|
|
I am writing this at 2am. My wife knows nothing about it because she is fast asleep upstairs. I'd be up there with her, if I was allowed to have the light on and the new Tom Wolfe to read - or if she was willing to discuss the day. Unfortunately, in the world of slumber, we are polar opposites. In every other way, we have a great and complementary relationship. Sure, we fight a little over the remote control or where to go on holiday, but, for the most part, our lives are without friction. Until it comes to sleeping.
And I'm not the only one. Almost half of the people quizzed in a survey last week admitted that, when it comes to sleep, they are incompatible with their partner. In fact, they prefer to read a book or watch TV to having sex or talking to their partners in bed.
For a third of couples, the problem is so bad that they said they would get a better night's sleep if they could go to bed alone. And a worrying one in 10 said they got more comfort from their duvet than their loved one. No wonder we're all obsessed by the peculiar business of 'bediquette' - how to conduct oneself in matters of nocturnal rest. This has nothing to do with making sparks fly - that's a completely different matter - but everything to do with respect for your slumbering partner.
It's a serious matter. If sleep is the new sex, incompatibility can lead to relationship breakdown. The survey revealed that couples were more likely to be irritable, depressed, unable to concentrate and to pick a fight with their partner following a bad night's sleep.
According to Dr Chris Alford, the sleep scientist who compiled the survey: 'Sleep is a basic but vital human need. Lack of sleep has a detrimental effect on a person's health and physical and emotional wellbeing. With more workdays lost as a consequence of sleep loss and sleep disturbance than through asthma, it is alarming to see how many British couples are suffering through bad etiquette in bed.'
Personally, it's a subject I'm close to seeking UN intervention on, or at least contemplating some form of demilitarised zone. A partition wall should do it. My wife enjoys sleeping at least eight hours at a time and preferably she likes to get this well underway before midnight. The conditions have to be right, too. The room has to be totally dark, the bedding able to withstand Arctic temperatures and absolutely, positively, no noise whatsoever.
On the other hand, I choose to stay up until the last possible minute watching TV. When I do settle down, in the early hours naturally, I like to keep the light on, read or listen to my iPod until I drop off. With such opposing sleep patterns, it's not hard to see that we have an entirely different view about what exactly Rem means in the bedroom. For ages, my wife would ask each morning why I feel so unable to entertain the idea of climbing the stairs, brushing my teeth, saying goodnight, switching off the light and counting sheep until dawn.
If I'm being entirely truthful, she does this while bleary-eyed and threatening to throw a breakfast bowl at my head. 'I'm just not made that way,' I protest. 'Margaret Thatcher only needed four hours' sleep.'
In between yawns, my wife gives this excuse the lack of respect it deserves. But there's a serious point somewhere in my creaky defence. Rather than toss and turn all night about what I forgot to do in the office, I'd much rather, with head still on pillow, check emails at 2am via my Blackberry or dial into voicemail on my mobile. I don't see this behaviour as the sad indictment of the modern age, but as a valuable use of otherwise wasted time. 'I'll sleep when I'm dead', as the saying goes.
A low point came recently after I'd forced myself to go to sleep next to my wife, only to have a highly disturbing dream about my planet being invaded by killer insects from Mars. I dealt with this by attacking one of the aliens head on, then woke up to find I'd punched her squarely on the nose. She went to work with a black eye. Not a good look on a left-wing newspaper. For a long time after that, she didn't care where I slept as long as it was nowhere near her. Sanctions were lifted only when a good friend of hers, recently a mother, pointed out that my all-night alertness would be a godsend when we decide to have children. My wife realised she might be on to a good thing after all.
But part of me knows she's right. Insomnia, work stress, obsession with the PlayStation - call it what you will - but it seems my habits are echoed by lots of my friends. Perhaps it's a peculiarly male disease to resist quiet time, lying there with nothing to do. I guess we don't know how to relax or give in to rest. But how can I when there's too much competing for my attention? Too much stuff. Didn't you know that E4 repeat The Simple Life with Paris Hilton at 2:20am and that Sky Sports News now calls its graveyard slot Through the Night? It'd be a shame not to.
Jeff, who works in the City, is a mild recreational gambler who thinks nothing of heading out at 2am to see his mates at the casino. He doesn't seem to think this is an issue that might affect his relationships, even though they never last longer than two weeks. 'I spend all day working; the last thing I want to do in my social time is sleep. What's the point? When do I live?'
Another male friend fights a battle with his wife every night about illumination. He bought her an eyemask and some earplugs; unfortunately, he presented these proudly on the night she decided to brighten up their pillow talk for him with some new lingerie. He's still sleeping in the spare room. 'She told me where exactly I could put the earplugs,' he complains.
In a recent straw poll of all our friends, I was quick to point out to my wife that we were one of the only couples without a TV upstairs. There are many things a bedroom are for - and I understand enough to know watching late-night rubbish together is not one of them. And, to be fair, my wife only complains about the effect my anoraky activities have when they disturb her - she couldn't care less if I don't want to sleep. Annoyingly however, I know that when I close the laptop and creep up the stairs, she'll manage to stir, regardless of how quiet I am. Well, if the room wasn't so bloody dark, I might be able to find the bed.
So, am I impeding a healthy and successful relationship by refusing to settle down? Do I have commitment issues? Because I don't want to sleep anywhere else or with anyone else for that matter. Ever. I just can't make sleep be anything other than functional. If I'm tired, I'll rest. And usually I'm not. At least not when she is.
According to relationship therapist Dr Petra Boynton, we place far too much pressure on ourselves if sleeping habits don't coincide and we can't achieve a 'mirror model of affection'.
'Societal pressure means we only think our partnerships are valuable if we are entirely in synch with each other,' she observes. Given that we are each individuals, who were surely attracted in part by our very separateness, she argues, the search for this relationship holy grail is just not viable when applied to nocturnal patterns, especially when we all have habits, routines and fundamentally different rest needs. To make matters worse, when mirrored behaviour is not achievable, we automatically feel we have failed each other, and issues of guilt and conflict arrive.
While Dr Boynton believes that compromise is a key factor in all aspects of partnership, she thinks we need to let go of the pressure to measure up to a relationship ideal. If it works to have separate bedrooms, as one couple I know do, then so be it. It doesn't mean we are any less in love.
As Boynton points out: 'Our lives are very different from our parents' lives. Today, there are few sex-segregated areas within the modern home, so the man seeking refuge in his shed is perhaps echoed to some degree by the man taking himself off to the spare room to the PlayStation after lights out. As a generation, we cope far more as individuals in our daily working lives and don't allow ourselves room to recover.'
So maybe's there's a happy end to this struggle for bediquette. Having taken the advice of Dr Boynton, my wife and I have accepted that we are both right, that both our sleeping patterns are normal. It's an obvious - but crucial - thing to understand. In our case, I now go to bed when she does and once my wife has 'achieved' sleep, I'm allowed to get out - go downstairs, work, read or whatever.
And the key lesson in all of this is that whatever happens, we always wake up together. Surely, that's the most important rule of all?
Stefan Demetriou
The Observer
|
|
