was to bring it up I would be crucified. I really am not an argumentative person and if anyone even criticizes I tend to let it go or play dumb cause I just cant do conflict and the odd time I have tried to defend myself it winds up with me not being coherent or unable to make my point correctly. Im rubbish at it. Anyways my point is I ma not in a position to ask her to stop and I dont think anyone else in the house is bugged by this and I would just end up being the bad guy and making a tit of myself.

Am I being unreasonable being annoyed by this, I never see him, but I see her a lot. IDK maybe I am over reacting, or being unreasonable, maybe I should just let it go. I am not in the house that long, and everyone hates me here anyways. But the rent is the cheapest I will get by far. IDK, any advice.

No you are not wrong. Your flatmate is endangering you.

Thelonious Monk

I've had this issue in the past, albeit not during a pandemic. I guess you're thoughtful of your flatmates and you would be mindful of bringing a boy/girlfriend around all the time as it might be a bit much on your flatmates. Some people, well this kind of thing just doesn't seem to enter their heads, same with leaving dishes around and just doing things that might get under the skin of other flatmates.
I was in your situation once, I'd come home from work starving and my flatmate's boyfriend would be cooking some complicated meal and I wouldn't be able to get near the kitchen for an hour or two. Used to drive me nuts.
I just focused on getting the hell out of there and getting my own place, never flatshared again.

Why do you think everyone hates you? It doesn't sound like that place is working out for you.

Darc19

Darc19 wrote: »

How?



(this covid hysteria is getting very boring)

Bigdig is100% right.
I believe that we as a country did such a great job at the start of the year, that the low numbers convinced a lot of people that’s it’s all BS.
However now the sh*t is really hitting the fan and I know people who’s lives have been turned upside down because of this. This is not fake news or hysteria I can assure you
Covid is real, the risks are real and the OP is 100% in the right to feel the way they do.

Big Bag of Chips

ProblemsHouseMate wrote: »

I never see him, but I see her a lot.

I think if you don't see him, don't have any contact with him then you are being as safe as you can be. Air out the house regularly. Windows should be opened for a time every day.

If she sees her bf anyway, outside of the house, then she is likely to pick up the infection from him if he becomes infected. That will happen regardless of whether he is in your house or not.

Big Bag of Chips

Big Bag of Chips wrote: »

I think if you don't see him, don't have any contact with him then you are being as safe as you can be. Air out the house regularly. Windows should be opened for a time every day.

If she sees her bf anyway, outside of the house, then she is likely to pick up the infection from him if he becomes infected. That will happen regardless of whether he is in your house or not.

Not really true. More people in the house, higher the chance of surfaces being touched ( just one example)

Goes against the current advice so this issue is really black and white, no visitors in private homes.

Dressoutlet

Big Bag of Chips wrote: »

I think if you don't see him, don't have any contact with him then you are being as safe as you can be. Air out the house regularly. Windows should be opened for a time every day.

If she sees her bf anyway, outside of the house, then she is likely to pick up the infection from him if he becomes infected. That will happen regardless of whether he is in your house or not.

This is exactly how I see it.
If she's with him anyway, he could be the source of the house catching it even if he never stepped foot inside.

Dressoutlet

Dressoutlet wrote: »

This is exactly how I see it.
If she's with him anyway, he could be the source of the house catching it even if he never stepped foot inside.

This isn’t “make up your own rules” or interpret the guidelines how you wish. The guidelines are crystal clear and the housemate is breaking them

Big Bag of Chips

I'm aware of the current restrictions. I work in the health service and have seen my own parents maybe 4/5 times since March 2020. The only friends I have physically seen are my colleagues. But, OP, you are unlikely to get anywhere with this one. You could bring it up with her if you felt it would be any good, or you can take precautions as best you can when you know he has been around.

Continue to sanitise your hands. Keep the hard surfaces, door handles, counter tops, clean. Ventilate the house. Are you all working from home or are you in work?

Unfortunately many people don't think the rules apply to them. Or they think, like your housemate seems to, that they are following the rules in general so that means they get a free pass on the rules they don't like.

If you don't feel you can bring this up with her, then best you can do is try minimise the risk of transmission in the house.

LilacNails

Op what is your landlord like? Could u have a word with them saying u are v uncomfortable in the house with outsiders coming in, without consideration or respect for ur health or concerns. Ur the one paying rent, not the bf.

