‘Sex is all about the sofa now’

For seven and a half years, Brad and Felicity, now in their early 30s, have been sleeping in the same bed. Their 18-month-old daughter, Brooke, has shared their bed since she was born.

• Felicity and Brad with Brooke, at 23.18

Felicity The first time Brad slept in my bed, I assumed it was a one-night stand. We’d been chatting on Instagram and I thought he was really funny and beautiful. We decided to meet up for a drink and he came back to mine, but he ghosted me after.

Brad I didn’t! Your timeline’s all wrong.

Felicity You did! Remember you were preoccupied with your ex? Confused?

Brad If there was any lack of replying on my end, it wasn’t for two weeks.

Felicity Well, after Brad had cleared his head and I’d done a bit of wooing, things happened really fast. We moved in together three months later.

Brad We’re lucky in that we’ve always slept really well together. We used to sleep all cuddled up.

Felicity It’s sad in a way, because we don’t cuddle any more. Now Brooke’s next to us we have solo sleep positions.

Brad Felicity sleeps in a C-shape next to Brooke. She makes her body like a human shield for Brooke, who can breastfeed during the night without Felicity having to sit up. I think we’ve skipped a lot of the arguments new parents have, because neither of us has to get out of bed to feed the baby.

• From 19.45 to 06.27

Felicity Brad sleeps like a vampire in a coffin. He lies on his back, really stiff, with a pillow over his head.

Brad Of course, there are still tense moments between us. Felicity is physically doing so much more than me, because Brooke refuses to take a bottle. So we’ve tried to make it fairer. I take the dirty jobs. If Brooke is sick in the night, I change the sheets. We also have our cat roaming around our bed throughout the night and I’m in charge of trying to control her.

Felicity The bed is no longer a romantic place for us as a couple. It’s a family space. It’s still special, though.

Brad Sex happens exclusively downstairs now. Never in bed.

Felicity It’s all about the sofa. We wait until after she’s gone to bed, and we try not to look at the baby monitor while we’re doing it.

‘We rarely tussle over covers’

Now in their late 70s, Steve and Sandra have slept in the same bed for 55 years.

• Steve and Sandra at 22.47

Steve We like to sleep in the nude. We always have.

Sandra It’s more comfortable that way. We have compatible sleeping habits. That might be the secret to our success as a couple. We rarely tussle over covers and both lie very still. Steve never wakes me up thrashing about in the night.

Steve I do snore, but if Sandra gives me a gentle nudge, it works wonders.

Sandra Steve is a considerate man. He gets up earlier than me but creeps out of bed to get dressed in the hall, so as not to disturb me. I’m really crabby and out of it in the morning.

Steve You don’t disturb me, either.

Sandra Well, I probably would if you weren’t pretty deaf. I snore all the time; you just can’t hear me. I don’t have to creep about. I could fall on the floor and you would sleep through it.

Steve Yes, maybe the real secret to the success of our marriage is that I have gone deaf.

Sandra His deafness has come at the right time, because now we are in our 70s we both get up multiple times to go to the loo. He goes on his tiptoes so as not to wake me up, and he simply can’t hear me stomping in and out.

• From 22.56 to 08.35

Steve On a good night we each get up to pee two times. But if we’ve been drinking, it could be five … so boring! Night-time is a bit like Piccadilly Circus in our house – it’s amazing we don’t run into each other in the hall.

Sandra It’s like we have a sixth sense about when the other person is up. We never go at the same time.

Steve We are harmonious sleepers. This is why I don’t understand why you keep on bringing up the idea of separate bedrooms.

Sandra I have been campaigning to have my own room, but Steve won’t have it. We’ve been empty-nesters for ages, so we have the space. I love the idea of having the bed all to myself.

Steve I think it would be very bad for the marriage. We’ve been so many different people in this bed: care-free hippies, beleaguered parents, doting grandparents. Sleeping together is precious. We’ve been having this same argument about separate bedrooms for decades but luckily I always win.

‘We call ourselves a throuple’

Deeanne (on left of picture) and Carter have been sleeping in the same bed for nine years. Up to three days a week, they invite their lover Kyla to join them, an arrangement they have had for for four months.

• Deeanne, Carter and Kyla at 04.50

Deeanne Ever since Carter and I first met, we’ve invited other people to join us in bed. We have never wanted a traditional monogamous setup.

Carter When I first met Deeanne, I had just come out of a long-term relationship and so had she, so we were both looking for something casual. Then we fell in love, but our threesomes continued.

