Dr. Rubin Naiman

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Sleeping Together

The Neglected Night Side of Relationships

Sleep is as much a social as it is a solo experience. In my work as both a sleep specialist and a couple’s therapist, I’ve found that many couples experience some of their most enchanting as well as their most challenging moments in and around sleep. Sleeping together, in the literal sense of the term, is a rich topic that deserves much more consideration.

For many couples, the time spent sleeping together is the bulk of the time they spend together. Some couples appear to be strongly synchronized or entrained in their sleep and wake patterns. They may share an evening wind down ritual, bedtime and even cuddle throughout the night.  Some may even prefer to arise together and explore their dreams in the morning. Other couples maintain routines and sleep wake schedules that can differ by many hours. Though they may share a home, they function as if they live in different time zones.

Going to bed heightens our vulnerability. It carries us from an active, dressed-up and socially defined waking self to a more receptive, near naked and emotionally liberated sleepy self.  When we shift to the horizontal, our hearts and heads are on the same plane. The rational mind recedes, we become more primal and open to the erotic — as well as the neurotic. Whether in the form of physical symptoms, emotional issues or spiritual challenges, our stuff comes up at night.

SLEEP DISRUPTERS

Tonight, 24% of U.S. couples (and 34% of Canadian couples) will sleep in separate beds. Why? Well, the major culprit appears to be loud snoring. Other common reasons include sleep disruptive insomnia, kicking, thrashing, hot flashes, nocturia (frequent urination) and nightmares. Still other couples struggle with conflicting environmental preferences regarding temperature or sleeping with lights or the television on. I suspect emotional conflicts also play a role here. Unresolved issues that are diluted by the bustle of waking life become more visible in the dark.

Some experts believe that sleeping apart is associated with negative effects on relationships. Loud snoring, which has been most extensively studied, exerts significant stress on relationships and actually increases the risk of divorce. Despite this, so many couple’s fail to address their sleep disrupters and choose, by default, to spend their nights apart.

Maybe “sleeping together” has become a euphemism for making love not just because both occur in bed, but because both hold the potential for deep intimacy. Sleeping together is not about shared unconsciousness, but a shared experience of non-ordinary consciousness — of sleep and dreams.  In awakening together, we can encounter each other freshly remade, still wet from the rebirth of our new selves. I believe that becoming more mindful of sleep as a shared experience can help heal relationship issues as well as deepen intimacy.

SOME SUGGESTIONS

Although I absolutely don’t believe there is just one right way to sleep together, I do think that most couple’s could benefit from bringing more mindfulness to their personal experiences. For couple’s interested in exploring greater entrainment with one another, I would offer the following four basic suggestions:

1) Address any sleep problems you may have. Whether you sleep together or apart, loud snoring, insomnia and other sleep disrupters are compromising your well-being. As a first step, do all you need to better understand and ameliorate your sleep problems.

2) Become more mindful of your personal needs and wants around sleep. And also of any vulnerabilities, fears or anxieties that night might bring up for you. Open a dialog with your partner about these thoughts and feelings.

3) Synchronize your circadian rhythms with your partner’s by gradually shifting your individual sleep-wake schedules. Begin by winding down together. Use that time to process unfinished business from your waking day. Think about bedtime not simply as the time you go to bed but as the time you spend in bed together. Think of it as an event–maybe an overnight excursion into a deeper, shared space.

4) Try to arise together or at least to have some shared quiet time in bed in the morning. Use this time to become reacquainted as your newly rejuvenated selves. Explore your dreams and share your deepest intentions about the day to come.