My (21F) Roommate (21M) constantly takes their stress out on me.

First time poster, but I'll cut to the chase.

Me and my roommate are exes, we moved in together whenever we were dating with my best friend (24M) and his brother (22M). We've all lived together for 2 years, I moved across the country to live here, my Roommate in Question (RQ) moved 2 hours away from home. College is way cheaper than our respective states, and all of my friends are where RQ is from. Even in our relationship, RQ would take out their stress on me, whether through emotional abuse, pinning things on me, or generally being very withdrawn and unwelcoming. Anytime I would bring it up, I'd get gaslit, you can see why the relationship ended. Despite all of that, we are actually very good as friends, we just don't mesh as a unit. Coronavirus has taken away a lot of lives for RQ, two of his family friends have died from it, and his grandma just died for unrelated reasons, but she was the only person in his family he had a real connection with. I give a lot of leeway because I know how stressed he is, and how much he's going through, so I try not to take a lot of things to heart. But it is DRAINING. I get the brunt of all of his bad moods, being talked down to, being told I'm not doing enough (chores, dishes, cooking, ect), and then I have to go on discord and hear him act like nothing is wrong, and listen to him laugh with all of our friends, knowing full well that I am his emotional punching bag in private.

I'm tired, but I don't know how to talk to him about it without it coming off as insensitive, or him just chalking it up in his mind to me being "too sensitive." Because of past abuse, I am always the punching bag and am fine with taking it, and dealing with the emotional toll later on my own, but it's starting to make it to where I don't want to be in the same room as him because he'll say some backhanded BS that he knows will cut me deep. I know the only reason he's being like this is because of what has happened recently, but I am also so tired of being his punching bag when he has a giant support system that he just refuses to use. Any advice on how to deal with this would be helpful, I'm about to break our SAH order and drive to a friends house.

TL;DR: My roommate uses me as an emotional punching bag because of recent deaths that have hit him pretty hard. It's draining, and affecting my mental health, and I need advice on how to talk to him about it without him trying to gaslight me.

Submitted May 05, 2020 at 11:43PM

First time poster, but I'll cut to the chase.Me and my roommate are exes, we moved in together whenever we were dating with my best friend (24M) and his brother (22M). We've all lived together for 2 years, I moved across the country to live here, my Roommate in Question (RQ) moved 2 hours away from home. College is way cheaper than our respective states, and all of my friends are where RQ is from. Even in our relationship, RQ would take out their stress on me, whether through emotional abuse, pinning things on me, or generally being very withdrawn and unwelcoming. Anytime I would bring it up, I'd get gaslit, you can see why the relationship ended. Despite all of that, we are actually very good as friends, we just don't mesh as a unit. Coronavirus has taken away a lot of lives for RQ, two of his family friends have died from it, and his grandma just died for unrelated reasons, but she was the only person in his family he had a real connection with. I give a lot of leeway because I know how stressed he is, and how much he's going through, so I try not to take a lot of things to heart. But it is DRAINING. I get the brunt of all of his bad moods, being talked down to, being told I'm not doing enough (chores, dishes, cooking, ect), and then I have to go on discord and hear him act like nothing is wrong, and listen to him laugh with all of our friends, knowing full well that I am his emotional punching bag in private.I'm tired, but I don't know how to talk to him about it without it coming off as insensitive, or him just chalking it up in his mind to me being "too sensitive." Because of past abuse, I am always the punching bag and am fine with taking it, and dealing with the emotional toll later on my own, but it's starting to make it to where I don't want to be in the same room as him because he'll say some backhanded BS that he knows will cut me deep. I know the only reason he's being like this is because of what has happened recently, but I am also so tired of being his punching bag when he has a giant support system that he just refuses to use. Any advice on how to deal with this would be helpful, I'm about to break our SAH order and drive to a friends house.TL;DR: My roommate uses me as an emotional punching bag because of recent deaths that have hit him pretty hard. It's draining, and affecting my mental health, and I need advice on how to talk to him about it without him trying to gaslight me.