How to Share a Bed While Getting the Best Night’s Sleep

Frank Thewes is used to hearing from people who wake up on the wrong side of bed because of their partner’s sleeping habits—but who don’t want to move into separate rooms. He was one of them, once. “It can be highly symbolic for somebody to consider a sleep divorce,” says Thewes, a couples therapist in Princeton, N.J. “For a lot of people, that’s scary territory, so they want to avoid it.”Snoozing apart—for even just one or two nights of the week—often ends up being the best decision for a couple. But it’s not the only solution. Thewes has transformed his own sleep life thanks to a variety of new technologies (plus buying the biggest bed he could find), and now he and his wife both enjoy sleeping next to each other. “A heavily-equipped couple is a couple that can have great sleep without a sleep divorce,” he says. “You don’t have to wake up resenting your partner.”The first step to figuring out a way to make it work is understanding that sleep is highly individualized: we all need a di...