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Common Sleep Partner Issues

Spending the night with your boyfriend, girlfriend, or spouse is one of the most intimate and rewarding parts of being in a long-term relationship. Sleeping near someone you love could improve sleep quality, reduce stress, and of course, elicit feelings of joy, contentment, and overall satisfaction with your relationship and your life. 

Unfortunately, there are also some potential drawbacks to sleeping next to your partner, especially if differing schedules, personal habits, or occurrences like snoring cause one or both participants to suffer sleep disruption. 

What are some of the most common sleep partner issues you may come up against when you decide to share your cozy nest with another? 

Out of Sync Sleep Schedules

Whether you’re dating and seeing your partner only a couple of nights a week or you’re married and sleeping together nightly, bedtime can become a sore spot if your sleep schedules differ. 

If one of you hits the hay at 9 pm and pops out of bed at 5 am like clockwork, and the other comes rolling in at midnight and snoozes until 8 am, the chances of anyone getting a full night of rest are pretty low. 

While you may be able to more closely sync schedules, you might also try skipping jiggly coil mattresses in favor of a hybrid mattress that’s less likely to alert one party when another enters or leaves the bed.

Snoring or Sleep Apnea

While light, rhythmic snoring can actually be sort of soothing, noisily sawing logs can quickly put the kibosh on amity within a relationship, especially when it’s a chronic and disruptive condition like apnea. 

Snoring could be curbed in a variety of ways depending on the cause (antihistamines to treat allergy symptoms, for example). Even apnea may be reduced through weight loss in some cases. 

However, serious apnea is not only detrimental to sleep — it can also be life-threatening. It needs to be diagnosed by a medical professional, and often, treatment with a continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) machine can help. 

Insomnia or Sleep Disruption

Are you an incredibly light sleeper? Maybe you suffer from intermittent or chronic insomnia that keeps you up at night. When one sleeping partner’s circadian rhythms are out of whack, it can definitely make it difficult for both parties to get a restful night of sleep. 

Active Sleeper

Some people sleep like the dead, waking in the same position they fell asleep in eight hours earlier. Others roll around all night, steal the covers, or get up frequently for a drink, to use the restroom, and so on. Active sleepers may not be able to control their sleep habits, but if they don’t at least try, it could put a strain on a marriage. 

Different Comfort Levels

We all have different ideas of what makes a bedroom comfortable, from an ideal temperature to the firmness of a mattress. 

Maybe a husband likes the room cooler than his wife. This disparity of needs could be easily addressed by cooling the room and adding more bedding or by each partner having their own dedicated bedding. Choosing a natural latex mattress that contours to each person’s body could help with comfort for both sleepers. 

Creating ideal sleeping conditions for two people and dealing with issues that disrupt sleep isn’t always easy, but when you confront these problems head-on and seek solutions together, you have the best chance to create a mutually beneficial sleep environment.