I was blown away by the response to the post we published last week on BA50, Marcia Byalick’s “Marriage Everlasting In Separate Bedrooms.” The post literally went viral. There have been 60K views on our BA50 Instagram and BA50 Facebook and the comments poured in… including a rousing…
I wanted to share some of my thoughts on this topic and am inviting you all to share yours as well. I truly was surprised and curious to learn more when I read the comments by so many who were also happier in separate bedrooms and still have healthy marriages.
This was news to me and struck a chord as well.
First of all, there is the judgement piece. There are many topics about our marriages that we prefer not to share because who wants to be judged, so I was thrilled Marcia took on this topic. And, the truth is, I learned from this post.
Initially if a friend told me they had separate bedrooms I would automatically think intimacy is over in their lives and they are living as roommates. I learned from this post that this is not the case. The bottom line is that better sleep makes people happier and I happily have dropped the judgement.
And the truth is, better sleep is such a personal issue. Sleep issues are huge especially for women over 50 as we all know, so it should come as no surprise that we all need and have developed strategies to sleep better. I mean gummies, shots of cognac before bed, specially weighted blankets, white noise machines and yes, separate bedrooms. This is sleep survival.
Personally, I sleep better with my husband in my bed than not. It’s kind of funny but I love a “warm body” next to me for better sleep. This is how I roll. P.S., my dog would be in my bed spooning with me if my husband wasn’t so against it, but hey, that’s me.
But so many of my friends say, “I couldn’t sleep last night, my husband snores and kept me up AGAIN!” That does indeed sound torturous so I hope they read this piece. And, what about that CPAP machine – is it really just “white noise?” I’ve heard otherwise. There’s so many reasons to get separate bedrooms and now I get it.
And, when I talked to my BA50 writing group about this topic they immediately jumped in with so many marital topics after 50 and beyond that we find other’s judging us about or we judge as well.
If anyone is up for it, I would love to invite you to write a piece on open marriage, getting remarried to the same person, how to manage step children, separate vacations…. If so, please email me at editor@betterafter50.com with your submissions for consideration.
We will be writing more on those topics. Stay tuned…
(By the way, the best way to comment on our posts is on Instagram or Facebook because we can’t control the spam on the comments below so engagement is happening over on our social media.)
The post Saying Yes To Separate Marital Bed Responses Blew My Mind…What Did You Think? appeared first on Better After 50.
