Sleep and Love

Katie, I've got a question for you.

Yeah, do you think we sleep better when we're sleeping in the same bed or when we're not sleeping in the same bed.

I sleep better when you're in the bed because I'm really cold and I put my cold feet on your hot hot, too, hot body.

I'm down for whatever results in bow chicka. Wow. Wow.

When we go to sleep at the same time, there's a better shot at it.

I can't believe you made this about going to sleep earlier.

Hi, everybody, I'm Katie Lows. I am an actor, a podcast host, a mom, and honestly very tired most of the time.

And I'm Adam Shapiro, an actor, a pretzel maker, a dad in Katie's husband.

And this is Chasing Sleep, a production of Ruby Studios from iHeartMedia in partnership with Mattress Firm. Everybody sleeps, and sleep affects just about everything, our health, relationships, intimacy, being patient.

With your kids, our work, and our play.

In this season of Chasing Sleep, we'll dig into the many ways sleep impacts our lives and find out what's real and what's myth.

And we're going to talk to everyday people about real life situations that lots of us encounter.

And this is our first episode. Good luck, honey, let's do it.

Let's get into it.

This episode is about sleep and love. I'm so excited to be co hosting with my husband.

Yeah, this is nice.

It's like a built in date.

I agree. You know, it's really nice when you're in a relationship and you.

Can just do about anything together, you know, talking, laughing, eating, drinking, exercise, raising kids. But you know what could be difficult, huh, sleeping in the same bedroom together.

Yeah.

We talked with some other couples to find out how they're doing in the bedroom.

Don't you mean sleeping, I mean sleeping.

In the bedroom.

We've been together for thirteen years seven months today.

Forty years. Yeah, coming up on six years.

The nicest thing about sharing a bed together is waking up in the morning and kind of communicating and having sort of that interaction.

You know, we're a team and it is nice to like be close to each other physically.

I feel like we get to like online together and just kind of like talk through what happened during the day.

We can snuggle, but we can also have our own space.

You like, will put his.

Arm around me, I just have to like push you off.

You take the good with the bad. I definitely sleep better when I got my partner a bit. I just do. I do like having my partner next to me. Yeah, absolutely love sleeping next.

To each other.

It's the best. I think there's something comforting about your partners.

It's like the balance. The bed needs some balance.

That's very poetic. It's something that just feels good.

And I just.

Genuinely and generally feel a lot happier being able to sleep with my partner every single night. I just have so many questions about improving our sleep, our relationship to sleep, our relationship to each other.

Like, for example, I sleep with a snorer.

You do?

Is it me?

You?

Adam Shapiro, you snore?

Wow?

Yeah, we're a married couple and sometimes we put each other to sleep.

That's that's healthy, right.

Unless we're having sex at the same time.

It happens. Oh, we are going there.

I am really excited to speak with today's guests. We are joined by doctor Wendy M. Troxel. She is the author of Sharing the Covers, Every Couple's Guide to Better Sleep.

Welcome, doctor Wendy Troxel.

Thank you so much. For having me. I'm really excited to be here today with you all.

I have so many questions for you about relationships.

Whoa I'm sure Katie does.

We also have Kai Dates and Valerie Weisler here. They are a very cool, happy couple from Brooklyn, New York.

Hi, Kai and Val thank you.

Happy to be here.

Yeah, thanks for having us, Thanks for being here.

Guys, Kai and Val, you're young, You're in love. How long have you two been together?

We have been together since October twenty nineteen. Our first date was a date we didn't know was a date at the local ice cream parlor. So about three and a half years now.

And how long since you've moved in together?

Previously because of lockdown with the pandemic, it was like we were college students dating and then we were long distance for I think like six months, right, and then Val moved into my childhood home.

With me for six months.

Got it.

And then Val lived in Ireland for a year to do her master's degree while I finished my undergrad degree. Wow, and now we live together in the same city.

So now, in all these circumstances, have you ever felt like your sleep quality is affecting?

How the two of you get along as a couple.

Yeah, I think I I am the person in our relationship who has the most sleep issues. So I feel drawn to start because I tend to have big meltdowns when I'm tired. So I think I'm the one who's most impacted emotionally by lack of sleep. I think for me, I tend to have a pretty easy time falling asleep, but a very hard time staying asleep, Like everything gets heightened. And so I think I am a better communicator and partner when I have my.

