‘My wife lets our daughter sleep in our bed at night, I sleep in the spare room’

My wife and I are in our 30s and have one daughter, who’s recently turned two.

My problem is, my wife lets our daughter sleep in our bed at night, which means I usually get out and go to the spare room.

At first it was just the occasional night when our daughter woke up and came in, but now it’s become pretty much every night.

My wife doesn’t see anything wrong in it and says that our daughter just needs comfort at the moment.

However, I’m exhausted from sleeping on a bad mattress and, more importantly, our sex life is virtually non-existent.

I’d love your opinion.

Coleen says:

I know letting your daughter fall asleep again in your bed seems like the easiest option at the time when you’re tired, but you really are making a rod for your own back with this one.

It’s pretty normal for young children to wake up at night and want to get into your bed, but you have to keep putting them back! If it’s causing stress taking her back to her own bed straightaway because she cries, wait until she falls asleep, then carry her back, so she wakes up in her own room in the morning. If you consistently do this, eventually it’ll work.

When you have young children and life is busy and sometimes stressful, having a good sex life is a lot about having the opportunity to actually have sex. So, if you’re being banished to the spare room, that’s going to cut down the opportunities significantly.

You’re right to address this now before the periods between sex get longer and you find you’re not having it at all.

If you’re working from home and your daughter has a nap, why not use that as a chance to have some grown-up fun?