Snoring / Divorce

I think I may have found the major reason for divorces.  Let me explain.  My wife and I have never really fought in the 16 years of marriage and 20 years of knowing each other.  They say it’s healthy for couples to fight sometimes, but we just can’t seem to come up with something to argue over for extended periods of time.   There was that time when I kept changing radio stations on our drive to Yellowstone, or that time when we had a deep conversation about where to squeeze the toothpaste. 

But recently, I have finally found something that really pisses of the sweet wife, which magically transform her into a defiant angry boxer, floating like butterfly, stinging like a bee.  My snoring, and subsequently, her sleep deprivation.  One of the side effects of sleep deprivation is that the offending spouse appears rather unattractive and downright ugly, studies find.

On a typical night, I fall asleep with my hands raised high (like-I-just-don’t-care) legs apart to what I imagine to be an “X,” or DaVinci’s Vitruvian Man.  

I get a gentle nudge “Stop snoring,” she says.

I mumble incomprehensibly. Three minutes later, a jab.  “You’re snoring again.”

She must be dreaming because I don’t snore, nor do I ever remember snoring.  Five minutes later, another blow, considerably sharper that the previous.  This continues until the morning when I’m left with signs of blunt force trauma.  I’m convinced there were round-house kicks involved.  She looks disheveled and irritated, with panda eyes, cranky and angry as I’ve never seen her before.

Snoring has probably caused more marital discord than any I-saw-you-checking-out-that-girl moments.  It’s probably why twin beds are sold in increasing record numbers.  And for some of us who are blessed to have a guest room, you may have already renamed it as the ‘snore room.’  And for the rest of us, maybe the ‘snore couch’ will suffice.

Being a dentist, I’m well aware of oral appliances, sleep apnea devices, snore guards, etc. etc., many of which reduce or eliminate snoring to the delight of wives worldwide.  There’s even a suction thingy that sucks out the tongue that makes you look like a totally bratty kid throughout the night.   But alas, I’m at a point where I actually need one, and will have my lab fabricate one once my wife (gladly) takes an impression of my upper and lower dentition.   But not the tongue suction thingy—yet.  I have to draw the line somewhere.  

Personally, this raised the question, what did people do before the advent of new technologies and techniques we have today?  It turns out in ancient times, many cures revolved around driving evil spirits away. Sometimes, it involved drilling holes in the skull, which probably worked if the trepanation was to the back of the head forcing the guy to sleep on his side.  If he died, that solved the snoring also.  Babylonians slept with a human skull for seven days, kissing and licking it seven times each night.  While no research has shown to prove or disprove this method, more recent studies have shown that snoring is the direct result of combining breathing and sleeping.  As such, if you eliminate the sleeping aspect or the breathing aspect, snoring will likely be eliminated. 

Getting back on point, if you do a google search for top reasons for divorce, you’ll see a list, ALL of which are EASILY and GREATLY exacerbated or directly caused by lack of sleep.  So if you snore, I personally encourage you to seek treatment for this devastating disease, and let it be known that I not only save teeth, but also marriages.  ^_^