Deeanne We see our relationship with Kyla as very fluid. The three of us will joke around together and call ourselves a throuple, but in reality it’s less official than that. There have been periods when Kyla has stayed in our bed for three nights in the week, but then we can go two weeks without seeing her at all.

Carter Deeanne and I have children together, which makes organising our adult sleepovers a little more difficult. We prefer it if Kyla visits when our kids aren’t in the house.

• From 03.36 to 07.53

Deeanne The most challenging part of our sleepovers is that our bed is too small.

Carter I love being in the middle of the bed at the beginning of the night, but I get hot so quickly that I don’t last long. We do fit together very nicely, though.

Deeanne I enjoy the cuddles, but I actually hate the reality of sleeping with three people in the bed. It’s not comfortable, it’s hot, and I don’t think any of us sleep very well. I see it as a side-effect of the play. Usually Carter will have to get out of the bed at some point during the night.

Carter It’s worth it, though, I think. When you get to explore different people together as a couple, it makes you stronger. It gives Deeanne and me more to fantasise and talk about.

Deeanne Right now, Kyla doesn’t stay over quite enough to warrant getting a bigger bed, but we’ve talked about it. I would like to buy a super king.

‘Whippets are like hot-water bottles’

A single woman in her early 70s, Kate (pictured here with Willow) has been sleeping with her dogs on the bed for 59 years.

• Kate at 01.13

I have been happily single for 30 years but I did always have a dog on the bed when I was married, too. Perhaps that was the beginning of the end! People think it’s peculiar that I haven’t felt the need to find a new partner since I divorced, but I am proud to be a woman who has made it on her own.

My bedroom is my kingdom. I like to think it is a very calm space, although I recently got a new puppy and she has disrupted things a bit.

• From 22.20 to 07.10

Whippets are a bit like hot-water bottles except for the fact that they whine. I have two at the moment, which is a bit overpowering. The older dog used to sleep on the bed but she has been bullied out of it by the new dog. I’m engaged in a kind of war with the puppy. She spends the entire night trying to worm her way up the bed towards my face. I have to wake up at regular intervals and push her back down again. I have occasionally opened my eyes to find her head actually next to mine on the pillow.

Often I will have one of my smaller grandchildren in the bed with us, too, and my cat usually makes an appearance at some point during the night. It’s cosy, but at the same time mayhem. I haven’t slept through the night for about a year now. At 3am the puppy will start wriggling and I have to carry her downstairs to mess in the garden. My staircase is very narrow, so I cling on to the banister and climb down sideways. Every time I do this, I feel I am dicing with death.

‘Our bed is too small for all four of us’

For nine years, Laura and Saam, now in their early 40s, have slept in the same bed. They have a three-year-old and a six-year-old who often join them at some point during the night.

• Saam, Laura and their two children at 07.15

Laura When our children slept in cots they couldn’t escape, but since they have learned to walk and graduated to beds, they often sneak into ours. They share a room and conspire to ruin our lives because they usually get into our bed as a double act. We were probably stricter parents when we had one child.

Saam I’m happy for them to come into our bed if I can remain asleep or oblivious.

Laura Our bed is just too small for all four of us. There’s generally a foot in someone’s eye. Saam is left partially sticking out of the bed. He’s pushed and pushed by our son Caspian, then he eventually just gets out.

Saam An Oedipal cuckolding …

• From 23.35 to 07.06

Laura If it’s the middle of the night and it’s just one of them, we generally accept defeat, roll over and hope for the best. But if it’s six o’clock in the morning and it’s two of them, they’re usually fighting. At that point we will ask them if they will please go and play in their own room. The problem is they are stronger than us at 6am and they win.

Saam They like to play a game where they jump off the end of the bed into a beanbag. Laura has a foam roller she uses for her back that they make a bridge out of and slide down. They just generally like to trash the room.

Laura We haven’t set an alarm clock for seven years. There’s no point. I sleep with one eye open.

Saam I sleep with both eyes open.

‘I wake up with oatcake stuck to my face’

For just over a year, early 30s couple Frankie (on left of picture) and Divya have been sleeping in the same bed.

• Frankie and Divya at 23.32

Divya Frankie and I have been sleeping together for a while now, so our bed etiquette has certainly relaxed. I’m not so anxious about impressing her any more. I wear scraggly pyjamas and am less afraid to fart in bed.

Frankie Divya has confessed that in the early days, she couldn’t sleep all night because she was holding in her farts. That doesn’t seem to be a problem now.

Divya We are definitely more comfortable in bed together, one year on. Frankie is a troubled sleeper, though, and I sometimes get preoccupied at night worrying that she isn’t getting enough sleep.

