Woman abandons pregnant roommate who took advantage of her constantly

Just because you live with someone doesn't mean you are responsible for their wellbeing. Plenty of roommates live perfectly well together and have completely separate lives. Being friends with your roommate can be an added bonus, but a close connection shouldn't be assumed.

That's part of the issue this poor woman is dealing with in a new "Am I the A-hole?" post. After years of being taken advantage of, OP had to blindside her roommate and leave her in the lurch even though she's pregnant, and now she's wondering if it was the right thing to do.

OP explains that she has been living with her roommate Holly for a year-and-a-half. Holly has been a terrible roommate. OP did the vast majority of the chores and didn't like her very much, but Holly seemed to consider her a really good friend.

OP would try to talk to her about helping more, but she just made excuses. "She told me once that it was my fault because I do it better than her and she is now not used to doing chores," OP writes. That's horrible. 

Then, six months ago, Holly told OP that she was pregnant. OP has been covering Holly's rent at that point because she didn't have any money. OP would tell her she had to move out, but Holly would cry or make excuses until OP backed off. Holly was basically manipulating OP into doing everything for her, and it got to the point where she couldn't even support herself.

Holly quit her job a few months later and couldn't find another. But she felt like she had OP to depend on, so she felt fine about it. OP writes, "She thanked me for being so nice about the rent and the food and she also told me she is not feeling scared about being a single mom as I would be there to help her."

Holly was basically trying to entrap her roommate, who she'd only known and lived with for a little over a year, to raise her baby with (read: for) her. So not OK. OP freaked out, understandably. "Helping out a person when they are in a spot is one thing. But it was clear that she was expecting me to help her even after the baby was born. I didn't want that," she wrote. Nor should she be expected to want that.

So OP quietly started to make plans to leave. She found a new apartment that she would share with a friend, and one day, when Holly wasn't home, she moved all her stuff out. She let her landlord know she wouldn't be renewing the lease, and then she left a message for Holly telling her that she's moved out and that she should talk to the landlord about her situation.

Holly has left OP multiple voicemails saying she should have talked to her before moving out and saying that she's "abandoned" her. OP's friends have different opinions about how she handled the situation. OP writes, Bottom line is I left an 8-9(?) month pregnant woman who was depending on me for many things (like rent, food, etc.) on her own during a pandemic while she was jobless."

Commenters were slightly conflicted. No one disagreed that Holly's behavior was completely despicable, but some people thought OP should have at least mentioned to Holly that she was moving out. 

"Yes, she was taking advantage of you and that makes her an a--hole," one person wrote. "But you went low when you could have gone high here and at least given her a heads up about it. And [you] left her in a serious bind. You had the opportunity to remove yourself from the situation and still be a bigger person, but you chose to screw her over on your way out."

But some argued that OP didn't have the option. "You tried to talk to her," another person wrote. "You tried to get her to do chores. Didn't work. You tried to talk about paying rent properly. Didn't work. Each time she pulled some emotional manipulation (crying / deflecting / gaslighting). So you didn't have any reason to think that talking would work."

What do you think? Did OP go too far by slipping out of the apartment without so much as even warning Holly? Or was she totally justified in leaving this manipulative woman to fend for herself?

Editor's Note: The article was originally published in May 2020.