Struggling to find a mattress that works for us

[nucappy]

I’m looking for some help from the community here. My wife and I have had Beautyrest mattresses for a while, we bought a King-size Plush Pillowtop in 2014 and then had it replaced under warranty in 2020. The replacement they gave us was the lowest base model, and it started sagging within a year. 3 months ago we decided to replace it, so after an exhaustive search, we settled on the Ghostbed Flex due to the fact that we had read it was great for side sleepers and had great edge support. The fact that they are a trusted member here helped solidify that choice. We also had visited Shovlin, as they are local to us, but couldn’t find a bed of theirs that met our needs.

When the bed arrived, we found the edge support wasn’t that great and my wife’s arms were falling asleep every night, which was something we never experienced on the Beautyrest mattresses, along with her having significant upper back pain. We bought a 2" topper from SOL to try and help make it softer, and while it helped, we still weren’t satisfied.

So we decided to go to SleePare in NYC to try out a bunch of bed-in-a-box mattresses, but came away from that not really liking any of those beds (Helix, Winkbed, Avocado, Bear, Leesa), then we turned to Mattress Firm to try and find another Beautyrest that would be like what we had before. The first one we bought was a Medium Firm BRS 900, which was hard as a rock and after one night knew there was no way it would work. We exchanged it for a Plush Pillowtop Pressuresmart, which felt great in the store and when delivered, also felt as hard as a rock.

Meanwhile, we returned the latex topper and requested a return from Ghostbed, who asked if we would try their memory foam topper. We agreed, and that has made the bed “ok”. So now we’re at the point of sleeping on the Ghostbed, debating whether to just accept having an “ok” mattress or what else we could try. We looked at some Stearns and Foster but are obviously concerned that being owned by an “S” brand will mean the durability is crap and we’ll be out thousands of dollars.

Here is where I need some advice on what to do next. Our stats are:

Me: 5’8", 190 pounds, combo sleeper, about 50/50 stomach/side
Wife: 5’3", 200 pounds, side sleeper

My wife tends to sleep hot, and given that she is heavier, she needs the support from a bed but also the comfort for pressure relief. It just seems to be very difficult to find this combination and we feel like we’ve researched to exhaustion.

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated!

[NikkiTMU]

Hi nucappy.

Welcome to our Mattress Forum.

It sounds as if the alignment of this mattress (with the new topper) agrees with you more than others you tested, so that’s a good thing. While I can’t diagnose why your arms are feeling numb, I can provide some insight and possible things to investigate.

Technically, limbs going numb are usually caused by a lack of pressure point relief.

the upper layers are about “allowing” enough sinking in to create the mattress cradle which is a larger area of surface contact with the mattress to relieve pressure and support the recessed areas of the spine. The deeper layers are about controlling any further compression than necessary for pressure relief to “hold up” the heavier parts of the body and keep the spine in its range of natural alignment. The amount of sinking allowed by lower layers has less effect on pressure relief in other words (in most types of mattress construction) but controls alignment. This is why when people change the firmness of upper layers to solve support issues or the lower layers to solve pressure relief issues they will often create new issues and may not solve the issue they are trying to “fix”.

Arms falling asleep often indicate a comfort layer that needs to be softer or thicker. The next most common reason is probably a pillow issue (likely needing a thicker or firmer pillow) which could also affect pressure on the shoulders. Of course the initial break in or adjustment period is also a possibility but this would generally lead to gradual improvement over time … particularly if you walked on the mattress to speed it up. The challenge of course is to figure out which it is so that any fine tuning or refinements can change things in the right direction. Sometimes people are sleeping better throughout the night and repositioning less often on their new mattress, and this is the cause of pressure build up.

The links contained in post #11 here provide quite a bit of good information about diagnosing possible reasons for should joint pain.

There is also more information in post #2 here that talks about the various symptoms that people may experience on a mattress and some of the reasons that can cause them that can help with the detective work or trial and error that may be necessary to identify the types of changes that may be helpful.

We looked at some Stearns and Foster but are obviously concerned that being owned by an “S” brand will mean the durability is crap and we’ll be out thousands of dollars.

This is indeed a risk. You may get the feel you are looking for…for a while, until it starts to sag. If you can get the specifications of the S brand you’re looking at and compare it to our Durability Guidelines that can help you to narrow your options.

We exchanged it for a Plush Pillowtop Pressuresmart, which felt great in the store and when delivered, also felt as hard as a rock.

Interesting What kind of bed frame do you use? Do you know what kind of frame it happened to be on in the showroom?

My wife tends to sleep hot, and given that she is heavier, she needs the support from a bed but also the comfort for pressure relief. It just seems to be very difficult to find this combination and we feel like we’ve researched to exhaustion.

Have you considered a latex hybrid? Latex is great at offering both comfort and support, and sleeps cooler than the other foams.

NikkiTMU