Unpopular Opinion

Keeps the dust off your bed

I like it to look nice and neat. Mess and disorder puts me on edge. I like the bed made with the pillows fluffed and throw pillows placed in a certain way. And I do feel like it's more comfortable to sleep in a bed that has been made, because the pillows are fluffed and all the sheets are smoothed out and evenly distributed between my husband and me. I do just get in bed and turn over, I don't rearrange anything, and instead of a blanket I have my hubby for knee support :)

But if there was someone I trust enough to be in my bedroom, I’m not going to waste my time convincing you that I do not, in fact, sleep in my bed.

If this is really how you feel, then I suppose I can't dispute you. But this is like saying, "why would I comb my hair? Anyone I want to talk to is okay talking to me as I am."

Sure..... But most people care about things like this. Maybe not explicitly - most people don't explicitly think to themselves "ugh, an unmade bed. What a loser." But on a subconscious emotional level, this is essentially what is happening. As a society, we've decided a made bed looks better than an unmade bed. That you have failed to make your bed prior to someone entering your bedroom indicates a lack of willingness or ability to confirm to social norms. This, then, typically corresponds to individuals with low social status, and lowers others' opinions of you. Again, this happens on an entirely emotional, subconscious level for almost everyone most of the time. But the fact is, it happens.

Hence, when I'm going to have guests in my bedroom, I make my bed. I don't make my bed every day - I just don't care that much. But I will 100% make my bed if I'm expecting someone else to see it, just like I would sweep the floors and comb my hair.

end every sentence with MOM!

Right now, I'm lying down on top of my made bed. There are time where lying down is nice, but Id rather not get under the sheets. Maybe I'm old, but resting is different from sleeping.

But if there was someone I trust enough to be in my bedroom, I'm not going to waste my time convincing you that I do not, in fact, sleep in my bed.

This is just a bad faith argument. No one is trying to convince anyone of that they don't sleep in their bed. A fair amount of grooming is performative as is quite a bit of tidying. I, for one, get a sense of calm when I'm tidying things. I don't believe I'm not going to untidy things and I don't live in stress that things need to be tidied. But I'm mindful of it and attend to it when I have a chance.

When I get up from the bed, I may tug on the corner to remove the me sized indentation, but that's it.

I, for one, don't care if you make your bed or not. But I'd have a tough time sharing a bed with someone who doesn't.

Because science.

Why Mess Causes Stress

You don't need to remake the bed just for sitting on it, you just need to adjust the bed sheets for five seconds.

It looks nicer and a nice home that looks cared for is worth it on its own. I find it much easier to relax when things around me are tidy. Not making your bed is no different than leaving everything lying around after you're done using it. If you want to live like that, you do you, no judgement, but I don't.

It makes it more comfortable to sleep in.

More comfortable for the cat. She doesn't like it when it's a mess

Unpopular maybe, but I agree with you.

I leave my bedroom in the morning and don't really come back until I am ready to go to bed. So the appearance doesn't matter to me.

I prefer my bedding to be how I left it, not all flat and tucked in.

My partner disagrees, so the bed is usually made by them because even if I do it it's not up to standards and I get up and leave for work earlier anyways.

But I get it. The only reason I do it is to be nice to my partner, I could give two shits personally.

If I had an efficiency apartment or something I might do things differently because it's like, cluttered in the whole living space, but otherwise I think it's a waste of time unless you're trying to impress someone.

No matter how shitty my day is, at least the bed is made.

Also, the texture of the sheets on your body feels smoother if the bed was made hours before going to bed, than that feeling of untidy sheets. My sleeping position is sideways, the blanket below me, back is cold, feet over the edge, only one leg covered.

I air my bedsheets outside 3 days after changing them, I change them once a week. Also, my bed is for sleeping and the nasty only.

And from personal experience, partners who didn’t make their bed tended to not have their shit together, so I’m kind of biased.

I used to think like this but then at one point I looked at my bed and I can't stand it. It eventually reflects on how you treat the rest of your home and outside as well . If you find a 10 second task infuriating and pointless that's not too far off from thinking mopping , cleaning toilet , ironing clothes are a waste of time as well.

The ritual of unmaking the bed can help some people, who experience difficulties sleeping, mentally prepare for sleep.

Same argument could be made for sweeping/vacuuming the floor or combing your hair. It will just get messy again.

For me making the bed makes things a little nicer and gets me rolling on doing other tasks. First accomplishment of the day and it takes 10 seconds.

Also and maybe more importantly, it will keep dust and spiders and other insects off the sheets I lay on/in. If you've ever got dressed or folded laundry in a sunny room yoh will see how much dust everyday moving around generates. Those dust particles are skin cells (human and animal), bits of fabric, hair, and plastic microparticles since so many clothes are made from plastic.

Most of our daily routines are.

It is also actually not healthy to make it right after you slept in it.

I'm with you here. It does look nicer when it's all "setup" but for its purpose, I agree... makes no sense if I'm going to be under the covers anyway. Society plays stupid games and well... you know the rest.

It makes it more comfortable to sleep in.

