6 Presidents And First Ladies Who Slept In Separate Bedrooms

Life at the White House may seem like a fairytale to the average spectator. But the bedrooms at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue — which have seen presidential couples come and go for decades — have different, darker stories to tell. Accounts from within the White House have long punctured holes in the perfectly curated perceptions of first couples the public is typically exposed to. Among the most telling details that betray the reality of presidents and first ladies behind the facade lies in their unusual sleeping arrangements.

Though minor, this has been a highly significant clue in deciphering the relationships between many U.S. presidents and their wives. From strained marriages to mismatched schedules to loveless lives, bedroom dynamics within the White House have been steady indicators of what private life at the highest status looks like once the front doors are shut, cameras are off, and optics don't dictate decisions. 

The practice of couples sleeping separately has been justified in many ways throughout history. Nineteenth-century customs considered it an upper-class feature, but modern discourse claims that it is key to a happy marriage. At the White House, however, sleeping arrangements have often transcended such reasons. Consider, for instance, the affair-fueled presidencies of Bill Clinton and John F. Kennedy, or Richard Nixon's erratic sleeping habits, which reshaped their nighttime routines with their wives. Here are six presidents and first ladies who slept in separate bedrooms for reasons that were often practical, sometimes bitter, and other times stemmed from just pure convention. 

Notwithstanding the complexity of their marriage, Eleanor and Franklin D. Roosevelt's partnership is widely considered one of the most influential the White House has ever seen. But much as it stood on steady foundations of a formidable political legacy, it was also shaped by significant physical and emotional detachment — especially after FDR's well-documented affair with Eleanor's secretary, Lucy Mercer. Divorce was not an option, so Eleanor is said to have set down a rule after the scandal that forbade her husband from sharing her bed again.

Though the incident transpired during FDR's pre-presidency years, the pair apparently carried this disunity over into the White House, when he took up office in 1933. Historical accounts in The New Yorker detail the contentious private dynamics between the Roosevelts, marked by independent schedules and distance. "They had the most separate relationship I have ever seen between man and wife. And the most equal," a White House staffer claimed. 

Despite the chasm, Eleanor committed to her role as first lady like no presidential partner had before, spearheading civil rights advocacy and social reform from her seat of power, as her husband led the nation through the Great Depression and World War II. Simultaneously, against the shadow of FDR's alleged infidelity, Eleanor cultivated her own friendships outside of marriage. The most notorious of these was with journalist Lorena Hickok, whose relationship with Eleanor has been a topic of enduring historical fascination. 

It's now a famous bit of lore that Jackie and John F. Kennedy's marriage was a complicated affair — pun intended. The bumps in their marital journey didn't just make for juicy front-page headlines; they also carried over from the tabloids into their private quarters at the White House, where the presidential couple reportedly slept in separate bedrooms. To a great extent, this sleeping arrangement was fueled by conventional and practical reasons. 

The separation of Jackie and JKF's bedroom suites aligned with the aristocratic social customs deemed acceptable in the 1960s. While JKF preferred a harder mattress owing to his back troubles, Jackie slept on a softer bed — a dilemma that was solved by joining two twin beds together, with each of their preferred mattresses, in case JKF wanted to crash in his wife's passionately customized bedroom.

This privacy also likely served another purpose. JFK's alleged string of mistresses was a notorious open secret throughout his presidency and even as the couple tried to maintain a facade of poise in public, they apparently lived separate lives behind closed doors. In interviews she gave in 1964 that appeared in the book "Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations on Life with John F. Kennedy," Jackie described their separate schedules, due in part to JFK's day job. "He'd get up a quarter of eight ... and go into his bedroom and have breakfast there ... sometimes I'd like to just, sort of, stay in bed until about nine."

While it may have been a decision driven more by custom than discord, Lady Bird and Lyndon B. Johnson often slept in separate quarters during their White House tenure in the 1960s. The custom part of it was rooted in the historical idea that sharing a bed "was a symbol of poverty, because you couldn't afford your own bed or your own bedroom," according to first lady scholar Annette Dunlap who told People. This tradition stretched all the way from Europe to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, affecting the sleeping arrangements of couples up until at least the Johnson presidency.

