When you live with your best friend, it’s like living with family. You become two peas in a pod: planning and doing just about everything together! It’s the ultimate kind of companionship: you’re both adults and don’t have to answer to authority, but you still let the other know your every move. It’s a strange dynamic, but it’s one of the best living situations—having both a roomie and best friend all in one.

Your Bed Becomes Their Bed
One of the best things about being so close to your roommate is the fact that you now have two beds. If you’re bored of your own room, head on over to theirs for a change of scenery! Odds are, you’ll end up sharing a few snacks, watching TV or spending way too much updating your social media channels than you will getting anything productive done. Plus, you’ll have someone else to lounge around in your pajamas with, despite the fact that it’s the middle of the day.

Meals are Best Cooked Together
As a single adult, or recent grad, you know that making a giant meal for just one person can be cumbersome and tiring, and usually not at all worth it because you’ll either have a tonne of leftovers, or will have wasted a tonne of food. When your roommate is your best friend, you will want to plan all your meals together as if you’re a nuclear family—complete with a sit down time at the table and unspoken rules about who cooks and who cleans.

You Plan Everything
Sometimes you feel like you’re living with your parents, or are becoming your parents. Every time your roomie goes somewhere, you find yourself asking: “What time are you coming home? Which days are you home for dinner? Who are you going with?” You might get on each other’s nerves, but you just wouldn’t feel right if you didn’t know what time to expect them home, or what they are doing during the day. Even when you’re apart, you’re constantly texting and planning the next time you’re going to do when you’re both home together. “Okay, sweatpants and Family Guy at 10 p.m.!”

You Feel What They Feel
If your roomie experiences a heart-wrenching breakup, you’re right there with them eating a bucket load of ice cream while watching reality TV. You feel their pain. You also get to celebrate and enjoy their successes as if they were your own. Partying is twice as fun, because you probably share most of the same group of friends, and there’s never any argument about the household’s quiet time.

You Inherit an Extended Family
Most of the time, your best friend’s family automatically becomes your family. The same is true when you are best friends AND roommates, except that your connection gets even more intense. Soon, your roomie starts to refer to your parents as their parents—“What is Papa Stinson making for Easter dinner? Tell your parents their adopted daughter say hi!” Family dinners are even more fun because you have an extra partner in crime.

Taylor Stinson co-authors Toronto-based lifestyle blog,  The Girls on Bloor.