Best sleep doctor Troxel, Since you're not just a relationships expert, but you're so knowledgeable about how sleep affects relationships, help us understand what sleep means for being happy as a couple.

Oh, that's a loaded question. So the vast majority of the study of sleep, the science of sleep, has focused on sleep as this individual behavior, and yet that's not how sleep occurs for most couples. After all, we spend about a third of our lives asleep, so that's a major part of our coupled existence. When we're sleep deprived or sleep is disturbed, it really manifests quite obviously and quite quickly in our moods, particularly our irritability levels.

Yes, you know, today's a perfect example. Our kiddos woke Oh, we have two kids, five and two. They woke up very early. They jumped out of their rooms, they jump in our beds, and then it becomes sort of a competition between me and Katie on who can stay in the bed long enough without going crazy and getting up and doing the morning with the kid.

And that happens with a lot of couples for a variety of different reasons. Children being just one of the sleep disruptions that can disturb the sleep of a couple. And again, this is where sleep in our relationships are so intertwined because who's the person that you're most likely to lash out at when you're irritable and sleep deprived.

It's amazing how many fights Adam and I have been together for seventeen years and how many fights we have been in and sleep has never really been a topic something that we should really like work on, and how we sleep together. I mean, Adam and I talked about briefly about, you know, snoring.

How do you and I?

VALANCHI, I'm sure do you have personal stories about all of that?

Is somebody a snorer? Adam's a snorer? What about you?

Only occasionally? This guy is too, We're both snores.

What are your sleep sounds that wig each other up?

I am a sleep talk I am too.

I'll say the sleep talking is actually not a low point for me. It's a high point because I think that sleep talking is so funny and I don't sleep talk. But growing up I was like, I hope that my future partner sleep talk because I think that is just hilarious. And I'm the night owl and the relationship so I'm usually up later than Ty, And if I'm lucky, do.

You get to catch it?

I get to hear something weird that they say in their sleep, a little gift, So that is a joy for me. But then the snoring, I think both of us have our own qualms about.

The other person.

Yeah, I think this was actually pretty recently, Val really woke me up with some loud snoring, and I was very aggressive in my half awake, half asleep, like stop it.

But then I found out from that because that was like, I can't.

I love you so much, I can't.

I believe you yelled at me the one time it happened because you snore every night, and I had no idea that I snore every night.

Snoring is the disease of listeners, so it's not surprising that because you were unaware.

Yeah, oh, that's so funny.

I think sometimes I hurt Katie in that I'm I go to bed so much later than she does. I'm like sneaking in like an international spy, like a ninja.

She's best laid plans.

Sometimes you come into bed and you just decide I really want to snuggle her at one am.

This is true, but I'm talking about the times that I come in like a ninja.

It seems to not matter.

It seems like Katie always wakes up when I come in, no matter how loud I get. But I can't go to bed at the same time she does. That's just not in my personality. My energy is not your biology.

Yeah, doctor Troxel, what do you advise couples who don't have same sleep schedules.

The reality is, just because you fall in love with human being doesn't mean you're automatically biologically going to be syncd up in terms of your natural, biologically driven sleep wake rhythms or cir Katian rhythms. Couples may decide for this reason because their schedules are so different and the sleep disruption when one partner comes to bed later is so disruptive. They may even choose to sleep in separate bedrooms.

I would be so much more game of cuddling you at nine nine thirty than when he tries to sometimes do that at one or and I'm so angry that he's interrupted my big window.

When you're not exhausted quite yet.

Adam has no problem falling asleep at ten pm if we've gotten after it. You know what I'm saying, Like seriously, like he that is the only time he has no problem falling asleep at ten or eleven is if he has an orgasm.

Goodness, Yeah, we're going there.

I'm not interested, right, I'll fall.

Asleep at three pm if you want to have sex, kated.

I'm in a sexual mastery class for men right now, you tell because I want it. During a silent auction at a charity event the other.

Day, I made him bid on it. I was like, this sounds cool.

Well, I was in a bidding war with my friend and then it became a joke, and then it became a very expensive joke.

But now I'm in this intense class. It's amazing.

Did you already start it? Yeah, kiddy, I'm a mess, I'm a blister, Okay.

