Help choosing a new mattress

[phoenix]

Hi KayaO,

Hey there! I’ve been a lurker on this site for about a week now and am hitting saturation/overload from all the great info so I thought I’d better post some questions and get myself a new mattress so I can stop dreaming about mattress shopping lol.

Welcome to the Mattress Forum!. Hopefully you’ve already read the mattress shopping tutorial here which includes all the basic information, steps, and guidelines you will need to make the best possible choices … and know how and why to avoid the worst ones.

Two of the most important links in the tutorial that I would especially make sure you’ve read are post #2 here which has more about the different ways to choose a suitable mattress (either locally or online) that is the best “match” for you in terms of PPP (Posture and alignment, Pressure relief, and Personal preferences) that can help you assess and minimize the risks of making a choice that doesn’t turn out as well as you hoped for and post #13 here which has more about the most important parts of the “value” of a mattress purchase which can help you make more meaningful quality/value comparisons between mattresses in terms of suitability, durability, and value.

First about me - I am about 5’4 and 170lbs and a side sleeper. I’ve never slept on a mattress besides innerspring and an old sleep number (ugh). I tend to prefer a softer mattress that I can sink into a little. The mattresses in store that I’ve tried and found pretty comfortable are the tempurpedic cloud luxe (for about 10 mins, then it felt like I ‘bottomed out’ and hit the hard stuff), the eclipse calla which is a pocket coil with zoned support topped with a 2" gel foam (they wouldn’t share density), and a restonic kingsomething which was also a pocket coil with zoned support topped with 2" 21ILD talaylay and 2" unspecified softer foam in the quilting. The restonic still felt a tad too firm and I know that soft foam won’t hold up long term.

The first “rule” of mattress shopping is to always remember that you are the only one that can feel what you feel on a mattress and there are too many unknowns, variables, and personal preferences involved to use a formula or for anyone to be able to predict or make a specific suggestion or recommendation about which mattress or combination of materials and components would be the best “match” for you in terms of PPP (Posture and alignment, Pressure relief, and Personal preferences) or how a mattress will “feel” to you based on specs (either yours or a mattress) or “theory at a distance” that can possibly be more accurate than your own careful testing (using the testing guidelines in step 4 of the tutorial) or your own personal sleeping experience (see mattress firmness/comfort levels in post #2 here).

I can certainly help you to narrow down your options, help you focus on better quality/value choices that are available to you either locally or online, help you identify any lower quality materials or weak links in a mattress you may be considering, act as a fact check, answer any questions you may have along the way that I am able to help with, and help with “how” to choose but only you can decide which specific mattress is the best match for you in terms of PPP or all the other parts of your personal value equation that are most important to you.

I would prefer a cover that is tufted with wool for the natural fire protection and 3" of a soft, probably 14-19ILD natural talaylay, just because it seems to be the safest stuff to sleep on. Once I get past the comfort layer I get a little lost though. Both mattresses that I really liked had the zoned pocket coils however I don’t know if there should be some sort of transition layer between the latex and coils since the restonic sales lady told me she didn’t really like the mattress she showed me because the latex tended to sink into and get stuck in the coils. I haven’t really seen any mattresses that are designed like this though. I’ve also heard that having firmer coils in the middle can actually cause hip pain rather than alleviate it. I’m willing to be brave and try some other kind of foam for support but need some advice as to what exactly I should be looking for. I don’t have much selection locally to try besides the big name brands and a very few random licensees.

Unless you have a great deal of knowledge and experience with different types of mattress materials and components and their specs and different layering combinations and mattress designs and how they combine together and can translate them into your own “real life” experience that can be unique to you … I would tend to avoid using complex specs to try and predict how a mattress will feel or perform for you and focus more on your own actual testing (hopefully using the testing guidelines in the tutorial) and/or personal experience. When you try and choose a mattress based on complex combinations of specs that you may not fully understand or only based on a single spec (such as ILD) that may not be a relevant or meaningful as you believe it is then the most common outcome is “information overload” and “paralysis by analysis”.

If you let me know your city or zip code I’d be happy to let you know about the better options or possibilities I’m aware of that are in your area.

The one real question I have, besides my general cry for help, is on the Brooklyn Bedding best mattress ever. The soft mattress which they recommended has only 2" of soft latex going straight to 2" of firm. The price is amazing but I’m concerned this won’t work well for a side sleeper who likes a plushy bed.

Brooklyn Bedding has some guidance about their firmness choices on their page here that should be helpful. Their medium would be an “average” choice that would be suitable for the most people so the soft would be softer than average.

If you are uncertain about your firmness choice though and when you can’t test a mattress in person then the most reliable source of guidance is always a more detailed conversation with a knowledgeable and experienced retailer or manufacturer that has your best interests at heart and who can help “talk you through” the specifics of their mattresses and the options they have available that may be the best “match” for you based on the information you provide them, any local testing you have done or mattresses you have slept on and liked that they are familiar with, and the “averages” of other customers that are similar to you. They will know more about “matching” their specific mattress designs to different body types, sleeping positions, and preferences (or even to other mattresses that they are familiar with) than anyone else.

Don’t forget that most of the simplified choice mattresses (including Brooklyn Bedding) have a free return policy so you can try it in your bedroom instead of a showroom and if for some reason your choice doesn’t turn out as well as you hoped for then they have a 120 day trial policy that costs you nothing if you don’t like it.

Phoenix