Phoenix,
Do you feel the Seven Comforts would be the place to start?
If anyone out there has input, please let me know your experience with either product. I am having back pain and hip/shoulder pressure points on my Dreamfoam level 7. I am used to a softer bed, but am worried about risking alignment with the Dreamfoam latex topper. The Seven Comforts doesn’t look “substantial enough” to give much help with pressure points. Question if the heavier parts of my body will bottom out with the latex rod fill?
The Seven Comforts topper is surprisingly heavy and “solid” even though it contains “pieces” of latex instead of being a solid layer. “Bottoming out” is connected to the thickness of the entire sleeping system rather than the thickness of any particular layer because all the layers compress together so you won’t actually “bottom out” no matter what topper you use. The goal with a topper though is that you actually need to “go through” a topper to different degrees (rather than bottoming out) into the layers below it because otherwise it would be so firm that it wouldn’t be suitable for sleeping on and even then it would “bend” into the compression of the softer layers below it anyway. If a topper “allows” your more pointy parts (pressure points) to sink down enough that other “less pointy” parts of the body start to bear more weight, this redistributes the pressure away from the pressure points.
The shredded latex will probably be a little less “risky” in terms of alignment because it will displace a little under the shoulders in addition to compressing which will allow your shoulders to sink in a bit more. This will bring the torso into firmer contact with the mattress and with its larger surface area it will take up some of the weight that was on the shoulders and relieve pressure. Because the hips/pelvis already have a larger surface area … they won’t “displace” the pieces as much and the pieces underneath them will compress more like a solid firmer layer layer rather than a combination of displacement and compression which can help prevent the heavier pelvis from sinking in as far as the shoulders.
In other words … the Seven comforts may be a little less risky in terms of alignment than a solid layer which only compresses under weight with no displacement. This would be especially true when you already have a fairly soft comfort layer on top of the mattress and alignment is especially important. If you had a thinner or firmer comfort layer than you do where an additional softer topper had less alignment risk … then a solid soft topper may be more appropriate.
Edit: see post #52 here first if you are considering ordering this topper.