I think in the Brady Bunch and the new cartoon Bordertown the husband and wife sleep in separate beds. I wonder how common this is in real life and other shows?
My father’s side of the family is all twin beds; my mother’s side and SiL’s side are all marriage beds. 1.Bro and SiL have a marriage bed; 2.Bro has a marriage bed but his fiancée’s family are also twin-bedders and they’ve remarked they’re likely to go twin beds if they ever change that bedroom (she’s moving in with him).
My father would fall asleep under a blanket even in the dead of summer, so long as temps weren’t above body temp. Once he was asleep the blanket might get kicked to the floor, but he needed the weight to fall asleep. He liked medium springs.
Mom used twenty five blankets pre-menopause, can’t stand them at all post-, and was told to sleep on a hard surface a long time ago.
I know of a couple of retired couples that not only have separate beds but separate rooms as well. Both couples are happily married too.
I can kinda see the appeal. Once you get the kids out of the house, why the hell not? I can imagine once you’ve been married for 20+ years, spooning probably isn’t all that important anymore. A nice comfy bed, with nobody tossing and turning to wake you up. And the only person’s farts you have to smell are your own.
I’ve had to sleep in a separate room from the hubby on occasion, especially on a worknight- he’s got snoring issues.
Hitler had them in the bunker.
I would always go to bed with my wife and watch a little TV or play around and then go sleep on the couch in the den. Did that for many years.
My Grandparents on my Mother’s side had them, and they were a happy couple 'til they died. They raised 8 kids, so it would seem that they didn’t always use separate beds.
My parents had different bedrooms for as long as I could remember. The were married for 41 years until my father died. They had their problems later on, but seemed happy enough that I don’t think the separate beds had to do with not liking each other. I think it was different schedules and different sleep styles.
I can remember a couple of times when I was little being sick in the night and going into my mother’s room and my father was in bed with her. I remember thinking that was weird at the time. It wasn’t until later when I was older that I realized what the reason for that might have been. :eek:
In the 50s all couples slept in separate beds. There’s plenty of documentary evidence of that.
The Bradys most definitely slept in the same bed. Random photo example.
My parents have different bedrooms since my brother and I moved out. I think the main reason for them has been that dad is a freeze baby, and also a human furnace. Mom is menopausal and has a lot of temp swings and doesn’t want to deal with dad’s need for heat.
Separate beds in the same room would seem weird to me. Like Bert & Ernie!
It’s pretty much ubiquitous among Orthodox Jews, as husband and wife are not allowed to sleep in the same bed when the wife is menstruating.
My parents have separate bedrooms and have since the kids all moved out.
My father says its because my mother snores. He has gotten progressively deafer, but he can hear her snore :rolleyes
I think its more because they live on different schedules (he likes to sleep in and putz in the morning, she is a get up and go person) and like different amounts of covers.
They are in their 70s and are still quite affectionate to each other - though I haven’t asked about the details of their sex life.
Certainly not all. My parents had a double bed. I got occasional glimpses of the master bedrooms in other households – they were all double beds. I generally assumed most married couples slept in the same bed, except, of course, on TV.
And the relationship didn’t last very long after they moved in. Coincidence?
My maternal grandparents had separate rooms - but my grandfather worked nights and he needed the darker, quieter room in the back of the house so he could sleep during the day. I assume they kept the same arrangement after he retired, but I don’t know.
Sometime after my dad retired, my folks slept in separate rooms. Dad liked staying up late, plus he snored. All his clothes and stuff stayed in the master bedroom, but he slept in the guest room.
My husband has had multiple spinal surgeries, and he’d often opt for the guest bed while recovering, especially when I would be getting up and going to work in the dark of the morning. Sometimes, you just need to sleep apart.
I’m looking forward to when the chicks all move out. We’ll set one bedroom up as a guest room and the other will be mine… all mine.
I like to stay up late, I snore, I like having my pets sleeping next to me. He snores, he farts and the pets kind of bug him.
I’ll have my pc set up in there and we’re going to install a hood range over it. This will give me a nice bright light for when I feel like reading a book and it will keep the room from being too smokey.
I might drag out my fish tanks and set them up with just fish I like. I might have plants hanging in the windows. I may add cat window beds (depends on if there are any cats left behind… each boy has their favorites) which might be called Derp beds for my derpy lil Chihuahuas who like climbing the cat towers to lie in the sunshine. I will bring all 3 of my bookcases in and have him work some carpentry magic so they can be stacked on top of each other. I will hang up various pictures and paintings that I have acquired but can’t hang in our bedroom (he has a thing about those walls remaining hole free… he built them so I can’t complain).
I’ll finally have a closet! Somewhere to put all my shoes (I don’t have a lot but winter, summer and slippers and no place to put the ones I’m not wearing). I won’t have to tiptoe to bed and then deal with him grumping about it (I think that would occur even if he was retired because it happens when he’s on vacation). I’ll be able to go to sleep listening to classical music (something I haven’t done since we moved in together and then got married 20+ years ago).
We tried having just seperate beds but it was kind of crowded having a King and a Twin in the same room and then my youngest son decided he was done with his toddler bed and wanted my bed (which is why it was actually bought 
).
Mistermage says he’ll be lonely but every night when I come to bed I have to make him scoot over and let me have my 6" plus 12" for various dogs. That doesn’t sound right … I make him give us some room and then he doesn’t feel as comfy as when he had the whole bed to himself for 5 hours. I told him we could still take naps together.
I strongly suspect that the “documentary evidence” to which TriPolar was referring was, in fact, 1950s TV shows.
Not single beds for us, but a double bed with two single quilts. We started doing that after holidaying in Austria where it is standard practice. It solves 90% of coverage-stealing incidents and you can pick the perfect tog rating and choose to wrap-up, leg-out or kick-off as the mood suits each of you.
It also has the benefit of keeping each other within easy cuddling distance.
Ah, I see – a joke that went over my head. Not the first time . . . :smack: