A Successful Marriage Doesn't Necessarily Require Sleeping In The Same Bed

A Successful Marriage Doesn't Necessarily Require Sleeping In The Same Bed

For many couples, the question of sharing a bed isn't quite the no-brainer one would hope it to be. It intensifies intimacy, but compromises sleep. It builds closeness, but can numb passion.

In her 1932 book The Sex Technique in Marriage, author Isabel Hutton suggested that it's important for newlyweds to sleep in separate beds to gradually introduce both the man and the woman to that component of married life. Lisa Grunwald and Stephen Adler, a modern married couple and co-authors of The Marriage Book, joined HuffPost Live's Caroline Modarressy-Tehrani to discuss this old cultural norm, what issues arise with sleeping together today, and how there is no one right or wrong answer when it comes to sharing a bed and maintaining a successful marriage.

"Weirdly enough, at a certain age, people do start to talk about separate beds again, and it's an amazingly taboo topic," said Grunwald. "It's a big no-no in romantic terms. I think that [Hutton's] advice, which was given early early on for honeymoon nights, was based on the assumption that women came into the marriage as virgins and that that first introduction to sex would be just so overwhelming for her that they absolutely needed to stay apart, and help the poor guy keep his excitement to a minimum. We like having one bed, and I think most people do."

Adler provides the flip side of the coin with his commentary on how sometimes, it's advantageous for a marriage to provide a little distance when it comes to sleeping space.

"In a marriage, you're together so much and you see every moment, and every moment is not necessarily that attractive, so there is some point to be made that you have to maintain some mystery," he said. "You shouldn't necessarily always see each other at your worst. Sometimes have some separation... Friendship and closeness pushes you towards seeing everything and being really together, but passion actually pushes you to have some distance, so you need to have a balance between the two."

To hear more, watch the full conversation in the HuffPost Live video above.

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