Married but sleeping separately

A worrying trend? A study in the US finds that 23 percent of married couples are sleeping alone and this could spell trouble warns a psychologist. From CNN:

Although many couples say separate rooms have been a blessing (Barr says her friends are jealous of her sleeping arrangement), Minnesota clinical psychologist and marriage counselor William F. Harley Jr. warns sleeping separately could spell trouble.

"Whenever I see a couple wanting private time -- they want to be alone, they want their own friends, they don't want to feel like they're joined at the hip -- my immediate question is, 'What is it about being together that bothers you?'" says Harley, author of "Love Busters: Overcoming the Habits that Destroy Romantic Love." "My feeling is that sleeping together is a very, very important part of being integrated with each other."

Jason Holloway, 29, an estimator from Greenwood, Indiana, who slept on the couch for about six months while his wife, Rebecca, was pregnant, agrees that separate beds have a downside.

"I had the TV, I had the dogs with me," he says. "But I didn't feel 100 percent like I was part of the loop. I felt removed from the whole situation."