I am 5 ft 7" 114 pounds, husband is 5 ft 10" 225 pounds. We have in 3" layers 1 extra firm Dunlop, 3 firm Dunlop, 2 medium Dunlop, 2 soft Talalay, all in twin extra long and 2 each of 1" soft Talalay plus 1" gel memory foam. With different layer combinations my husband has pressure on shoulders with numbness in arms sleeping on side and pain in lower back sleeping on side or back. I have with different layer combinations pressure on hip and thigh when on side and lower back pain in both back and side sleep. If anyone has suggestions we could try it would be appreciated. At this point I am wondering if we need to switch to a pocketed coil base and try again. The best for my husband has been bottom to top extra firm, firm, medium Dunlop with soft Talalay on top with no mattress cover. Just started having hip and back pain. Best I could get was firm, soft, firm under a zipped cover with 1" each soft talalay and memory foam on top and firm, medium, soft under zipped cover with 1" soft on top. Got lower back pain each time after several days.
Hey Ccat17.
Welcome to our Mattress Forum 
This is a classic “weight gap” puzzle, and it’s one of the hardest things to get right with an all-latex DIY build. At 114 lbs, you’re essentially floating on top of the latex like a leaf on a pond, while your husband at 225 lbs is likely “bottoming out” through the soft layers and hitting a firmness wall. When you both have lower back pain, it usually means your spines aren’t neutral, but for completely different reasons.
For your husband, that shoulder numbness is a major red flag that his comfort layer isn’t deep enough to let his upper body sink, but the back pain suggests he’s losing support in the middle. Since he liked the Extra Firm/Firm/Medium Dunlop stack with Soft Talalay on top, I’d try a “transition” trick: put a Medium Dunlop layer above a Soft Talalay layer. It sounds counterintuitive, but creating a softer layer underneath a medium one can sometimes help a heavier sleeper feel supported without that immediate “shove back” from the denser Dunlop base.
At your weight, Firm Dunlop is basically a sidewalk. Your hip pressure means you aren’t sinking in at all, which is forcing your spine into an awkward curve. You really don’t need Extra Firm or even Firm layers as a base because you don’t have the mass to compress them. You need “travel”—space for your hips to move so your waist can be supported. I’d suggest trying a stack of Medium Dunlop at the bottom, then both of your 3" Soft Talalay layers, and that 1" memory foam on top. This gives you 7 inches of “give” before you hit any real resistance.
Honestly, I think your instinct about switching to a pocketed coil base is spot on. Pocketed coils offer way more “travel” and “give” than 3" slabs of latex, especially for side sleepers. For your husband, coils would allow his shoulders to sink much deeper than a stack of Extra Firm Dunlop ever will. For you, they provide a buoyant support that doesn’t feel like a hard stop. If you’ve tried every combination of these 10+ layers and neither of you is waking up refreshed, the “firmness wall” of an all-latex build is likely the culprit.
One last thing to check is your cover. If you have a tight, quilted zippered cover, it can create a “drum effect” that makes even the softest latex feel like a board. I’d try testing your favorite configuration with the cover unzipped or completely off just to see if the material itself is the problem or if the cover is tensioning the surface too much.
NikkiTMU
Thanks for the reply. That sounds like a good suggestion to try on my husbands side. We currently have our quilted mattress cover completely off the bed to try to help his shoulders. The 2 firm layers on the bottom of my side are to help keep the top of the bed level with his. I currently have firm, firm, medium, and soft also with mattress cover off the bed. My lower back up to bottom rib was really stiff this morning, so I had him check my alignment lying on my side. My shoulders were up higher than my hips and spine bowed down in a dip to my hips at bottom of spine. I have slight curvature normally but it was noticibly more than normal. It seemed like my hips were sinking too much. I have a small frame but more weight in hips than shoulders. It’s really hard to tell if hips are sinking too much or not enough, so I try to go for a picture in the morning of my spine to help tell.