Those are deliberate design choices. The way If you dodge perpendicular to the attack of the melee enemy it should place you in a position that you can land the attack.
There is a hunger penalty to dashing, and eating causes sickness. Hunger impacts damage, dash cooldown, and attack cooldown. And sickness getting to 100% totally makes you hungry and prevents you from eating for a while. so your damage will be at its lowest and your cooldowns at their longest. So the constant dashing is there to put pressure on your hunger and thus your sickness.
Hopefully you will comeback for more gameplay. I am hoping that the difficulty is a curve matter and not necessarily balancing.
I am grateful for you feedback. It may look like i am dismissing your point but I am not. It is something to consinder, and if i get more complaints on the matter it will help in my final decision on changing my deliberate designs because they are not working as i hoped.