Sexsomnia - Sleep Sex

We have reported about the rare case of a woman having sex with strangers while sleepwalking. But have you ever referred to a particular middle of the night sexual event only to learn that your partner doesn't remember it having happened? Or had a partner initiate sex in an aggressive way that would never happen when you were in a normal awakened state?

A recent discovery has brought the subject of sleep sex, or sexsomnia into the light of day, or should we say, the dark of night. As it happens, some people talk in their sleep and a few even get up and take a walk-about, acts which they cannot recall doing once they wake up. Now we are learning that having sex is a new version of these sleep phenomena, or parasomnias.

It may seem like fun, but couples who live with it aren't all that thrilled with the idea. The only good part is that it is finally being recognized as a real phenomenon, and that can help "sufferers" understand it better. By the way, "sufferers" in this case are more likely to be those people sleeping alongside the sexsomniacs, who are woken up with less than romantic sexual advances. And even if the advance results in sex, the sleeper may have a hop in their step and a smile on their face in the morning, but the act will not be something they remember having.

Stages of Sleep:

Stage 1    -  passed through briefly when falling to sleep
Stage 2    -  most of the sleeping time is spent in this stage
Stage 3/4 -  deep sleep, when people can sleepwalk
Stage 5    -  REM sleep, when people can sex sleep

How is it possible that we know so much about sex and yet having sex in your sleep has never been recognized? It's obvious that disorders related to sex always take longer to come out than less loaded medical conditions, but this disorder has an extra sticky component: taking initiative with sex is a grey area. Under the right circumstances and in the right measure it can be appropriate and even invited, but without any invitation and without the constraints that a healthy awareness brings, it moves into the area of sexual harassment and even possibly rape. Just as people are instructed not to wake a person who has wondered around the house in her sleep, but to lead her back to bed gently, it's just not on to expect a partner to play along with a sexy come-on, especially when it is being made aggressively.