messi wrote:
OP, the fact he doesn't get out of his room is alarming. Even those on death row get outside 1 hour a day. There is a reason for that.
So? I never talk to anyone in the real world.
messi wrote:
OP, the fact he doesn't get out of his room is alarming. Even those on death row get outside 1 hour a day. There is a reason for that.
So? I never talk to anyone in the real world.
I've given this some thought. You write in a feminine manner, like a woman pretending to be a man. You stated you were going to talk to R.O.T.C. before you talked to him. You won't say what this fella did in U.S. Navy. Making up military a specialty is too complicated for your narrative. Of course you would ask. There is no way you would take on a roommate from military without asking his specialty. You made all this up.
Duh
The fact that he went from normal (friends, hobbies) to nothing makes me wonder if something happened to him. At first I thought maybe breaking up with his serious GF was devastating to him, but it sounds like he broke up with her and she wasn’t expecting it. Was he going to a lot of ROTC events? I wonder if anything sketch happened there? I don’t know...unless he has a history of doing this, one usually doesn’t completely change their behavior or personality without some precipitating factor.
You're not overreacting. This is a serious situation. Get in touch with his nuclear family ASAP!
Also, I think it would be wise for you to move out and distance yourself from this person. You don't want to be caught in the cross fire if he snaps.
Be careful. No good deed goes unpunished.
david45 wrote:
messi wrote:
OP, the fact he doesn't get out of his room is alarming. Even those on death row get outside 1 hour a day. There is a reason for that.
So? I never talk to anyone in the real world.
I find that hard to believe. You must have at least one friend, colleague, family member, or acquaintance that you talk to.
Absolutely nothing wrong with being socially withdrawn. Some people prefer it. I only leave my house to run an hour every day. On rest days I don't leave. If I wasn't a runner, I would barely need to leave. I don't want to hang out at a noisy bar or need friends to talk about the banalities of life. I have everything I need and prefer isolation to work on my projects. Maybe this man is writing a novel, starting a business, creating art? It's not up to you to judge. You're probably an annoyance to him.
Rhodium Nights wrote:
david45 wrote:
So? I never talk to anyone in the real world.
I find that hard to believe. You must have at least one friend, colleague, family member, or acquaintance that you talk to.
Just family member. I don't have any friends
Mental Illness is no joke. I dont exactly have the numbers but it seems to me there are more people with mental health issues today than there were 25 plus years ago. Is it something in the food? Has the world sped up too much ? I dont exactly know what it is but years ago i did not know anyone with mental health issues personally. Today i know about 10 to 12 people that take meds for something related to their mental health. Anyways my advice would be to keep a close eye on him and dont turn your back on potential signs of danger.
You should move out, call the ROTC about this guy
Maybe this guy spends all day reading the LRC boards and it has given him a bitter, twisted view of the world. Naturally he now prefers to isolate himself from such a cruel unfeeling world.
But seriously, back in the early '80s I had a roommate who started out being friendly and cheerful and talkative. We had different circles of friends, but we ate together sometimes and talked often.
Suddenly he became depressed and withdrawn and we stopped doing anything together and he stopped talking to me.
Not long after that he moved out. Then I found out from mutual friends that he was gay (which I had wondered about) and he had AIDS. He died of AIDS a couple of years later. I am sure he found out about his diagnosis while we were rooming together, and that explains why he suddenly changed and became very depressed and withdrawn.
Maybe your roommate also has received some dire health diagnosis. Or maybe he had an identical twin who committed suicide. Or maybe the girlfriend got pregnant and had an abortion against his will. It could be any crazy scenario; you just don't know. You could try to approach him and maybe explore the angle that something has happened in his life which he is taking very hard. I don't know, it's just a thought.
Probably the safest idea for you is just to scram and get out of this possibly dangerous situation, unless you really want to pursue a more empathetic approach. But you know what happens regularly to Good Samaritans who stop by the roadside to help broken-down motorists? They get hit by other vehicles. And you definitely don't want to step in and try to break up a fistfight, because then both guys end up hitting you.
Didn't you catch AIDS from him? I find this hard to believe.