That said, theories of the Johnsons' rock-solid partnership abound in records of political history and many depictions observe that they didn't just share a bedroom, but also cherished the rituals of ending and starting each day together. But there are also suggestions that they spent some nights apart. Julia Sweig's book "Lady Bird Johnson: Hidden in Plain Sight" holds an account of Lady Bird visiting LBJ's bedroom one morning when the topic of his re-election hung heavy over his head, only to find him still in his nightclothes and crying.

Some other issues ran deeper. LBJ's roving eye was an open secret in Washington and, while Lady Bird remained loyal to her husband in public, she could hardly have been unaware of his philandering. Dunlap pegs this as a reason behind the Johnsons keeping separate bedrooms, with the claim that LBJ's extramarital tally superseded John F. Kennedy's. 

Watergate looms large over Richard Nixon's political legacy but there is a discerning little detail from his private life that still has enough fuel to keep rumor mills going, even 50 years after his presidency ended. Contrary to the united front they portrayed, Richard and Pat Nixon reportedly slept in separate bedrooms within the White House. The foundations of this practice between the Nixons weren't as acrimonious as in the cases of some other presidents, stemming instead from their well-recorded difference in nightly schedules. 

For an interview with Time in 1972, Richard gave a tour of his bedroom that, with its single bed, didn't betray any signs of two people occupying it. "At night, I usually wake up between 12 and 2 when my mind is clear and make some notes," he said. Pat confirmed as much, according to Will Swift's book "Pat and Dick: The Nixons, An Intimate Portrait of A Marriage." "Nobody could sleep with Dick," Pat is said to have shared with a White House staffer. "He wakes during the night, switches on the light, speaks into his tape recorder or takes notes, it's impossible." 

There have, however, been suggestions that the Nixon marriage was not really the gold standard of solid partnership that history has painted it out to be. Author Annette Dunlap told People that behind the scenes, a rift seemingly developed after Richard became President in 1969 and Pat's position in his inner world diminished, which likely also affected their sleeping arrangements. 

The Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky affair did more than just test the limits of a presidential scandal in America. It apparently also rejigged some sleeping arrangements at the White House. In the midst of the scandal breaking out and the media circus gaining momentum in 1998, Bill moved to a sofa in a private study close to the bedroom he shared with his wife Hillary Clinton. This change lasted several months, according to the 2015 book "The Residence: Inside the Private World of the White House."

Though the Clinton-Lewinsky saga only came to a head in 1998 when the news was outed, White House staffers had apparently been witnessing it play out for a while before that. The book made the bold claim that Hillary was in the know of her husband's affair and though she didn't divorce him, their marriage was shrouded in sadness. In the words of one florist, "It was like a morgue when you'd go up to the second floor. Mrs. Clinton was nowhere to be found." 

Interestingly, rumors of the Clintons sleeping in separate beds had captured public imagination long before the sex scandal made it to the newspapers. A Chicago Tribune article from 1993, which took on the divisive topic of whether or not it's healthy for married couples to sleep apart, blatantly stated that the Clintons "reportedly maintain separate bedrooms in the White House" and pointed toward the "gossipy conjecture" that surrounded this buzz. 

From Melania and Donald Trump's awkward PDA moments caught on camera to outright claims that the Trumps are essentially separated, they aren't exactly the poster couple of happy marriages. One such bombshell revelation that supports the theory of a strained marriage is that the Trumps allegedly sleep in different beds at the White House. "I think it's pretty unusual now to have a separate room from your husband. I think that speaks volumes [about the Trumps]," first lady expert and author Kate Andersen Brower told People, pointing to the now redundant historical custom of presidential couples keeping separate bedrooms in the White House. 

Confirmation for the Trumps' estranged sleeping arrangements have come from many sources, including a contentious one from Stormy Daniels, the adult star who battled Donald in court over an alleged affair they had. She said that upon asking him about Melania, he told her that they didn't sleep together — a claim he visibly bristled at during her testimony, per the Associated Press. In fact, there has been long-standing speculation that the Trumps don't even occupy the same floor in the White House, with Donald living on the second floor and Melania on the third. Still, they somehow make it work. A source close to Melania told the Daily Mail that the Trump marriage, though marked by separate bedrooms, was sustained on nightly rituals like dining together and an overall strong partnership.