A third of women and nearly half of men snore with some frequency. Add some allergies, a cold, or some consumption of alcohol, or weight gain to the mix and it is even more common. So your first step is to simply see if these later reasons are what you might consider first. If one of the easy explanations is behind your snoring, you can manage some basic changes to try to address them. And in the meantime, your main concern might be sore ribs – from your spouse’s elbow. But snoring can be a more serious issue for the quality of sleep and function of both spouses, and the health and wellbeing of the snoring spouse. Some snoring traces to sleep apnea and its associated concerns. Sleep apnea includes the symptom of difficulty breathing often associated with snoring, gasping and choking. Not all people who snore have sleep apnea and not all people with sleep apnea snore although snoring is the most obvious indicator of possible sleep apnea.