So overwhelmed! Please help!

Hi! I’m sure I’m like everyone else when asking all these questions, I apologize in advance as I know my questions are answered in previous posts. We bought a new mattress for my 3 year old son. After 2 weeks, my son was sweating through his close at night and suddenly developed a severe strutter. It could of been a pure coincidence, but after we removed the bed his stutter was considerably better.

I’m looking for an organic mattress with no chemicals at all. I have been reading horror stories of some “green” companies. Are there any green companies that someone can recommend that would be safe for my 3 year old son? Thank you so much for your quick responses!

Nicole

Did this just start? If so, recommend you take him to a doctor, a specialist or an allergist. Could be nerves, some environmental thing going on, bullying at school… I see no association between stuttering and a bed but then again I’m not a professional health care person. I’m worried that your conjecture may be based on feelings not facts. If he has been sleeping on this bed for some time and the problems just cropped up, I’d direct your suspicions elsewhere.

BTW, there is no such thing as “green”. It takes chemicals to vulcanize.

You can use the “Search Forum” option and do a search of all threads/posts linking you to “green” and “organic”.

Good luck

Hi Joenic,

As mark mentioned … there is a big difference between “green”, organic, natural, and safe and in the mattress industry these are often used interchangeably (and incorrectly) and more as marketing terms than factual terms. They all have very different meanings from each other.

Green means that from cradle to grave there is a lower carbon footprint. It has nothing to do with safety. For example if you have a polyfoam mattress that is shipped compressed then it would take less fuel to ship it (more would fit into the same container) which would make it more green than the same material shipped uncompressed. A material that can break down and decompose or be recycled at the end of its useful life is more “green” than a material that has to go into a landfill. Rebonded polyfoam (made from chemicals) for example is made from recycled scraps of polyfoam bonded together in a chemical resin and would be greener than the polyfoam because it is made from recycled materials even though it isn’t any “safer”.

You can read more about organic certifications in post #2 here and post #2 here. Even organic materials such as latex are allowed to use some percentage of chemicals to make the latex. There are sources of non organic wool for example which are probably higher quality and use more “organic” farming methods for the wool than some of the wool that has been certified as organic. Some of these choose not to certify their wool because the certification would only add to the cost of the wool.

Natural means that a material comes from nature and doesn’t necessarily indicate that a material is any “safer” than a material that isn’t natural. There are toxic substances that are natural as well (crude oil for example is a natural material since it comes from nature) and synthetic substances that are completely safe (food grade polyethylene for example).

A “chemical” is just a form of matter that has consistent properties and can’t be separated into its components by physical separation methods. Water for example is a chemical. In other words it’s the safety of chemicals that are the issue … not the fact that something is a chemical.

Something that is “safe” means that it is made out of materials that aren’t toxic to humans (or children) regardless of its origin. The most reliable way to know if a material is safe is based on either knowing exactly what the material is or is made from or testing for harmful substances and VOC’s.

There is more in post #2 here and the many posts and sources of information it links to that can help each person answer the very complex question of “how safe is safe enough for me?” and one of the links it includes is post #4 here which also talks about so called “green” mattresses.

Post #2 here also includes links to most of the better forum posts about mattresses and children that should also be helpful in deciding on the materials that you would prefer to use in a mattress for your son and they include many good sources as well.

I also agree with Mark in Texas that with the type of issues you were describing that a visit to a health professional would be the first place I would start.

Phoenix

Thank you! Yes I did have him checked out health care professional. I will research the posts per your advice. If I’m looking for SAFE over anything else for children… does anyone have a favorite brand that I can review? I truly didn’t realize there were so many choices…

Take care!

Hi Joenic,

Any manufacturer can use any materials that they choose in a mattress and most manufacturers make many different types of mattresses that use different materials so I would put much more focus on the materials inside a mattress than I would on the name of the manufacturer on the label. A mattress is only as good as its construction and the type and quality (and in your case “safety”) of the materials inside it. Focusing on the brand won’t tell you what you really need to know about a mattress (see post #2 here).

I also would be very cautious about using mattress reviews as a good source of information about a mattress since most consumers have very little knowledge about the materials inside the mattress they purchase and will often include information in their reviews that either isn’t accurate (or is just passing on what they’ve been told by someone that also knows little about mattress materials) or is only relevant or meaningful to them (see post #13 here).

Phoenix