Doctor Troxel, what does the data say about sex life in sleeping? Does bad sleep kind of affect your sex life?

Is that related? Yes?

Yes, getting good quality sleep has profound impacts on our sexual hormones like testosterone. In men, one study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, which is the pre eminent medical journal, showed that men, healthy young men, by the way, who sleep less than five hours per night,

This is a fascinating discussion and we are not done.

More to come.

We're back and I can't wait to get back to this conversation with Kai and Val, our couple in Brooklyn, and with sleep and Relationships expert doctor Wendy Troxel. There's so much more that I want to find out. Kai and Val, Can you tell us what's your sleeping arrangement right now?

Yes, we have separate rooms, but it didn't start from snoring.

Let's get into that.

I think for various reasons, I toss and turn in the middle of the night, but it's heightened when I'm sharing a bed sometimes. So when that's the case, whether or not it's because of vallis snoring or like just the you know, additional heat of the room because there's multiple bodies in it, or lack of space to sprawl, like whatever.

Yeah, I want to get a little bit into the snitty gritty because I'm absolutely fascinated by this. I can remember working on Scandal and there's an actor who will remain nameless on this podcast, but I knew wasn't sleeping in the same bed as his wife, and I was like loop writing's on the wall divorce, divorce, divorce, and it's like he's the worst snorer ever, Like it's awful.

I think like at first I was sort of like taken aback because I didn't really know anyone who does this, and before I was able to like fully commit to it, I think I had to do some like reworking of what this sort of like nuclear family norm is of like what a home space is supposed to look like and what a bedroom is supposed to be and represent. And I sat with that for a couple of days.

I talked about it with my therapist, and I went into therapy with the goal of, like get me out of this mindset, like in forty five minutes, I want to leave feeling comfortable sharing a room with my partner because something clearly must be wrong with me that this is my want. And then instead, my therapist, being a good therapist, was like, actually, this is what you want. It sounds like it's what you need, and that's okay. I heard the term sleep divorce and we are not married.

We've heard the term sleep divorce, but that's a that's not a divorce, that's like that's helping me.

I know, it's such a negative connotation. It sounds horrible.

My question is when you're when you decide to sleep in another room, Let's say we do this, do we have to create a second bedroom atmosphere?

Yeah, Valanchai, what are you doing?

I need to know how often you're sleeping together, how often you're sleeping apart? And also are we scheduling when we have sex? Like, tell me how did works.

Weekdays pretty much are in our own rooms. And then weekends are in like one of each of our beds, and we try to switch off. The goal was to make sure that it doesn't feel like there's like that one of our rooms becomes like the main room and the others is like the backup.

Right, when you do decide to meet up, it's always in Kai's.

Room, or it's always in Value room, right right.

And I tend to have a more anxious attachment style. And I have never really had my own bedroom. I've always been sharing it with like a sibling or a parent. And so for me, it's a new practice for me to learn how like if I wake up in the middle of the night from a nightmare, but I can go and like crawl into VAL's bed and be comforted.

So are I see you Val, I see you nice vow nice, Yeah, Adam, Adam will see you right there?

I see you, Adam.

And so the fact that we schedule sleepovers and are intentional about it, I think also doesn't like give you a reason to keep too much to yourself and to have like that nice sense of like young people in a relationship and being in almost like in community with each other.

That's really great.

See what I worry about is the interesting I worried about. Does it affect the sex life? Yes, doctor Troxel. What does the data say about sex life and sleeping in different rooms?

Are those two things even related?

For many couples, sex and good sex is actually scheduled. It happen when it fits into your life, and you have to be intentional about that. So just because a couple doesn't choose to actually spend the night sleeping together does not mean it's going to have a negative impact

Oh wow. Yeah.

Usually weekends are lately, as we're getting back into the swing of things, are when we have sex.

Because it's also.

Like I know with my work schedule that like I don't have to be like brain is moving in work mode and that we're already planning to sleep in the

Or there were times there's sometimes where like we are intimate and then Bell was like okay and good nights, and then that's how I like and it's.

Honestly, I am into this, Yeah right.

It's kind of it kind of indulges in a like as you said, we are a very communicative, very gentle loving couple, and there's something like fun about intimacy also kind of like there's a fantasy sometimes of like okay and see you tomorrow by.

Right, right, Like I can I can send them home when I want to do.

