I am just going to come out and say it… my husband and I do not share a bed. We do not even share a room. We have what has been deemed a Sleep Divorce. I mean we tried, we really did, but we can’t share a bed.
Right after college, we shared an apartment with another couple. Our room was the size of a walk-in closet. There was barely room for our queen-sized bed. Add a couple of dressers and the space began to close in on us. For a while, I tried to make the sleeping arrangement work. We’re not big people, so why couldn’t we share a queen-sized bed?! There were two answers to this question…
How The Sleep Divorce Started
I had woken up several nights thinking there was an earthquake going on. After jumping up in bed panicking, I realized my husband’s (fiance at the time) leg was shaking the bed and waking me from my slumber. I explained to him what was going on and told him to see a doctor. Like most men, he shrugged it off.
The second problem was how light of a sleeper I had become. I woke up to every little sound. The heat turning on. A squeaky floorboard. Car doors outside. It didn’t matter. To combat this, I bought earplugs. The earplugs were one of the best solutions to our problem and I still sleep with them everyday.
But his leg kept going…
I finally convinced him to see a doctor. He was officially diagnosed with Restless Leg Syndrome. The cure, magnesium. If only it worked.
A Happy Marriage and a Baby
We got married in September of 2004. In hopes of trying to sleep in the same bed, we bought a king. It wasn’t a king mattress per say but two twin XLs. We both figured that if the mattresses were isolated that he wouldn’t shake my side with his leg. But that didn’t work. A few months after we married, I took myself down to the guest bedroom and slept on the futon. It was the first time in a long time that I slept soundly. This continued until we had our daughter and my severe postpartum depression and anxiety set in. Back up to our bed I went in hopes that I could tune any of her crying out.
Here I am, losing my sanity trying to sleep and suddenly the bed is shaking because of my husband’s legs. I honestly was ready to forfeit and just come to terms that I would never sleep again. Then I was hospitalized for my postpartum illnesses. After my twelve day stay, I returned home very drugged. I was so medicated that falling and staying asleep was no longer a problem. This lasted a couple of months, and then my dosages were lowered, and sleep wasn’t happening.
After a lot of thinking, we felt it would be better for my sanity to sleep on the futon in what was now our daughter’s room.
The Move
When our daughter was almost two we moved to a new home to cut down my husband’s long commute. For some reason we attempted to sleep in the same bed because we didn’t learn from our past experiences. Maybe we did it because the master bedroom was on the same floor as our daughter’s bedroom and she was still young. Who knows?!
I developed a new habit that played into our sleeping disaster. Not only was my husband still suffering from Restless Leg Syndrome, but now I was adding something to the mix that kept my husband awake. I started to watch Golden Girls on our portable DVD player before going to sleep. The sound kept him awake. So I decided to use headphones. Nope. It solved the sound issue but there was still the bright light from the DVD that kept him awake.
It just wasn’t working!
Luckily, the house we purchased was a 4-bedroom house. We had set up the last two bedrooms as a guest room and a playroom. I permanently moved into the guest room. Problem solved with the exception of when we actually had guests. Then I moved back to the master bedroom during their stay. Good news is we didn’t have a lot of overnight guests.
I now had my own bed and my own room! Ah! And our marriage has been great ever since.
But it is Not Conventional!
So what?!
I’ve had a few friends shocked by my Sleep Divorce and a few that congratulated me. Those that were shocked couldn’t fathom not sharing a bed with their spouse. I mean, that’s what married people do, right?
Well, not always. My parents have been married for 53 years and still going strong. During my childhood I remember them starting out in their bed but due to my father’s snoring, my mother would pick herself up and go to the living room sofa almost nightly. When we moved from NY to CT, they tried once again to share a bed (Ah, that’s where I get it from). Nightly, my mother went down to the family room sofa. Problem was, there were no spare bedrooms at the time. Then my sister moved out and I went off to college. At this point, my father was given his own room. And that lasted for many years until my father was given a CPAP machine. Now they share a bed.
But, it isn’t only my parents. My husband’s parents have separate bedrooms as well and they will be married almost 50 years.
And, we can’t stop there. Kings and queens from long ago not only had separate bed chambers, they had separate wings in their castles!
In theory it would be nice to share a bed with my husband. It would make getting a hotel room easier. But we are happy with our setup. His twitching legs or his snoring does not awaken me. He is not awakened by my Netflix watching and apparent snoring. My mental health is better, and we both are getting a good night’s sleep. That is all that matters.
