Imagine coming home after a long day at work and crawling into bed, ready to sink into a restful slumber.
Just as you’re drifting off to dreamland, the grating sound of a chainsaw pierces the silence—your partner has just fallen asleep and proceeds to snore right next to your ear for the rest of the night.
Whether you’re the snorer or the one sleeping next to them, it’s easy to see how this situation could easily take its toll on an otherwise loving relationship.
Snoring is challenging enough on its own. It is known for its negative effects on a person’s health, sleep quality, and mood.
However, when snorers share a bed with someone else, they end up sharing the burden (and the noise) with their unwitting partner as well.
When the snores are loud enough, a dream relationship could transform into a living nightmare in the blink of an eye.
How snoring could jeopardize a happy relationship
Believe it or not, a failed relationship is an unfortunate but all too common consequence of snoring. A PlayOJO study of 2,000 people in the United Kingdom in 2019 found that 12 percent of the participants have cited it as a reason for divorcing their partner.
Approximately 18 percent have said that snoring is the cause of regular arguments in their relationship, while 30 percent sleep in a separate room from their partner because of it. Snoring may not seem like a big deal in the beginning, but it is clearly more of a deal-breaker than most people think.
Why?
Sharing a bed with a particularly loud snorer interferes with one’s ability to get sufficient hours of shuteye every night, which is essential to happiness, health, and focus. Sleep deprivation can make a person cranky and short-tempered. In a study published in 2017, researchers revealed that couples who slept less than seven hours a night are more likely to be hostile to each other than if one of them slept more.
Over time, poor sleep increases negative emotions between partners, cultivating tension, and resentment in the relationship.
Due to the disruptive nature of snoring, many couples opt for a “sleep divorce.” This means that although the pair are still together, they choose to sleep in separate rooms to improve their sleep habits and reduce the hostility that sprung from sleep deprivation. Getting a sleep divorce lets couples doze off quietly and peacefully apart. However, there are those who believe that spending evenings apart could affect the physical and emotional intimacy of the relationship.
Let’s face it: no one can sleep next to someone who regularly sounds like a dying animal while sleeping. The good news is, it doesn’t have to be a lost cause. Take better care of your relationship by treating the root of your relationship woes and figuring out ways to treat snoring.
