I have been shopping for a new king mattress. My old one is causing severe discomfort on my shoulder, arm and hands, to the point I am wearing a wrist brace at night. I sleep on my side and back, my husband sleeps side, back and stomach. He doesn’t really care what we get. I am 5"8", 220 lbs and my DH is 6’5" and about 205.
I have almost decided on a Beautyrest Truenergy Bryanna. It feels perfect on my side and relieves all pain. But I feel it doesn’t quite give me the lumbar support I want, when I am on my back. I tried out the next firmest mattress in the store, the Blaine. Back support was better, but I was out of alignment and could feel my pressure points when on my side. It seems that if I could find something between the two, it would work.
I’m not sure how to determine what exactly is missing. I’m thinking about looking at the memory foam mattresses instead but the Tempurpedic is out of my price range. Would that be a better option given my circumstances? Would I be better off with a firm innerspring matteress and buying a topper? I typically sleep with a pillow under my knees and often stuff one under my arm or behind my back (this is a really old mattress) so I’m ok with using a pillow if that would help with lumbar support, but I would like to use fewer pillows than I do now, if possible.
The first place I would start is post #1 here which has all the basic information, steps, and guidelines you will need to make the best possible choices (and understand why to avoid the ones you are looking at).
As you will read there … who you deal with can also be just as important as a mattress you are considering and if you let me know the zip or city you live I’d be happy to let you know of any of the better options or possibilities I’m aware of in your area.
Thank you for your reply. I spent several hours yesterday going over your site. It is extremely helpful but I guess I’m a bit overwhelmed with the information at this point. After reading all this yesterday, I revisited one shop today and looked again. The two beds in question appear to have identical support characteristics so I guess the comfort layer of the Bryanna must be interfering with my lumbar support? The alignment on my back is fine on both beds, it’s just skewed on my side on the bed with the better lumbar support. Is there any way to improve the lumbar support on the softer mattress?
I am not in any way tied to gettig this one,but I’m trying to understand what combination of materials I need to get the comfort of the first with the lumbar support of the second, while avoiding the alignment problems of that model.
Once you have read the basic information in the post I linked things will start to make more sense to you. While your questions about mattress design are answered generically in the various sections in the mattresses section of the site … I would avoid the temptation to get too technical or trying to design your own mattress and use your personal testing as a way to identify mattresses that have what I call the PPP (Pressure relief, Posture and alignment, and Personal preferences) you need rather than using technical information because there is no formula or “design theory” that is as accurate as your own personal experience and testing.
It’s also much better to “connect” with people who already know what you would otherwise need to learn than to try and become an “expert” in how to “fine tune” a mattress where you can’t get any meaningful information about what is in it in the first place. Just enough information to help you identify who has the knowledge and experience to help you is enough. More than that and things can become overwhelming.
The better options and possibilities I’m aware of in the Dallas / Ft worth area are listed in post #4 here.
Make sure you call and talk to any retailer or manufacturer you plan to visit first and also make sure that before you even test any mattress that you know you will be able to find out exactly what is in it layer by layer or you will end up spending time that has little benefit to you and probably only add to frustration and confusion.