I have absolutely no idea where that comes from. Do you all sleep like Dracula? My bedding is usually tussled about within minutes of me laying in bed. Blankets balled up for knee support, one leg sticking out for temperature venting. I couldn’t imagine sliding under the covers and laying perfectly supine like Vladimir Lenin.

You fold your clothes after you clean them? Why, your clothes are just going to get wrinkled anyway.

You eat your food without blending it all up in a blender first? Why, your stomach mixes it all up anyway.

You take a shower? Why, you're just going to get dirty again anyway.

You wash your hands after you shit? Why, you're just going to shit again the next day.

You make slippery slope arguments? Why, you can just frame them as unpopular opinions.

I thought the one thing to worry about with the bedsheets is not to grow a large population of mites in them. So you mainly want to keep it ventilated.

Fatal counter point to all your arguments:

It feels better when you do.

Literally none of your logical arguments matter one iota because the human brain does not care how much you logic an argument. It feels nicer and more comforting climbing into a made bed then an unmade one.

Also, lying on wrinkly sheets is inherently uncomfortable.

You make the mistake of assuming that someone makes it look nice for someone else and not themselves.

I have cats, if I don't pull up the covers then I get to sleep with tiny grains of cat litter.

I have 2 dogs, and I’d prefer their shed hair ON the bed, rather than IN the bed.

Making your bed, is not the same chore for everyone. Some people have many layers and pillows on a fully accessorized sleeping platform. Yes it would be a chore to do that daily (personal opinion). And some people have a duvet, in a duvet cover on a mattress with a fitted sheet on it. Very easy to just shake that duvet over the bed and move on. 30 seconds and done. For some people, making the bed means folding up the duvet and leaving it across the foot of the bed so the mattress can air out all day. And then there is this interesting setup from Germany

However, I think the real subject here is... it's no one else's business what happens in your bedroom. Paint it plaid, sleep on a pile of plushies, have orgies, do your taxes in a corner chair, hang all your underwear on pants hangers from a rod suspended from the ceiling. Whatever. Your bedroom, your privacy.

I had one of those sleep number mattresses once, they have inflatable air bags inside so they zip open and you can get at all the layers of foam too. If you saw how much moisture gets trapped in there you'd do like I do and turn your covers down for the day so everything can dry and air out.

Making your bed all nice and tight just traps a whole lot of moisture.

This opinion is actuaöly very popular with me.

Generally I agree, and am so deep in the habit of not making my bed that it's never a thought in my mind. That said, if you or someone you might be sharing the room with is experiencing any kind of hard emotional state and feeling overstimulated, then making the bed as well as other general cleanup can make the space less noisy. In that context it can be therapeutic.

I'm on the fence about the popularity of this opinion, so I'll upvote after I respond.

But you missed out in your data gathering. There are other reasons to make a bed, if not daily, at least regularly.

First, my bonafides. Twenty years as a nurse's assistant. That meant making beds and taking care of the people in them was my responsibility.

As such, I not only had to wonder if it was more than just an optics thing, but make sure that if it wasn't, I was following best practices. See, if there were reasons to do it beyond those you listed, it would shift priorities, as well as maybe changing when and how I did the job.

Comfort is only part of it, though it isz a factor when a person can't shift their own linens.

See, those folds of fabric can, and do, apply pressure to skin differently than flat sections. So remaking a patient's bed becomes a necessity. Matter of fact, it becomes necessary to check their linens while performing care, though that's tangential.

Secondary to that is dislodging anything on the sheets. This includes, but is not limited to, particles of dirt, dead skin, lint, items dropped previous to the bed check, and more. That's the factor that matters most for people that can make their own beds. You don't really realize how much stuff is on the sheets just from one night of use unless you make beds regularly.

There's a sub-reason to that as well. Evaluation. While a lot of people do change sheets on a schedule, often timed with laundry day or days, there may be need to change sheets in between times. No way to be aware of that necessity if it's from an unknown cause unless you check the sheets. And there's no better way to check them than the process of making a bed. Smoothing things out allows to to both visually and tactilely examine the condition of the sheets.

Now, I can almost guarantee someone reading this is thinking "but I don't do anything nasty in my sheets". Yes, you do. Promise. Everyone does, they just don't know it. Even climbing in fresh out of the shower and not moving after, you're leaving stuff behind when you climb out again. May take longer to build up, but it's there.

All those little bits you leave behind are food. Food for something. Mites, bacteria, fungi, whatever. So no matter how clean you are, making your bed at least decreases what's left behind.

Making a bed properly does take time. Not a whole lot, and practice makes it faster, but it's more than just throwing the top sheets back in place.

So, I would encourage folks to take the time to at least smooth their sheets out a little before they climb in, if nothing else.

I think y'all have a fundamental misunderstanding of why beds were 'made' in the first place. Tight sheets prevent vermin from slipping between the sheets and waiting until you climb in to experience nightmare fuel. It's a great thing that this doesn't happen often in our first world experience.. but let things slip a little and this becomes a necessity, not a weird habit.

Another reason: I tend to perspire in my sleep. And if I were to make my bed in the morning and cover up the sweaty sheets, that's a recipe for a real bad time when I go back to bed.
Gross as it may be, that's the life of a sweaty sleeper.