I was going to say 18 when I went to college for the first time, but then you mentioned hospital roommates. I was 14 the first time that happened, but I’ve never had a stay longer than 11 days so I’m not sure how much that really counts.
I have not always done well with roommates. In the hospital, they often crammed 3 beds into a room meant for 2, and most of my hospitalizations happened when I was pediatric, so I was often sharing rooms with small children, usually cancer patients. That was always very sad, and often difficult. With hospital roommates of all ages I have had issues sleeping, oftentimes because they left their TVs blaring through the night.
I only shared an actual room with someone in college for one quarter. My first quarter of school, before I dropped out due to health issues. My roommate was a very sweet woman who I never got to know very well. She was very kind but just didn’t seem very interested in becoming close with me.
For the rest of college, I lived in apartments with people but had my own room. I have horror stories of varying degrees about almost all of my housemates, but on a few occasions had a good relationship with them.
I’ve lived with just my boyfriend for about three years now. It’s bliss.