In today’s edition of the Los Angeles Times, the popular syndicated columnist “Ask Amy” is asked the following question:

Dear Amy: My wife insists that we sleep in separate rooms. She says I snore — and maybe I do, a little — but sleeping alone makes me feel emotionally alone.

I’ve tried to compromise, asking her if we could stay together for a while first before splitting — but she will not yield, not even a little.

I was sad, but now I’m angry too.

After 20 years of marriage, I feel utterly rejected.

Help!

Sleeping Alone

Dear Alone: I read an article recently saying that “snoring rooms” are the latest thing in home design.  These little soundproof bedrooms give everybody a chance to get a decent night’s sleep if there is a snorer in the house. But the idea isn’t that the snoring room will become a separate bedroom– but more of an occasional refuge.

I agree with you that your wife’s actions are destructive, and your reaction is completely understandable. The charitable assumption is that your wife is so disabled by two decades of interrupted slumber that it has made her lash out.

But I don’t think this is really about the snoring.

Snoring is a relatively easy issue to grapple with, compared with what you two are facing — a lack of intimacy and exile to emotional Siberia.

Whenever a relationship changes so radically, it’s safe to assume there is something major going on.

You need to get to the bottom of this, and a marriage counselor could help.

The response that Amy gives “Sleeping Alone” assumes that the core problem is a lack of intimacy and that going to a marriage counselor would be the best solution. Though a lack of intimacy may have developed over the years of snoring, it is not intimacy that is the problem…

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