One man's plan wrote:
Didn't you catch AIDS from him? I find this hard to believe.
AIDS isn't like COVID-19; you don't catch AIDS from breathing the same air. You have to have intimate contact. C'mon, everyone knows this.
A little worried wrote:
Had a guy move in last summer. I'm currently 31, he's 29. He was a totally normal person the first several months we lived together. He had friends, a girlfriend, hobbies, etc, and though we were different people, we talked some here and there. Then, probably around mid September 2019, something changed where he very suddenly became super reclusive, stopped talking to me and started avoiding me, broke up with his girlfriend (who he talked about marrying just weeks before and she was totally blindsided herself), and started staying in his room with the door shut ~100% of the time. He does not use our kitchen and only comes out a couple times per day to go to the bathroom or answer the door quickly to grab food he ordered (usually a sandwich or a pizza). Any time I try to talk to him during these very brief moments he appears, he gives me like one word responses and does not pause for even a split second to try to make conversation of any kind.
He is in the Navy and has already served 4 years. He told me when he moved in that he decided he wanted to become an officer which required a 4 year degree, so that's why he moved here and is attending school full-time on the military's dime. Before covid, he was still extremely reclusive, but I didn't worry too much because I figured he's at least going to class and his ROTC thing, but once covid hit, everything is online, and he no longer even leaves our apartment. I work full-time, so I can't say for certain, but from what I can tell, he has had no in-person human interaction (besides answering the door to grab delivery food and seeing me maybe 1 minute per week if that) for MONTHS now. He stays in his room and plays video games online; I can hear that. What else he does in there I do not know.
Anyway, while I'm normally one to very much mind my own business, I'm starting to get a little freaked out. He has never said or done anything that suggests he's violent or plotting anything, but going months without interacting with humans and being clearly depressed for months is not healthy and often leads to pretty extreme dysfunctional thinking and behavior. Again, he's never SAID anything explicitly worrying, but at the same time it wouldn't surprise me at all if I came home to find him dead one day, not to mention the possibility he might snap in some other way.
I'm kind of at a loss as to what to do since I've already tried "reaching out" to him numerous times over the last 6 months, and he clearly does not want to talk at all. I've thought about trying to contact ROTC or whatever and have a meeting with someone and explain what's going on, mainly as concern for my roommate but also for my own safety. Not really sure what else to do, if anything.
Any ideas? Am I overreacting? All input is welcome.
I would move out. Does he have weapons? Who knows what his mental state is.
Put a note under his door and tell him his behavior is alarming and you are going to leave or get a new roommate.
HM guy wrote:
You should move out, call the ROTC about this guy
I'm very reluctant to do that because apparently if the Navy finds out he has any kind of mental healthy issue he will be discharged and have to pay back the tens of thousands of dollars they have paid towards his education. I don't want to duck up his life. I realize that is better than him offing himself or something worse, but it's hard for me gauge just how serious this is. The potential for it being very bad is there, but there's no clear sign suggesting that he definitely or probably will have a break of some kind.
I do appreciate the input, everyone.
Why don't you invite him out to have a beer or order a pizza or something? He may be going through some stuff and would really appreciate you making the effort. Depressed people aren't very good at taking initiative, but that doesn't mean they don't want to. That small act may be all he needs to get back on track. You don't need to be his therapist, just be a dude to hang out with.
reread your post and see you said you did try to reach out to him. Maybe try it one more time, worst case scenario, you get to eat pizza.
wear a masks when you start groping each other ?
Similar story for me. One year in law school I roomed with a guy who had been in the navy in a submarine. Except for class he spent 99% of his time in his room which was 16 X4 with the shades down. He would have 1 minute cold showers. If he had to stay on campus between classes he would wait in the back of his windowless van. He never passed the bar and 15 years I saw an announcement in the college magazine that he had died 2 years earlier. Probably killed himself,
Mind your own business Karen, You sound like someone who looks for things to complain about. It's quite likely that he doesn't want to have anything to do with you. Leave him alone.
I had a roommate that I couldn't stand so I stayed in my room whenever I could. I never told him my business, never had conversations. I just stayed away from him as much as possible.