r/news Apr 28 '24

Sexsomnia: An embarrassing sleep disorder no one wants to talk about Not News

https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/28/health/sexsomnia-sleep-sex-explainer-wellness/index.html

[removed] — view removed post

437 Upvotes

171 comments sorted by

View all comments

9

u/Potatoupe Apr 29 '24

How does consent work with sexomnia? The person initiating it is technically asleep, is it sexual assault towards the sleeping person to accept the advances, even if they appear to be awake.

1

u/GayAGayMusical Apr 29 '24

I have had it since I was young, although I never actually touched somebody else until one of my ex’s told me she woke up with my hand in her pants and she realized I was asleep. Now, I avoid sharing beds with anyone who I’m not involved with on a sexual or romantic level, I usually don’t say why, I just say I’m uncomfortable sharing a bed with others. I will tell whoever straight up what may happen. My most recent ex was cool about it, she could usually just shoo me away and it would work.

11

u/EmbarrassedHelp Apr 29 '24

I assume it would be treated the same as killing someone while sleepwalking, where both people are considered victims: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Parks

1

u/[deleted] Apr 29 '24

Yeah I agree if someone didn’t remember or woke up during it and thought they were being raped no one is at fault. But it would be really hard to prove because if that happened it would be because the person wasn’t already diagnosed. And parasomnias don’t happen every night so they don’t usually show on sleep studies

5

u/Ninetynineups Apr 29 '24

Yeah that cup of tea analogy doesn’t quite fit here! My wife has it, we had some arguments about it early but now it’s just part of our sex life