Roommate [34F] is neglecting everything (bills, her child) to care for her addict boyfriend [28F] as he battles almost definitely fake pancreatic cancer

Strap in. This is a wild one, and I have no idea what to do.

I moved in with my roommate six months ago after a serious suicide attempt. She invited me, let me live a few months rent-free to get used to the insane amount of therapy that I'm undergoing, and not have to live alone. Awesome! She's a really good person.

The trouble started about 8 weeks ago when an old flame moved back to town and they started dating. I was pretty sketched out by him from the first meeting, as dude was going through classic symptoms of dope sickness (my dad was an addict, I know the signs).

Within a week, he'd moved in with us. I dealt with it by putting a lock on my door. I started working a bit, and chipping in for rent/bills, and I'm gone enough of the day where my interactions with him are very limited.

When I do see him, he's drunk. Period. From the moment he wakes up around 6pm until he passes out around 10am, he's absolutely wasted. He drinks a bottle of rum every single day.

So about two weeks ago my roommate came to me crying. Her boyfriend dropped a bomb on her that he has pancreatic cancer. Stage 3. He was diagnosed about 18 months ago and at the time was given a few months to live.

I call bullshit. I haven't said that to my roommate yet... because if I'm wrong, I'm the worst human being alive.

I'm no doctor, but if someone has that prognosis, drinks like crazy, was shooting up daily as recently as two months ago, and popping molly every other day, I'm pretty sure they'd be dead. He also isn't seeking any treatment at all.

Whatever. It's her mistake to make. I'll support her if it turns out that he's lying. I've expressed that I have concerns about him, but I'm not going to accuse him of lying about cancer until I'm 100% sure. At least to her.

But beyond this piece of shit who is constantly falling down drunk in our house, my roommate is completely neglecting her responsibilities to fund his alcohol, drugs, new clothes, and trips to see his shitty friends.

Last week, our landlord stopped by to ask about the last two months of rent that's gone unpaid. Her car was repossessed last weekend. Her child, who lives with us on the weekends sits in his room playing video games all day to hide from this drunk idiot stumbling around.

I paid the back rent from the Xmas money my family gave me, so eviction isn't going to happen.

I know that everyone is going to suggest that I move, but with work and therapy right now, it's just not an option. I have nowhere else to go.

I just need to know how to be a supportive friend while she's financially and emotionally ruining her life over a heroin addict who is almost certainly lying about having cancer.

If any doctors can chime in, that'd be really helpful, too. I mean... I don't think I'm too off-base in my guess that a person with stage 3 pancreatic cancer could survive a bottle of rum and other assorted drugs daily.

TL;DR: Roommate's new live-in boyfriend is probably pretending to have cancer while financially bleeding her. Need to be supportive, but also... I don't know... nudge her towards reality.

Submitted December 29, 2019 at 04:23PM by phantomsforever_xo https://ift.tt/2Q8zh5z