Do u think u could say this to the LLC and they might intervene?

YellowLead

Are there any threads on this in the renting/property section of boards OP?

Would be interesting to hear from somebody who is in a similar situation and has handled it. I imagine it’s a common enough issue at the moment. Would be interesting to hear a landlords perspective also.

LegacyUser

LilacNails wrote: »

Op what is your landlord like? Could u have a word with them saying u are v uncomfortable in the house with outsiders coming in, without consideration or respect for ur health or concerns. Ur the one paying rent, not the bf.

Do u think u could say this to the LLC and they might intervene?

Hi could I ask what is the LLC. I could try but the landlord is never here, I am the only one with the problem of him being here, there's 2 others on the house who isn't the girl with the bf and myself, and the two others don't seem to have an issue, in fact they sit and chat with him in the same room whenever he's over. If I asked the landlord to intervene it would be obvious that it would be me who ratted.

As I said I'm not popular at all here, the electricity in the house went recently, I only have one plug in my room which I had been using to charge my phone when it went, I got a lot of dirty looks when we were talking about it....idk if I was being blamed or what the reason why was, and we switched all the plugs on individually afterwards, when we were done the kitchen I suggested my room next (after all it was only the one plug in the room and all I was using it for was to charge my phone) and I was told no, I was jumping the gun and had to wait my turn while they did the other rooms....it was just like I was being accused of being selfish, not waiting my turn etc when literally any room could've went next and my room had only the one switch, it's so so so minor that incident but it was just a really odd and uncomfortable vibe....I'm waiting to hear back about a social housing application so I can adhere of HAP. I like this area and Iike this house but I really don't feel like I'm fitting it at all. I actually can't socialise much with my flatmates as I have a medical condition that basically has flare ups for hours and nobody wants to see what these flare ups entail so I just stay in my room a lot. I over filled the garbage the first few weeks I was here but then I started putting half my garbage in the public bins, someone then started overfilling the bin (and had be contributing quite a lot also that I think I was getting blamed for prior to me binning half my stuff) and I got blamed, I told the flatmate I had been taking my garbage to the public bins on the street but she didn't believe me when I told her that the house bins were half full already when I would take them in the day of the garbage disposal (the other flatmate would empty so much stuff into the bins with her bf....I didn't want to place blame but I was there when it happened, everytime I opened the bins as well there would always be a mountain of takeaway boxes from her too). So now I don't put one scrap in the house bin. I bring all my waste, tinfoil, toilet paper, milk bottles, vegetable cuttings, food I won't finish, empty laundry detergent bottles etc, into my room and I bin all my collective waste in several different bins up and down the street. This isnt normal and I'm so mad they didn't believe me, I used to get up at 6 am to do it. This isn't a normal thing to do.

I can actually here him coughing downstairs (not enough to be very concerned) but he's in the kitchen where my bed duvet has been drying all of yesterday and today and right now I feel uncomfortable having had my clothes/duvet cover on the clothes horse where he is after spending hours and I think I'm just going to rewash all my clothes. I live in a tiny box room so there's no room in my room to dry them out so IDK what I'm going to do and I know it seems ott to rewash my stuff but I just can't do it, it just makes my skin crawl.

leggo

I had a housemate (who’s since moved) who had his girlfriend that worked in a newsagents stay over 2-3 nights a week mid-pandemic. At the end of the day, she was his girlfriend and I was just a housemate and he’d have sided with her 100 times out of 100, so I just decided to limit my own movements which I was doing anyway. If I got it, I got it. I’m not high risk and you can do everything right then still catch it if you go to the shop for 5 minutes.

If I had been high risk I think my only workable option would’ve been to stay with the family since they’d be the only people I could realistically expect to play ball for my health’s sake. It’s ****, it’s not fair, but that’s the world we live in right now and it’s only temporary anyway.

OP I don’t think your main issue is the boyfriend anyway, I think that’s only a small part of a bigger issue that this place seems to be a bad place for you to live as much for your mental health as physical. It’s not working, you’re not happy, and if you’re ever at a point in your life where you start to feel as left out and inconsequential as you do currently...you need to look into changing your surroundings and the people around you ASAP.