Yeah, And that's also nice.

It's like the best of both worlds. So great, you look forward to it.

I think of weekends a lot differently this setup where we're sleeping over.

I look forward to it.

And like, if we're sleeping over on a Friday night, it's almost like a given that we know on Saturday morning we're gonna take our dog to our favorite, big old place, and like it feels.

Like, yeah, right, it feels like a weekend.

Right, it feels like a weekend. Oh man, you schedule sex, you're in big trouble or you know you oh yeah, this it's a very modern convention.

Yeah, it's a very well yeah, I mean, you know, back in the medieval times, it wasn't even it was never ever the marital bed. It was really a communal bed entire family, and certainly cultures around the world still don't ascribe to the marital bed. They have you know, family beds, and really sort of the stigma attached to sleeping together versus a part has you know, waxed and waned, you know, across the centuries. You know, it was day Rah Gore and the Victorian era for couples to sleep

Oh wow, when you friends come over and you're like, this is VAL's bedroom, this is Kay's bedroom, are people like, what what are you doing? And do you feel like you have to explain yourself?

I think, especially with the older people in my life, there's definitely a lot more oh okay, and you know that they're confused and for them, they have been grown into this idea that sleeping in suffer earms means that something is wrong.

What you said, Katie about people who are like, ooh, divorce, divorce, divorce.

But what is a cool surprise is that I found that when a lot of our friends come over to our house and they see our separate rooms, we yet to be the blueprint for them and kind of the permission givers of like, oh, this is possible. And we've had these conversations where a lot of our friends see us as people they can turn to to process this is something that they want in their relationship and be able to give advice on what it looks like to make that happen.

What about betting? Does betting have any.

Sort of like you know, Well, the mattress industry is definitely paying attention to the need for individualized preferences within the shared bed, and that can solve many couples issues. For instance, if they have different sort of firmness preferences of the mattress, or one partner tends to toss and turn or steal the sheets. There's even a method known as the Scandinavian method, which is essentially two twin beds put together equals a king and this is also sort of satisfies many couples.

Oh, that explains the hotels in Europe, Katie.

Yeah, exactly. Well, it's also a space issue. It's easier to get two twin beds and two a room and put them together then you know, lugging up a massive king bed into a room. But this also does satisfy some couples who are struggling still with the stigma. They want the appearance of a marital bed of a shared bed, but it actually because it's two twin beds, each partner can have their own bedding and it's just one common overlayer comforter. So yeah, we even have terminology sort of to manage.

These issues, right.

That is fascinating because Katie, like Katie, is very cold at night and she likes it to be warmer.

She likes more sheets on her.

And it's kind of a hard thing to navigate when I want less sheets on me, because you kind of have to like make like an s curve with the sheets, like they've got to be on Katie and then come down around me. I mean, that's a difficult thing. Wow, Katie, this is interesting.

Yeah, you guys might want to try the Scandinavian method with individualized mattress pads that have heating and cooling elements. There you go, that's that's my.

Trick I do.

I did want to ask doctor Troxel another question, because I feel like for some couples, the sex come in the expense of sleep unlikely to be.

Good sex, especially because Adam wants to do it late at night and I like a shower hour, like once.

You have kids.

Yeah, if we have a date and there's dinner and whatever, I'm like, while we're showering getting ready to go to dinner, we do it, and then we go to dinner. And then if I'm really full and tired and just want to watch my programs.

Watch a little Yellowstone and pass out.

There's really no right time to have sex, you know.

There's no like bedtime right before sleep or in the morning or anything like that.

Right, there's no like.

Absolutely not no. I mean, and we know this from extensive relationship research that in long term relationships, spontaneous sex is really not how sex occurs for most couples. And sure, there's probably times where if your schedules are so busy, but you know the only time for you to have sex with your partner is at night, and you both consent to sacrificing a little bit of sleep. I imagine it's not taking hours. I don't know, but sure, go for it.

Although I have to say sometimes to share in my I don't know if this is weird about me, but sometimes when we have sex and I have an orgasm, I actually feel incredibly energized, Like I'm the opposite of Adam, Like I can have an orgasm.

He's asleep, and I'm like.

Let's clean the house and do more laundry and pack the dishes, like I'm just like.

