The COVID-19 quarantine has caused a mental health crisis, and your roommate just can’t handle it. Without his daily gym routine and his work wife to listen to all his problems, he’s now just projecting his unresolved trauma onto you. Since he got furloughed (not laid off, he insists), the lack of a boss or any authority figure to report to has made him revert to a juvenile state of mental health. He has preyed upon your inability to say no and has been using you for his emotional labor. You’ve become his therapist, his friend, his daddy, and it has to end.
It started out slowly, he asked under his breath, “Hey, want to chat for a sec?” He suggested that you open that nice bottle of wine you’ve been saving, and then he unloaded on you for two hours. Now he’s making a routine of this, at least twice a week. It didn’t seem like a problem at first, the only thing on your schedule was re-watching Jersey Shore, so you had the time. You even mentioned to him that’s how you planned on spending your night, and he weaponized your sad and pathetic nostalgia, making you feel like spending time with him would bring the “house” closer. Now you’re in too deep, and the shit you now know about him only someone with at least a master’s degree can fix it.
This will be a hard pattern to break, but admitting you have a problem with submitting to the emotional whims of moderately attractive men is the first step to recovery. To think of it, maybe you should get some therapy too.
HornRimmer 