Q: “Somebody help me. I am in college right now and this schedule seems never ending. I have school 5 days a week and of course every professor wants their work on time and on point. My fiancé, although I love him to pieces, is working my nerves. We have a one bedroom apartment and the only place that is good to study is the living room/dining room, which has our lovely flat screen TV with Netflix; and whenever he want to watch sports he wants to watch them in the living room when I am trying to study! He also does things like if I am working on a paper and need full concentration, he'll ask me to get him some water or get his phone. If I get mad at him I'm the bad guy!!! I would do my work in the bedroom, but then I end up falling asleep. Going the library is an option but we share the car and I don't want to leave him with no car if he wants to go out with friends or anything like that. The only time I can study is when he's out of the house which is not that often. How can I go about fixing this situation, it's the beginning of the semester so right now I have to nip this in the bud before my grades start to suffer.” A: You are going to have to speak up and BE HONEST with your fiancé. Your education is #1 and having an inconsiderate boyfriend/fiancé is not beneficial with you being successful in your studies. I’m going to give your fiancé the benefit of the doubt and say he’s unaware of his actions, therefore, it is your place to make him aware of what he’s doing and how it’s affecting your school work. You need to let him know EXACTLY what he is doing; and that it’s quite annoying to you. I don’t know if you all have a TV in your bedroom, but, now is a good time to get an additional TV with the Netflix option for the bedroom. You two need to communicate and both need to know when you set time aside for studying, he moves his butt into the bedroom to watch TV. That should be a house rule; and if he’s thirsty while you’re studying, he’s going to have to get up and use his two legs and get his own water. Good luck to you
~ Tam Solomon, Contributing Writer