What you're saying is again, regardless of sleeping arrangement, it is not true that all sex happens right before bed or in the middle of the night. So being intentional, including scheduling sex, doesn't make you a laying couple. It makes you a real couple who have children or lives

Wow, thank you, doctor Troxel. Katie.

We think we're talking about sleep, and we think we're talking about love, and it turns out it's about communication, and so like so many other things when it comes to relationships, it's communication that is the key.

We are going to have a lot to talk about tonight at dinner and I am stoked. So doctor Troxel, thank you for being on Chasing Sleep.

It's been such a pleasure. And thanks so much for having.

Me and valan Ki. Thank you for being on our podcast.

Thank you for having us.

When we're in Brooklyn, we're getting dinner.

Absolutely would be obsessed with that. Please let us.

Oh that's definitely happening.

What a start to our first episode of Chasing Sleep.

I mean, if the.

Rest is going to be as mind blowing as this one is, we are in for a wild ride.

Yes, And how much sleep and good quality sleep can better affect our relationship our communication skills.

And we just kind of deal with all the difficulties of it. We don't really ever talk about it.

Look, obviously, VALANCHI are sleeping great because they are treating each other beautifully.

This is so true. I was really fascinated with the idea that maybe choosing to sleep in different rooms or different beds, or anything outside of the norm is not necessarily an indicator for your relationship.

Pulling apart, if.

Anything, could be the key to having a healthy and long relationship.

I was really fascinated by the option, which I think we could definitely adapt into our relationship. About this, like cuddle time before I go to sleep. I feel like we miss out on that so much because I go to sleep at ten and you go to sleep at midnight or one. I feel like there's a debriefing of the day, a physical touch and intimacy that may or may not be sexual, but just that there's a can a physical connection and a mental and spiritual connection that

You know.

I liked, you know, the removal of the stigma about scheduling sex.

I've always thought because I don't understand when you are in a relationship like we are, and we do have children and huge work lives, how you don't. I mean, I'm just so glad we have the professional here to tell us that that's okay and doesn't mean that anything is wrong with our relationship.

I'm glad that you and I are hosting this podcast together because we had a chance to talk about these things publicly. And it's really good to know that sometimes you get energized after sex. I've never been awake to see how you react to sex in any way, shape or form. I'm usually gone.

But what I liked about too is coming together for the weekends is when you is when Kai and Val meet up. That sounds so sexy. It sounds like how things sort of were when we started dating at them, and I would like meet you in Venice for the weekend because we lived on opposite ends of Los Angeles.

Yeah, I don't know if our sex list was ever better than when we lived on opposite ends of Los Angeles, right.

Well, Also, we were twenty four years.

Old, no kids, no job, no homework, no no homework.

At least we had seventeen jobs at that point, but there was nothing we had to bring home.

But I love the idea of their weekend being so sacred, like their time together is very special and intentional.

But I will say I kind of would love to explore the idea of a bed that accommodates both of us.

Yes, because you are hot, I am cold. You like hard as a rock for your back, and I like a little bit more of a softer, cozier, you know, smushy vibe.

You know this, This episode was really fascinating. I have a feeling our next episode is going to be even more fascinating.

We're going to be talking about dreams.

We've been logging our dreams, so get ready. If you thought we were all vulnerable and letting it all hang out, so to speak, in this episode, you ain't seen nothing yet.

I have so many dreams I want to talk about with me too. I feel like it could be a little uncomfortable. We're gonna be a married couple talking about our dreams and this is our subconsciousness and we're gonna be talking about this with each other.

This is wild.

Oh yeah, baby, But enough about us.

Let's hear about you and what you think of us. Go to your podcast player and rate and review Chasing Sleep. Maybe even leave some comments about dreams you guys have been have.

That's a great idea. That's a great idea.

And you could find us on social media.

Yes, I am at kt q Low's on the Instagram and.

I am at Shabby Shaps on the Instagram. Don't forget to follow or subscribe so that you never miss an episode.

Chasing Sleep is a production of Ruby Studios from iHeartMedia in partnership with Mattress Firm. Our executive producer is Molly Soosha.

This show was written and produced by Sound That Brands Dave Beeson, Jason Jackson, and Michelle Rice.

Chasing Sleep is hosted by Katie.

Lows In the Adam Shapiro and Until Next Time, hoping you're living your best while sleeping your best.

M