According to The National Sleep Foundation, “Around 57% of adult men and 40% of women snore.” Snoring is the punchline of countless jokes and comic strips. When you’re a kid, a snoring grandma can be a funny thing. However, As an adult who sleeps with a snoring partner, snoring is no laughing matter for you or for them. Snoring can indicate a dangerous health condition known as “sleep apnea.” Let’s look at how to sleep with a snoring partner and help them stop snoring in the future.
Snoring is Notoriously Difficult to Sleep With
If you have a snoring partner, you may worry about how your relationship is affected by their snoring and your reaction.
According to The Better Sleep Council, “63% of couples sleep most of the night separated.” In addition, their findings include:
- 26% of respondents reported sleeping better alone
- 20% percent, or one in five, claim to “cling to their respective [bed] corners.”
- 9% percent, or almost one in 10, say they sleep in separate bedrooms
- Almost 2 in 10 Americans say their dream home has separate master bedrooms
About 24 percent of married couples in the US end up sleeping in separate rooms because of earsplitting Zzzs, and about 17 percent of them say snoring takes a toll on their sex life. (2)
A study of 2000 people in the UK shows that 18 percent of married couples blame snoring as the cause of regular arguments in their relationship, while 30 percent sleep in a separate room from their partner because of it.” (3)
Studies show that snoring can hurt your relationship with a partner. More importantly, snoring can prevent sleep for both you and your partner, which comes with health problems.
Health Problems with Lack of Sleep
Statistically, many couples are going without needed hours of sleep. Lack of sleep affects both your physical and mental health. Researchers report that sleeping next to a snorer may cause more pain complaints, higher fatigue levels, and even an increased risk of hearing loss. (4)
Conditions caused by lack of sleep can include:
- Cognitive issues such as poor concentration and reduced reaction times
- Inflammation
- Hearing loss
- Negative outlook
- Anxiety
- Depression
“Sleep problems can boost inflammation and may jeopardize interpersonal functioning, risks that may be magnified in couples.” (5)
Snoring is not just annoying; it affects your health and your partner’s health to a significant degree. If you haven’t looked for medical answers to snoring yet, seeing an ENT doctor can make all the difference for you both.
Sleep Apnea: A Medical Condition
Snoring is often harmless, though annoying. However, snoring indicates a more serious underlying medical condition or sleep disorder for some people. You may not realize that snoring is often a medical condition that affects your partner’s overall health.
The most common sleep disorder that causes snoring is obstructive sleep apnea. OSA causes muscles in your throat to relax and block your airways partially or entirely when you sleep. Out of the 326 million people in the US, 10% have obstructive sleep apnea. (6)
Obstructive sleep apnea can cause:
- Snoring
- Repeatedly waking during the night for “no reason.”
- Gasping for breath
- Waking up feeling sleepy
- Daytime grogginess
If your partner remains undiagnosed and doesn’t seek treatment for a sleep disorder, they could face significant health issues. Untreated obstructive sleep apnea increases the risk of:
- Heart failure by 140%
- Stroke by 60%
- Coronary heart disease by 30% (6)
Getting a partner checked out by an ENT doctor can make all the difference in reducing or eliminating snoring and the associated medical risks of sleep disorders.
So the best way to sleep with a snoring partner is to help your partner find out if their snoring is indicative of a sleep disorder that an ENT doctor can easily treat. Not breathing well while sleeping may hurt both your health and your partner’s health.
Set Up a Sleep Study for Your Partner
It’s time to get proactive about finding out what’s causing your partner’s snoring. A sleep study can determine how risky your partner’s level of sleep apnea is. Sleep specialists use a night in the clinic to observe your partner and see how many times their snoring prevents proper breathing.
Sleep studies are a non-invasive and painless evaluation of your partner’s sleep. Clinicians attach electrodes to your skin. Your partner goes to sleep normally, and the test begins. Doctors evaluate the electrode data for many different bodily systems.
Data gathered includes your partner’s:
- Brain waves
- Rapid eye movements
- Breathing patterns
- Respiratory efforts
- Oxygen levels
- Snoring
- Muscle tone and leg movements
- Electrocardiogram data
- Heart rate
If your partner wakes up or has difficulty sleeping, the study helps determine why. After the study is over, you leave the sleep center the following day and come back in several weeks to discuss the results with your ENT doctor.
We Can Help
At Enticare, our board-certified sleep specialists work with you and your partner to help their snoring problem and your lack of sleep problem. Often, surgeries or medical devices can stop snoring in its tracks. Contact us today and start finding the solutions you need to sleep soundly all night and wake up feeling refreshed each morning.
Footnotes:
- Survey: American Couples Have Trouble in Bed
- Snoring: Harmless or Something to Worry About? | Sleep Foundation
- Why Snoring Might Be Ruining Your Relationship (And What to Do About It)
- Every Couple Is Sleeping In Separate Rooms, and None of Them Are Admitting It | Washingtonian (DC)
- Shortened sleep fuels inflammatory responses to marital conflict: Emotion regulation matters – ScienceDirect
- Sleep Apnea Statistics