There are bad ideas, like cutting your own bangs at 3 AM after a bottle of wine. Then there are catastrophic ideas, like purchasing a thirty-year mortgage with your ex-girlfriend and expecting it to be a seamless, drama-free utopia. One woman on Reddit is currently living through the inevitable fallout of such a decision, and it involves a very specific color palette, a fast-food meltdown, and a level of codependency that would make a therapist weep.
The OP (Original Poster) and her roommate have a history that is messier than a spilled paint can. They are in their thirties, lived together for a decade, and dated for six of those years. despite breaking up in 2019, they decided to buy a house together in 2021 because they are “best friends.” Before moving in, they allegedly made a pact that sounds like it was drafted by a couple of tweens at a sleepover: they agreed to paint every single room in the house a different shade of purple. Because, according to the OP, purple is a color that “everybody loves” and “goes with everything.” (Narrator voice: It does not).
The OP took this pact very seriously. She immediately painted her bedroom, her office, and a bathroom in various shades of violet, doing all the labor herself. Her roommate/ex, however, dragged her feet. Months passed with no painting. Then, one fateful afternoon, the roommate came home with her boyfriend and some friends, armed with paintbrushes and a color that was decidedly not purple. It was “grayblue.” And thus, World War III began in the suburbs.
Let’s unpack the “Wendy’s Incident,” because it is truly the cherry on top of this chaotic sundae. The OP was in her room gaming, seething because she could hear people “snickering” and having fun while painting. The roommate’s boyfriend, likely trying to be polite to the person lurking behind the closed door, knocked and asked if she wanted some Wendy’s. A normal human response would be, “No thanks,” or “Yes, I’d love a Frosty.” The OP’s response? She felt insulted that he treated her “as if I were a child incapable of getting my own food.”
She was so triggered by the offer of a Spicy Chicken Sandwich that she literally fled the house and drove to her parents’ home to escape the “noise.” When she returned two days later, she claimed the house felt “contaminated” because “strangers” had been there. Strangers who… painted a wall and offered her dinner. The drama is dialed up to an eleven, but the OP wasn’t done. She confronted her roommate about breaking the sacred Purple Promise.
The roommate explained the obvious: she is an adult woman who dates a man, he is going to be spending time in her bedroom, and perhaps a lavender love nest isn’t the vibe she wants. She wanted a gray-blue room. It is her room. In a house she co-owns. Most people would say, “Okay, cool, it’s your space.” The OP, however, viewed this as a personal attack and a betrayal of their “dream home.”
The OP is stuck on the idea that the roommate should have asked “permission” to have her boyfriend over. Let’s be clear: you do not need to ask your roommate for permission to have a guest in a house you own, especially when you are thirty-four years old. The OP’s possessiveness over the house and her ex-girlfriend is screaming from the rooftops. She claims the roommate did this to “hurt” her, rather than simply accepting that her roommate’s taste has evolved past “Barney the Dinosaur chic.”
This isn’t about paint colors. This is about the OP not being over the relationship. She is trying to control the environment to keep their bond exactly as it was, and the introduction of the boyfriend (and his influence on the decor) is shattering that illusion. Calling the house “contaminated” and getting angry that the roommate “gave in to the wants of her boyfriend” shows that the OP still views them as a singular unit, not two independent homeowners.
So, is the OP the ahole? Resoundingly, yes. You cannot force a grown woman to live in a purple room if she doesn’t want to. Buying a house with an ex was a bold move, but demanding they adhere to a monochromatic color scheme for the rest of their lives is just delusional.
What would you do if your roommate demanded you paint your room a color you hated? Would you grab a brush, or would you grab some Wendy’s and lock the door? Let us know in the comments if you think the OP needs to let the purple dream die!