Separate beds are like winning the lottery for your love life!

A SLEEP DIVORCE WORKS FOR US — AND SEX IS BETTER THAN EVER!

DOM SAYS: When I met my wife 22 years ago, there wasn’t a moment I didn’t want to spend with her. Awake. Asleep. All of it.

I loved our time between the sheets so much, I actually built us a bed. I cut all the timber myself and it was 7ft square. Vast.

We had two separate mattresses made for us. Steph’s was medium soft as she is the princess with the pea; mine was firm. Cost an absolute fortune, but we loved it.

Loved it. And then, three years after we met and a year after we married, Steph was — joy! — pregnant.

And as she became more pregnant our perfect bliss in bed became, well, a little less perfect. Increasingly whale-like and hormonal, my wife struggled to sleep, and so did I — partly because she’d kick me awake and hiss ‘stop snoring’ in my ear.

Between waking up to feed the baby and being woken up by me, Steph had soon had enough and booted me into the spare room. Frankly, I didn’t mind — we were both wretched with exhaustion. By the time our second child came along, we were committed separate bed roomers.

That our second child did come along should tell you all you need to know about the sex question. Everyone assumes sleeping apart is the death knell for your sex life, but I’m happy to report that’s far from the case. Believe me, separate bedrooms are the absolute best thing for your sex life.

A couple of years ago we went on a jolly to a luxury hotel, the George V, in Paris. At check-in, we let ourselves be bullied by the receptionist into taking a double, not the twin we’d booked. Come 2am, however, I was regretting my weakness as I bunked down in the bath, covered in towels and dressing gowns.

It wasn’t the first time. You can actually get quite comfortable in the bath if you get the towels right. If we stay with friends and there isn’t a spare room, I always end up on the sofa. I’m a sofa connoisseur. Or the floor. The floor’s not great, but it’s better than an irate Steph punching me in the back and shrieking.

I don’t blame her — it’s not just the snoring, it’s the moving. Some people are as still as a

corpse in sleep, but I often wake up with my head at the other end of the bed. I’ve sort of shimmied around. And there really is nothing worse than no sleep.

STEPH SAYS: When we were first together, in a grand gesture, Dom built us a bed. We had a wonderful time in it.

But while he may have been driving me to giddy heights of pleasure, he was also driving me crazy, even then.

The snoring. There is nothing like it. We’ve never had it measured, but I’m pretty sure it would be off any chart. So even back then, when we were all doe-eyed, I was permanently exhausted. I remember making him wear a T-shirt back to front, with a tennis ball in the pocket, so he couldn’t roll onto his back. But he could. And he did.

I’ve always needed a fair bit of sleep — 14 hours is ideal, but I can get by on eight — so as wonderful as this man was, there was a problem. We were simply not compatible overnight.

We have completely different body temperatures too — he’s a furnace, pumping out heat. So there we were, deeply in love, but all of sudden I was staring at him with unfettered rage.

When I woke up in the morning after basically no sleep (but always after Dom, because he needs only six hours), I’d struggle to open my eyes, already furious.

And then I got pregnant and my hormones added a little extra fuel to my fury, and frankly, moving to another bedroom was a wise move. The only move.

It’s not that much of a stretch to say separate rooms saved our sanity. People think separate bedrooms means no sex, but really it means the opposite.

People can be utterly revolting in bed. Disgusting. I don’t want to watch my husband wander out of the ensuite and immediately start pawing at me. I’d rather not have the loo in my mind at that point.

Not sharing a room means you maintain your mystique on both sides. And for me that’s important.

These days, our bed is no longer a battleground. I visit Dom’s room for a little assignation — he makes his bed specially, otherwise he never bothers (another thing that would drive me bonkers if we were forced to share a room) — and then I return across the hall, to my room.

It is a haven of goose down, Egyptian cotton and cashmere blankets. There’s an unwrinkled feather topper, exquisite white duvet cover and a cloud of Jo Malone linen spray.

And then I sleep deeply, with the full knowledge that I will wake up without murderous intentions towards my husband in the morning.