Frankie Divya’s night of sleep is still dependent on how well I sleep, which I feel bad about. I wake up a lot in the night and she never gets frustrated. Maybe that will change. We are still in the honeymoon phase.

• From 00.00 to 08.52

Divya We also both tend to get very hungry in the night. We keep a box of oatcakes on the bedside table, for snacking.

Frankie In the middle of the night I will be nibbling on an oatcake, thinking Divya’s asleep next to me. Then I’ll hear her say, “Give me one!” and we will both lie there in the pitch black, eating. I often wake up with some dried oatcake stuck to my face.

Divya I like those moments we have at 4am together. We usually have a little chat after we’ve finished eating, and a kiss.

Frankie Divya is extremely kind and understanding. She deals with all the little things I have to do to get a good night’s sleep. My hour of wind-down time, my snacks, my panic if I am not asleep before 10.30pm.

Divya What I would say is that the bedroom has different meanings for us throughout the day. The evenings aren’t our most sexy time together, as a couple.

Frankie Yeah, the scissoring tends to happen in the afternoon. We often combine it with a nap. We love napping.

‘The bed is the centre of life’

Matt and Helen are a couple in their early 60s. They have been sleeping in the same bed for 30 years.

• Matt and Helen at 01.11

Helen When we first met, Matt and I shared a single mattress. That is rare now, even for a single person. But we enjoyed it.

Matt We love sleeping together but we don’t necessarily sleep that well together. Helen is a very light sleeper, and I don’t go to bed very early, so I tend to wake her up every night when I get into bed, and often she can’t get back to sleep afterwards.

Helen But we tolerate each other! That’s why we’re still together, 30 years later. Also I have a secret prescription that I take if I haven’t slept well for three nights in a row. Even if I don’t take the pill, just knowing that I have it there is soothing.

Matt I suppose we are both anxious sleepers. I have a recurring dream that I am fighting off assailants. Often Helen will have to wake me up and say: it’s OK, you’re not fighting. You’re here with me.

• From 23.17 to 06.18

Helen That’s what’s so lovely about sleeping together. You have company. I sometimes wake him up in the night when I feel lonely, so we can talk.

Matt Perhaps we all have this embedded fear of sleep because we are so defenceless while we are doing it. Emotionally, your barriers come down so you can’t shut out what you might be able to when you’re awake. That’s why it is precious to have another person there with you.

Helen Yes, when he is away, the bed is not the same any more.

Matt The marriage bed is the centre of the little clan you build with your children. It can be a single or a double, or just a mat on the floor. The bed is the centre of life, wherever you go in the world.

‘We banned sleepovers’

They are in their early 30s and have been together for three years, but Nancy and Rowan do not sleep in the same bed, or even the same house.

• At Rowan’s at 09.09

Nancy We have never slept well in the same bed. After a few months of suffering together, we decided to ban sleepovers. Sleep is sacred!

Rowan Our houses are 12 minutes apart, and every time we hang out, one of us will cycle away afterwards, so we can each get a good night’s sleep.

Nancy I am high-maintenance around sleep, like The Princess and the Pea.

Rowan You’ve definitely got a unique “sleep process”.

Nancy I have to apply essential oils, and I’ve got a particular pillow I travel with. The mattress can’t be too hard and the sheets must be clean. When I used to stay over at Rowan’s, I’d lie awake thinking about the dirt on his sheets, whether his curtains were properly closed or if his phone was about to go off, and I can’t sleep if I’m not well fed. It’s like I’m a baby.

Rowan We tried to make sharing a bed work, but then I became so worried she was awake, I couldn’t sleep either. So we’d both lie in the dark, panicking. Then around 2am, Nancy would give up and cycle home, and I’d feel sad.

Nancy Did it make you feel rejected?

Rowan It was more that I worried we were fundamentally incompatible.

• From 22.20 at Nancy’s to 09.43 at Rowan’s

Nancy Everything changed when we quit sleeping together. We became much closer because the one big problem in our relationship was solved.

Rowan Sleeping separately has also made things more romantic between us. Physical intimacy isn’t lumped in with the anxiety of sleep any more, so we concentrate on it. I like to sleep in later, so if it’s a weekend Nancy will cycle over in the morning and wake me up by climbing back into bed with me.

Nancy We’ve talked about moving in together, but we will never sleep in the same bed again. We’ll have separate bedrooms, or buy two single beds and put them in the same room.

Rowan When we go on holiday, we always book a room with twin beds.

Nancy They are the dream. You can push them together for a goodnight kiss, then sleep in total freedom.

Some names have been changed.