It may mean you have to ask some tough questions like can you move back home or can you get by paying slightly higher rent etc...but it may be worth whatever sacrifice you need to prioritise your mental health here. Like say you have to pay more to get a new place and that’d leave you broke for now, there’s actually never been a better time to be in that situation than a time when socialising etc is just not an option! You ultimately have no control of this situation so take charge of what you do have control over and do whatever you need to get yourself in a better situation that doesn’t leave you like this.

Caranica

Dumping household waste in public bins is illegal and comes with large fines!

Covid regulations say no household guests, I can't understand why nobody else in the house has an issue. I would look at moving asap to somewhere where people comply with the rules and can accommodate waste disposal needs of all residents.

LegacyUser

Caranica wrote: »

Dumping household waste in public bins is illegal and comes with large fines!

Covid regulations say no household guests, I can't understand why nobody else in the house has an issue. I would look at moving asap to somewhere where people comply with the rules and can accommodate waste disposal needs of all residents.

I didn't even know that-now IDK what I am supposed to do. If I cant put it in a public bin but I cant put it in the house bin......ughhhhhhh.

The other flatmates-well they have went to other houses and one had a person over maybe on three different occasions when the no visitors rules have been implemented, so I guess it would be hypocritical for them to have an issue with it. Although they have not been as bad as the flatmate who brings the BF over, he is here numerous times a week.

I am on SW atm for an ongoing illness so I am waiting for my application for social housing to go through so that I may avail of HAP/I am going to make an application on medical grounds-which tbh I dont think will be accepted but I am going to try, it sounds like the only way you would be affected if is its something like suddenly finding yourself in need of wheelchair friendly accommodation-my illness is physical but it does not require specialised housing in the way someone who is wheelchair bound requires specialised housing. I think the CoCo must be slammed and crazy busy and may take some time approving my application-I sent in my application nearly a month ago and sent them an email asking for the postal address, they only responded to the email asking for the postal address today-I found the postal address elsewhere-I cant imagine how long it takes for an application to be approve rent is cheaper. I tbh probably have the cheapest room in the entire county-I have seen triple share rooms go for more. I am loosing money every week tho, I am trying not to spend money on things I do not need but I am still finding I am eating into my savings tat I was going to use for college. I can't afford to move....maybe if I get HAP, but even then the allowance versus what is on the market is a joke, I checked other counties and you can get single rooms in other counties based on their allowances, but the allowance in this county wouldn't even get you a shared room in someones shed in the back end of the country side.

Samsonsmasher

OP how are a couple supposed to have a relationship unless they visit each other? No intimacy until they are vaccinated?

Urethra Franklin.

Samsonsmasher wrote: »

OP how are a couple supposed to have a relationship unless they visit each other? No intimacy until they are vaccinated?

The same as everyone else-laws still apply to those who are single/in a relationship, they didn't write the laws, the government did. Just because someone is loved up doesn't mean thy are exempt. I didn't see the person I was seeing for 6 months because of C19 restrictions last year. You didn't answer the OPs question either.

The OP is right here IMO. The law is clear, with no rule for argument, no visitors allowed. Your flatmate is a selfish jackass here, I know so many people like this, just because they follow one or two of the rules they think they can look down on others who perhaps don't follow those same rules themselves, whilst simultaneously breaking the rules they don't like. They think they get a free pass because they wear masks in shops or can't go to the pub anymore. Double standards everywhere. Your flatmate is giving you a hard time about bins whilst expecting you to just sit idly by and be ok with something which is actually not only illegal, but places you in danger; in fact as an earlier poster said, your flatmate is not only breaking the law by having a visitor over, they are forcing you to break the law by binning your waste in bins on the street. I bet they are even blind to just how backwards/selfish this is.

Big Bag of Chips

It makes not a blind bit of difference what the current guidelines are, or what your housemate should be doing. The fact is, she is not doing it, nor is she going to. A precedence has been set in the house now where she has her bf over. She is not going to stop that.

You telling her it's not right is not going to change her.
Posters telling you it's not right is not going to change her.

You simply have no control over another person and their choices. And the fact that you are the only housemate who objects makes it even more unlikely that her behaviour will change.

This is not a good house share for you. You are constantly uncomfortable in the house. There are more issues than just this bf coming over. You should feel relaxed in your home. You are unlikely to ever feel relaxed in that house. So your only option is to find alternative accommodation where you will feel comfortable.

Housesharing is a numbers game really. So many different types of people, personalities and backgrounds in a small living space. It can take a few bad experiences before settling into one that fits.