Rest was more fragmented for females in shared bed, a study found!

    Most women love to sleep next to their husbands – if his snoring and thrashing weren’t guaranteed to keep her awake all night.

  Still, many women have mixed feelings about choosing to sleep in separate beds.

“There’s something nice about the warmth of a human body next to you, even if you’re not sleeping well,” says one woman, who has slept apart from her husband off and on for the last five of her 8-year marriage. “When you’re in bed together you’re in a little private space on your own time. Cuddling on the couch with the phone ringing isn’t the same.”

  Trouble getting a good nights rest next to your husband isn’t unusal. Women sleep less soundly when they share a bed with a romantic partner, a study published in Sleep and Biological Rhythms, found.

Surprisingly, men actually sleep better when they sleep next to a woman.

  There are a lot more couples sleeping separately than you might guess, says Mark Mahowald, director of the Minnesota Regional Sleep Disorders Center in Minneapolis and a professor of neurology. An estimated 23 percent of American couples sleep apart, according to a survey by the National Sleep Foundation. A Canadian study reported that 34 percent of couples hit the sack separatly.

  Women may have a tougher time sharing a bed because men are much more likely to be snorers. And often, it’s a woman who has to move to a different bed- or room, in some cases – when the decible level of her husbands snoring crescendos to an intolerable level.

  But snoring may not be the only problem for women who’d like to spoon all through the night…

Device measured movements
  For the study, researchers asked 10 committed couples, ages 21 to 31, to wear a small device called an actigraph on their wrists while they slept at home. An actigraph, which resembles a wristwatch, keeps track of a person’s movements during the night and chronicles their periods of sleep and wakefullness.

  The actigraphs showed that the womens sleep was more fragmented on nights when they shared a bed, than when they slept alone. The differences weren’t huge, but they were significant.

  The researrchers speculated that women’s fretful sleep might be caused by brain wiring differences between men and women. Women tend to be light sleepers because they historically have been the ones caring for infants, the researchers suggested.

  The actigraph’s measurements would most likely have been even more distinct if the couples in the study had been older, says sleep expert Michael Perlis. That’s because snoring becomes more of an issure as men again.

  I’m not surprised to see that men do better when sleeping in a shared. (we’re jus to irrstiable, to not want to be slep next too! :p ) But, studiest have shown that men are very dependent on close relationships – contrary to popular stereotypes, researchers studied how the quality of a relationship affects overall health and sleep in men and women.

  In general, men show mych clearer benefits from committed relationships. My own personal research showed that married men are much happeier and healthier than unmarried men. The findings are much less consistent with women.

Willing to sacrifice for a little snuggle?
  Nothing that a good night’s sleep is important to daytime functioning, the researchers suggested that couples might consider the possible deleterious effects of sleeping together and choos separate beds instead.

  But Perlis and other sleep experts aren’t convinced that this is the best plan.

“At the end of the day, there’s something essentially comforting about this behavior – so much so that people are sometimes willing to sacrifice perfect sleep to get it,” says Perlis. “I’d be hard pressed to imagine recommending with a cheerful heart for people to sleep apart.”

  Perlis and other experts suggest couples look for solutions to snoring and other sleep problems before turning to seperate beds. “I’d recommend ear plugs, whatever it takes,” Perlis says. “That’s also partly a personal judgement.”

  I personally can’t stand to listen to my guy when he snores, and it’s not all the time, so when it does happen, I do wake up. But, in return I wake him, and generally make him move to a different postion. I love sleeping on him. I don’t that I could really sleep in another room-bedm whatever! Snuggling is one of the added bonuses of sharing a life with someone, and sometimes sacrifices are just made.

How do you feel sleeping next to a noisey partner? Would you put up with it, or get up and change rooms?