I’ve now been on the Tuft and Needle for 4 nights. Have a couple of general sleep questions.
I really like the support and the comfort of the Tuft and Needle so far, but I still have to sleep with a pillow behind my knees/thighs while sleeping on my back. This is normal for me on any mattress, even the most comfortable of the hotel mattresses I’ve liked. On my side too, I have to sleep with pillow between my thighs to protect my lower back. My question is, since I still have to sleep with a pillow behind my knees while sleeping on my back, does this mean the mattress might not be quite right? Like, should my pelvis be sinking in more? However, it does not bother me, I’ve had to do this for the last decade, and I’ve never found a mattress that I can go without the pillow… In all other respects, so far the TN is working out, even for side sleeping, I have absolutely no pressure points (common for me).
On my back, the most comfortable thing for me to do is sleep with a rolled up hand towel just under my neck. For some reason, on this mattress, a pillow while lying on my back isn’t comfortable. Do you know of anyplace that sells small neck pillows? I wake up several times a night having to reroll my towel… (finally found a perfect pillow among my collection for side sleeping).
The mattress feels cold when I first get in- don’t care for that. Last night for the first time, I found the mattress sleeping hot, no doubt because I had put extra covers on because I was so cold when getting into bed. Is there a simple way to regulate the mattress temperature? Right now we are sleeping with the original knit TN cover, and a stretch quilted but not filled cotton mattress protector (a little heavier than flannel). Also using flannel sheets. I plan on putting on an all cotton allergy dust mite protector (from National Allergy). We had this on our old mattress, I washed it, just need to get it on (it is not waterproof).
Sleeping on an all poly foam mattress is such a different experience. I feel like I’m “floating” on top of the mattress. Literally, like when I’m on my back or my side, I feel like I must by lying on top of the mattress and not sinking in. But when I run my hand along my lower back, ribs, shoulders, sure enough, they are quite sunk into the mattress and supported. It is such a strange sensation. Wondering if you’ve heard this before, and if it’s a common thing. I’m getting used to it, but it’s so different than anything I’ve experienced before. No sinking in feeling like memory foam, no pushback/sinking like lates. Since I’m comfortable on the mattress, it’s not something I’m worried about, just curious about.
Thanks to this site, I may have found a comfortable and durable mattress. I’m still holding my breath, I know it can take a few weeks to really determine if the mattress is right. All I know my last purchases before MU were not right, 3 mattresses in the last 12 years…
If this is something that is part of your longer term sleeping history on many mattresses then it’s likely that it’s more connected to your back or to the strength balance between the flexor and extensor muscles that keep your spine in good alignment than to the mattresses you have slept on. The ideal neutral alignment when you are lying down is similar to your ideal alignment when you are standing with good posture except with a slightly flattened lumbar curve (lying down changes the effect of gravity on the spine) so a pillow under your knees will flatten the lumbar curve and can improve spinal alignment or muscle tension and this is a common recommendation by health professionals for back sleepers that need it. It’s possible that there is also a mattress design where you wouldn’t need to use a pillow under your knees (possibly with some type of zoning) but this is something that isn’t possible to know for certain outside of your own actual sleeping experience. Considering your history … I would treat this as “normal for you”. You could also try a thin pillow under the lumbar curve to see if this also helps and if it does then it’s possible that a zoned mattress could help as well.
A pillow between the knees is also a common recommendation for side sleepers (along with a thin pillow under the lower abdomen/pelvis for stomach sleepers) and can also help maintain neutral muscle tension and prevent back or joint pain for side sleepers that can come from twisting the back or from tight muscles pulling the back out of neutral alignment.
It’s also not unusual that a different mattress needs a different pillow because different mattresses can change how you sink into a mattress which affects the alignment of the upper body, head, and neck. For some people that sleep on their back a contoured or zoned pillow (that is higher or firmer under the neck) can be helpful or a pillow that can be “scrunched” so that it can have different shapes to accommodate different sleeping positions can be helpful as well. There are many places that sell neck roll pillows and a google search on “neck roll pillow” will bring up many different sources.
There are no “magic bullet” solutions no because there are too many variables involved in the sleeping temperature that is comfortable to different people. There are some more “active” temperature regulation products that are thermostatically controlled that may be helpful to warm up the initial temperature of your mattress (see post #5 here) but the initial temperature of your mattress may be a different issue from temperature regulation issues that you experience over the course of the night. You can also use an electric blanket to warm up your bed before you go to bed at night and the turn it off once you go to bed to keep you from sleeping too warm once your mattress is warmed up.
Your mattress will take on the temperature of the room around it until you go to bed and warm it up and denser foam materials can take longer to change temperature (in either direction) or maintain a specific temperature longer than fiber materials. A wool mattress protector or mattress pad may be helpful because wool can regulate temperature in both directions and can feel warmer when you first go to bed and can also help prevent you from sleeping too warm over the course of the night. There is more about tracking down temperature regulation issues in post #2 here.
The “feel” of a mattress (and how people describe it) is very subjective and will vary from person to person and it will also depend on the specific design and types of materials or foam that are used in the mattress but your experience and description certainly isn’t unusual. The feeling of “floating” or sleeping “on” a mattress rather than “in” a mattress usually comes from sleeping on more resilient materials (like polyfoam or latex vs slow response materials like memory foam) that aren’t too soft (which is relative to each person) but are still “soft enough” to distribute pressure very evenly across the surface of the body.