If you don’t want your roommates to find out the naked truth about your extra-curricular activities, make sure you sign on with the right crew. Otherwise you could end up with your, erm, pencil case left wide open during a study session with your girlfriend when one of your roomies walks in.
    These are, among other joys like sitting on moist banana peels left on your couch, what those of you who are planning to set up house with some new people can expect.
    This is not meant to scare students who are venturing from their parents’ nest for the first time — just don’t be surprised when you end up with a straggler on the couch for way longer than you’d expected, as happened to Robin Strom.
    The interior designer who works at Kensington’s Cushy Life once had to put up with a roommate from hell for three months — and she wasn’t even technically her roommate.
     “A few years ago I was living with two other girls in a basement suite. One of them asked if her cousin could stay with us for three weeks — she ended up staying for three months,” Strom says. “The girl was a chronic chatterer, she wouldn’t shut up. One night I woke up at 2 a.m. and just wanted to watch TV in peace. She must have heard me get up because she came out of her room and started yakking.”
    However, it was only when the roommate — the one with the cousin — left for Japan that things got really bad. “She just told us if we wanted her cousin to leave, we had to deal with it ourselves,” Strom says. “After awhile the cousin got the hint. But then when the roommate got back she didn’t want to pay for some of her utilities. It caused a huge fight.”
    Angel Guerra, who runs The Source online shop, has been on both sides of the equation — driving her first roommates nuts with her messy ways, and then running into a nightmare situation in the dorms at college.
    “I moved out for the first time with two girlfriends when I was 18. We thought we were going to be the raddest roommates ever,” the U of C education student says. “But in the end the little things got in the way — like my messiness. One time I left a banana peel on the couch and it made one of them, Danielle, so mad. She left a strongly worded note on top of it. Also, she was working days and I was working nights, so our schedules didn’t match up. She lost a lot of sleep because of me. The other girl was not very impressed with me at times either — particularly when I walked in on her and her boyfriend naked in her room. I hadn’t knocked.”
    The next year Guerra went to college in B.C., where things got really bad for one of her friends. “There were five girls living in our dorm room,” she says. “One, Natalia, had been dating Joel for seven months when Amanda moved in. She and Joel really hit it off and within weeks he broke it off with Natalia, who took it really hard. We all went home for Easter except Natalia, who ended up downing a bottle of pills. Thankfully she survived, but when we got back we would hear her cry herself to sleep until 2 a.m.”
    Now, Guerra and Strom are a few years older and have learned how to make it work in a household of strangers. They communicate well, which is key to having peace in the house, according to experts.
    “You should not be afraid of conflict, because when it arises you need to deal with it, rather than let it fester until someone explodes,” says private practice counsellor Pam Nyrose. “Communication is vital — which includes being clear about your needs as well as an active listener. Avoid blaming each other. Everyone needs to take responsibility for their actions.”
    SAIT counsellor Danica Hiedebrecht tells students to take things like lifestyle and personality into account when you are choosing a roommate.
    “If you are someone who likes to play a lot of loud music, avoid living with someone who prefers to study quietly. Cleanliness is always a big issue, so find out how much value your potential roommates place on keeping the house tidy,” she says.
    “Everyone has a right to be treated with respect and live in a tidy, peaceful place. If there is friction within the house, you have a right to say what you need. Students are already under so much stress — from exams, to homework and jobs, and relationships — that it is important their home situation isn’t making it worse. So it is best to be considerate, responsible and learn how to be respectfully assertive.”