Tips to happily coexist with a snorer
Snoring can take a heavy toll on a relationship when it disrupts your sleeping patterns. Frustration and resentment brews which can cause embarrassment, guilt and conflict. However, sleeping in separate rooms isn’t your only option.
According to a US study conducted by the Sleep Foundation, 32 per cent of men report that they are snorers, versus 16 percent of women. This means the majority of “sufferers” (the one’s lying awake) are women.
A study by John Shepard, M.D., medical director of the Sleep Disorders Center at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., found that the bedmates of heavy snorers lose an average of one hour of sleep per night. Another study released last year, from the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., found that when heavy snorers with sleep apnea underwent treatment, they and their spouses reported better sex lives and a smoother relationship.
How to tell them
Snoring tends to get worse as people age because, like so many other body parts, tissues in and around the airway start to sag. The mid-40s and up is when snoring really becomes more prevalent. This means that people who were never snorers before, may become snorers later in life. Regardless, there's usually very little perception of snoring on the part of the snorer. If they are having trouble believing your concerns, try a tape recorder or getting their friends to tell them. They’re more likely to believe it from them rather than dismiss in embarrassment.
Ways to deal
There are a few tricks you can try to get around your partners snoring issue before the couch starts to look more and more comfortable.
- If you wake up to your partner snoring in the night, try to gently move them onto their side. If you find they just move right back, try to prop up some pillows before bedtime to keep them from rolling onto their back. If this still doesn’t work, you can have them wear a T-shirt that has a pocket sewn onto the back to put a tennis ball in and every time they go to roll over they will find the position uncomfortable and roll back.
- Ask your partner to avoid eating too late at night as this effects snoring.
- As you will have probably noticed by then, snoring is louder and more likely to disrupt you if your partner has been drinking. Perhaps this is something to open a discussion about.
- If you are partial to a small humming noise in the place of snoring, you could look into getting a CPAP machine.
Related links:
Your sleep position linked to diseases
Why do women have a harder time sleeping than men?