A little Burnt Out

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I am taking a bachelor's degree in business on-line and my room ate is also doing an on-line bachelor degree on the same university.

It started out with her having to run errands or take care of a few household stuff so i volunteered to help with her homework. Months down the line I now do all of her course work. It has been about 5 courses now and I do all of her individual work, her team work, her substantiative attendance replies etc. In a way it does not bother me, because I like to help and I like IT, more than I thought I would. But at the same time, it has become expected that I will get all her work done, on time and well. Not to mention she has had nothing but straight A scores since I took over (not to say she didn't before, she did). But this past semester I scraped my finance class with a D, between doing all her work and mine and she actually got upset because I let it slip like that.

I have serious problems with math, for starters, and I have had to do her own load of work, as well. I am feeling . . . tired. but I know if I tell her I don't want to do it anymore, which isn't true I would just like a break, she would act real funny and stuff. She is too far behind the material to understand it, for starters, and she gets bored and we need our refunds to pay our rent and all that.

Did I make a mistake volunteering?

You didn't make a mistake volunteering.

You DID make a mistake letting her use you like that. She has no right to do that.

She's using the hell out of you, getting great grades, learning jackshit, and what are you getting? Failing your classes and loosing money.

Stop letting her use you like that.

You don't need a break, you need to stop doing her work for her. She's a cheater, let her crash and burn.

That would be so damn hard to do, I like her database classes and she does do a lot of other stuff for me. I guess she is using me huh?

The first and most important rule of education (especially higher education at university level): Always do your own work and never let someone else do your work. There are no excuses for breaking this rule, so her behavior is clearly not acceptable. Helping out is ok, but taking credit from other people's work is not. According to the rules of (some) universities she may risk serious consequences because her assignments could be classified as plagiarism. (But she won't because you have never published those assignments before as I understand.)

You should do it anyways...........no matter how she reacts. I agree that she is using you, it doesn't matter what she does for you........she has no right to expect you to do all of her assignments. It is also dishonest of both of you to submit your assignments in her name. It is against most university policies as someone else said and I think it is unethical. If she gets a degree in IT based on your work and then gets chosen for a job (over other applicants )in the IT field based on her credentials , this would be unfair because she cheated in order to obtain these credentials. It's also unfair to you to be failing your own courses because you're doing another person's work and helping them get A's!! In regard to your comment about liking some of her courses.........you should sign up to take some of these type of courses yourself. Maybe you could do them as electives for your Business degree? See what your online uni offers in terms of IT courses.

I have let people use me in the past, I have also done assignments for other people! I've come to realize that doing this was very wrong for the reasons that I described above, but I do understand why you would do this. At least in my case it was partly because I enjoyed the subject and the particular assignments the other person had to do and I wanted to be helpful.

Not to mention that I have a terrible habit of wanting to do for people and making them happy. My conversation skills are lousy, my hobbies are a bit on the odd side and not enjoyed by everyone at home, my eating is, of course, very selective and I only eat things outside of a basic dry and crunchy consistency when I cook them myself, and this also limits what gets eaten in the house. I know, personally, that I am a very hard individual to deal with, especially having no job, agoraphobia, picky habits, possessive habits, being bad in conversation, freaking out when the furniture gets re-arranged . . . etc. I felt that taking over, I would take some of the pressure off her, and maybe even the others, by taking on a load of work I was more capable of doing than getting a job outside of home, or being a supportive listener (which I still try to do, but its hard to remember that sometimes people just want to talk, not hear rational and suggestions, or that my obvious answers had already occurred to them).

She is a good friend and usually under a lot of pressure. She takes care of the finances, the bill payments, keeps track of the insurance, reminds me to take medication when I need it, keeps track of laundry days, etc. I have no problem doing house chores such as bathroom clean up and kitchen cleaning and the like, but I am also a little . . . off sometimes.

At the same time, having to take the load of two bachelor degrees its starting to burn me out, seriously. I go to bed tired and wake up with little desire to think or read or do homework.