I bought a queen W bed about 9 years ago and it served me pretty well until about last year. During that time my weight has increased and I’m sure the mattress’s ability to support me has decreased. After much research, I concluded that the Dreamfoam Aloe Alexis would meet my needs the best. My wife weighs less than I do so she didn’t seem to think the mattress needed replacement. The initial research I started last year trailed off as a result.
This year I decided that even if she was fine with it, the old mattress was not meeting my needs. I resumed my research and it led me back to the Aloe Alexis. As someone who weighs close to 280lbs the extra levels of latex appealed to me. Of course an all latex mattress might have been better, but would cost more. I placed the order and Chuck contacted me about selecting a comfort level. My wife sleeps on her side and weighs less so erred on the side of keeping her happy, so I selected a comfort level of 8 which means an ILD 19 over an ILD 24. I also ordered the foundation from their website to go on our sleigh bed. The order included 2 free shredded foam pillows and sheets.
Both arrived in less than a week. I was the only one home when they arrived so I did the set up on my own. The box for the foundation was smaller than I expected, but the box for the mattress was damn heavy. It took me a while to get it up the stairs, one step at a time. The foundation unfolded surprisingly easily and I soon had it ready receive the mattress. Getting the mattress on top took a bit of work to unroll and place properly once I sliced the plastic covering open. It expanded very quickly.
Like most have observed, there is very little smell from the mattress. I let it expand and several hours later we put on the sheets and slept. Because I selected a very soft comfort level, I felt the give and it seemed very similar to memory foam I had experienced in the past. But in the morning my back was hurting. I gave it a few more nights but I couldn’t take the back pain anymore. My wife didn’t complain about sleeping but did mention that the edges were too soft, she felt like she was falling off when close to the edge. I swapped the layers so the ILD 24 was on top. This helped a bit with back pain and somewhat with edge support. For me it still felt like a mattress where the support layer had failed, because it was too soft to support me. With helpful advice from Pheonix, I decided to use my one free layer exchange to swap the ILD 19 for and ILD 28.
The exchange layer took a week to arrive. It came in a box big enough to put an uncompressed layer in. It was light enough for me to take up the stairs much easier. I swapped it with the ILD 19 so the ILD 24 was on top of the new ILD 28. I immediately noticed a huge difference in support as well has much better edge support. After the first night I asked my wife if she noticed a difference. She noted the significant improvement in edge support but also revealed that the pain the previous configuration was causing on her ribs had gone away. This was the first I had heard she was having this but was relieved to hear it was resolved. We gave it a few more nights.
I myself am much happier with this configuration. After much prodding and questioning, I have determined that it works well for my wife as well. She noted that she hasn’t had to ask me to massage her back lately, as she has had to do for years. That was enough for me to determine that we have a satisfactory configuration and that the mattress can stay. A firmer configuration might work better for me, but it may come at the expense of my wife’s comfort. I think we have a good compromise.
The buying process from Dreamfoam is a very positive one. Chuck is very good about trying to determine your needs before putting the order in fulfillment. Of course he is limited by the information you provide. I ended up ordering a mattress that was too soft for our needs, but this is where the free layer exchange helps. If your mattress only has one layer I can imagine it will make quite a difference, but with the Aloe Alexis swapping out the softest layer with a firmer one seems to make a much bigger difference.
I really believe the Aloe Alexis is the ideal mattress for someone who weighs more than 250lbs but doesn’t want to spend even more to get a full latex mattress or one that lets you do a split configuration on a queen. I ordered an 8 and ended up with a 6 but I think the difference between having an ILD 19 over ILD 24 vs ILD 24 over ILD 28 is much greater than just changing the top layer. For my wife who weighs less than 130LBS the lower layer didn’t make as much difference, but for a heavier individual such as myself that second layer makes a huge difference. The 14" thickness did max out the depth of our fitted sheets, but so far everything has fit so far including the free sheets it came with. We both loved the shredded foam pillows it came.
Though I like the configuration we have now, I am glad we had the opportunity to try a configuration that was too soft. If I had ordered a 6 from the start, I would have been left wondering if softer would have been better. Now I know that it was not. For people like me who to like to do the optometrist approach of switching back and forth and deciding which is better, it would be nice if we could order a range of layers from the start and send back the layers we don’t want. I would imagine an option like this would come at a premium just because of the extra shipping costs, but it would also offer the ability to experiment and not just fine tune the comfort and support but also offer the peace of mind that you have tried and eliminated the alternative configurations. Perhaps there will be such offerings in the future.
All in all, the mattress is great as is the buying experience.
