My husband and I had toyed with the idea of splitting up for years, but when I finally decided that we should no longer live together, not sleeping in the same bed felt much more tangible than getting a divorce.
If the beginning of our marriage was snap, crackle and pop, the end was a bowl of soggy cornflakes. It was difficult to find things to celebrate in those early days of living separately. The realisation that our kids would have to turn their backs on one parent to go to the other seemed like an act of cruelty. But if I am making it all sound miserable, it wasn’t. Now, a few years on, the kids are all right and my ex and I are far happier for going our separate ways. One of the biggest surprises of our split has been that having my own bed contributes to a large part of that happiness.
One day, I may live with someone again, and we probably won’t have enough space or money to have our own bedrooms. I may learn to love the peeling clingfilm sensation of bodies parting in summer (although I can’t imagine that I will). But, for now, I know there is a stretch of undisturbed hours waiting for me every night; there are lazy Sunday mornings when my children might not bring me a cup of coffee, but they won’t disturb me before 10am, because I’ve told them not to. When my bedroom door is shut, I can sack off sacrificing, do away with sharing, forget about anyone but myself.
Of course, waking up in my king-size bed alone for the first time didn’t trigger a spiritual awakening, or a moment of rapture. The joy of sleeping alone revealed itself more slowly, like the cautious removal of the winter duvet when spring arrives, a familiar warmth kissing the skin. Soon I was enjoying a succession of dead-to-the-world sleeps, unconscious from the moment of switching off my bedside lamp to the alarm razor-blading the morning air. I hadn’t slept so well since my teens. I thought: is this how some people feel all the time?
I’ve shared my bed with someone for longer than I have not. Before marriage, I had always had a boyfriend, and we usually lived together. I was a young mother and my daughter and I slept together in our one-bed flat. I married and had two more kids.
My husband and I often woke with a small, sweaty child between us. To say that you have slept in such situations is stretching it: ill-thought-out manoeuvres in the dark left us all exhausted by morning. This stage where thoughts, hours and bodies merged into one another seemed to go on for ever, metastasising in a fuzziness that left me vague and useless for days at a time.
Newly separated and the only adult in the house, I had to look after myself if I wanted to look after the children. I started to discover things that felt good and that didn’t require cash, dating apps or a babysitter: a long bath; reading the papers in bed; and most important of all, sleep. I don’t know how much of my love for my bed comes from the sleep or the new-found solitude in bed after a day of being surrounded by people. But it is the only place I can go that is exclusively mine.
There are exceptions when I do share a bed, or sleep elsewhere. Who doesn’t love the heft, bounce and wedge of a luxury hotel mattress, dressed in white, starchy sheets that have been washed by someone else?
Occasionally, I will stay the night at my boyfriend’s place. Having sex is something we enjoy more than sharing a bed, though, which is no problem because we’re neighbours; we can almost hear each other breathe through the wall that separates our respective bedrooms.
When I can’t be bothered to schlep the 30 steps home, I stay put. While I enjoy the warmth of his body next to mine, waking up together in the morning is so much better than the actual sleep.
What I’ve learned from this relationship is that sex and sleeping in the same bed are not synonymous. My boyfriend and I are not cuddle-up-close types, anyway, and we both agree that we have deeper, longer sleeps on our own, free to move limbs this way and that and to claim all of the covers.
On the occasions that I’ve lain awake next to a sleeping body at 3am, my loneliness is far more acute than when I am on my own. At least then I can switch on the light to read, without worrying about waking my bed partner. I have a far greater chance of staying sane when I have seven or eight undisturbed hours under my belt. And for now, that sleep feels far more attainable when I’m alone.
