Separate Bedrooms: Ruin? Or Just Rest?
advertisment
More in LOVED UP
back-up- Why You've Been Inexplicably Dumped
- Opening the Ex-Files
- So You Think You're Good in Bed?
- Why Thirtysomething Men Have it All
- Corporate Intranets: A Stalker's Paradise
- Credit Crunch Dating Takes a Dive
- Recession Living: Dumped or Loved Up?
- The Intimate Details No One Needs
- The Truth About Dating Traders
- Online Dating: Mr Right or Mr Right Now?
It’s one of the last secrets to be confessed. Usually only when someone is staring relationship failure in the face will they whisper: "We’re in separate bedrooms". And the response tends to be shocked silence, and acknowledgement that the end really is nigh.
We’ve come to view separate bedrooms as the last stop before a split. It’s where each party retreats to lick their wounds and sob into their pillows, isn’t it?
For so long have we been force-fed a diet of cosy couples snuggling up, that you’d think the happy alternative did not exist. But it does. In perfectly respectable homes, from Chelsea to Chelmsford and far beyond, men and women are sleeping apart. Not just husbands and wives, and not just those in a lovers tiff, but people who actually choose to.
Hardly a soul will admit to it being a preference. But once the converted have come out with their secret, there’s no stopping them. They get quite evangelical about the bliss that is separate bedrooms. Better sleep, more space, no duvet stealing or snoring, privacy, comfort, peace and quiet - the list goes on.
But what about the sex, the disbelievers ask. How can it be a relationship if you aren’t having any? That, too, is a myth worth destroying. Consider instead the idea that it's something of an occasion when your man comes into your boudoir. And it is never sullied by used tissues, empty mugs, old newspapers, stray laundry, or scattered shoes and crumpled receipts.
It can instead be the bedroom women dream about before they start cohabiting. Pristine, fragrant, and uncluttered, with clouds of crisply ironed Egyptian cotton. The sort of place you can swan around in a silk peignoir, rather than an old t-shirt and his socks. You might even burn candles and arrange yourself across the bed in perfect relaxation.
When you do get a visit to this private idyll, there is something of a frisson of excitement. It’s for a reason - this is not about a drowsy, dutiful fumble. It’s a prepared invasion, a reminder of your own appeal as a lover, not just a cook, cleaner and laundry assistant.
Sadly, for most couples, the descent into separate rooms tends to be because someone is snoring like a wounded buffalo, or has appalling backache or incurable insomnia. Or a baby that wakes up five times a night. The unromantic truth is that quality sleep matters.
I remember being appalled when my boyfriend at the time - a highly-strung trader - hoofed me upstairs if I so much as rustled a pillow at night. The boy could not stay on top of his positions (the bank’s positions, that is) if he got a bad night’s sleep. So I was sent to purgatory, or the spare room, until I learnt to sleep quietly. I resented the banishment for weeks.
Fast forward a few years to a bigger job and a new boyfriend, and I’ve seen the light. When I have a huge day ahead and need every minute of my eight hours, I sleep downstairs, sprawling across the bed, losing myself to the land of nod the minute my head hits the pillow. When the week’s stress is over, I return upstairs to re-acquaint myself.
And absence really does make the heart grow fonder.
For so long have we been force-fed a diet of cosy couples snuggling up, that you’d think the happy alternative did not exist. But it does. In perfectly respectable homes, from Chelsea to Chelmsford and far beyond, men and women are sleeping apart. Not just husbands and wives, and not just those in a lovers tiff, but people who actually choose to.
Hardly a soul will admit to it being a preference. But once the converted have come out with their secret, there’s no stopping them. They get quite evangelical about the bliss that is separate bedrooms. Better sleep, more space, no duvet stealing or snoring, privacy, comfort, peace and quiet - the list goes on.
But what about the sex, the disbelievers ask. How can it be a relationship if you aren’t having any? That, too, is a myth worth destroying. Consider instead the idea that it's something of an occasion when your man comes into your boudoir. And it is never sullied by used tissues, empty mugs, old newspapers, stray laundry, or scattered shoes and crumpled receipts.
It can instead be the bedroom women dream about before they start cohabiting. Pristine, fragrant, and uncluttered, with clouds of crisply ironed Egyptian cotton. The sort of place you can swan around in a silk peignoir, rather than an old t-shirt and his socks. You might even burn candles and arrange yourself across the bed in perfect relaxation.
When you do get a visit to this private idyll, there is something of a frisson of excitement. It’s for a reason - this is not about a drowsy, dutiful fumble. It’s a prepared invasion, a reminder of your own appeal as a lover, not just a cook, cleaner and laundry assistant.
Sadly, for most couples, the descent into separate rooms tends to be because someone is snoring like a wounded buffalo, or has appalling backache or incurable insomnia. Or a baby that wakes up five times a night. The unromantic truth is that quality sleep matters.
I remember being appalled when my boyfriend at the time - a highly-strung trader - hoofed me upstairs if I so much as rustled a pillow at night. The boy could not stay on top of his positions (the bank’s positions, that is) if he got a bad night’s sleep. So I was sent to purgatory, or the spare room, until I learnt to sleep quietly. I resented the banishment for weeks.
Fast forward a few years to a bigger job and a new boyfriend, and I’ve seen the light. When I have a huge day ahead and need every minute of my eight hours, I sleep downstairs, sprawling across the bed, losing myself to the land of nod the minute my head hits the pillow. When the week’s stress is over, I return upstairs to re-acquaint myself.
And absence really does make the heart grow fonder.
Here Is The Writer : Alice in Numberland
By day Alice crunches numbers at a banking colossus in Canary Wharf, and by night she devotes her time to studying the strange behaviours of the male species. In between she expands her collection of Agent Provocateur and runs marathons. Tell her what you think about dating in the City.
view more articles by Alice in Numberland
