What difference does your mattress make?

My wife and i were discussing how and when my sleep apnea condition came about. We agreed that the onset of anxiety about 2 years ago may have been the early indication along with me canceling my gym membership and stopping all exercise allowing my weight to slowly go from 163lbs to 230lbs.

2 years ago we also changed from a regular spring pillow top mattress to a memory foam mattress, a nova form pure comfort one from Costco to be exact. Right away I notice that i changed from sleeping on my side and front to sleeping on my back, I immediately liked the mattress as i woke less through turning to relief the pressure points from the springs on my old mattress. However now i am thinking that the back sleeping may have contributed to my condition and am wondering if i should go back to a regular mattress in attempt to revert back to my old sleeping position. Would this be worth a shot or would i be wasting my time & money?

Hi Uncle Bob: We just bought a new firm mattress, and I seem to sleep lots better. As far a sleeping on your back, I do that every night due to the cpap mask. Larry..

Gee, Bob, I have a Deluxe TempurPedic mattress (which I LOVE), and I am almost exclusively a side sleeper. The memory foam didn't change that for me. I do know that all "memory foam" mattresses are not equal, so I don't know if yours is particularly squishy or not. Mine is a rather firm one in the TempurPedic line. In the beginning I did notice that it took a little more effort to turn than my old spring mattress, but it never changed my habit of sleeping on my side. And now, I don't notice any effort in turning.

TempurPedic took away all my aches and pains . . . and allows me to use a remote control with their adjustable base to elevate my head as needed for GERD or acid reflux. It's my prized possession!

Joy

PS - Have you tried the "Tennis Ball Fix"?

Tennis ball fix? No i have not heard of that, how does that work?

Uncle_Bob wrote:Tennis ball fix? No i have not heard of that, how does that work?

Joy may have a more specific description of the tennis ball fix but I think the basic idea is to attach a tennis ball to the back of your pj top to keep you from sleeping on your back. And that was the idea I was going to mention. Rather than getting rid the the mattress you like, you could instead use one of the methods that are mentioned on this forum, to keep you from sleeping on your back. I'm sure searching the forum will find posts with lots of good ideas to keep you off your back.

So now i'll have to tell my friends i sleep with a mask, a hose and now tennis balls

i'll do some searching but can't attach anything to PJs as i dont wear them just boxers

Uncle_Bob wrote:So now i'll have to tell my friends i sleep with a mask, a hose and now tennis balls
i'll do some searching but can't attach anything to PJs as i dont wear them just boxers

Yeah, the tennis balls add real class to the whole setup
Uh...put the tennis balls in your boxers?
I know, fill a backpack full of tennis balls and wear that to bed

Frankly I'm still not used to all this 'stuff'...and as time goes on the 'stuff' keeps adding up...now when I go to endurance rides with my horses, I'll be taking more gear for me to sleep at night than I take for their entire time at the ride.

Bob

What was it about the memory foam mattress that caused you to change positions? Did it make sleeping on your side awkward in some way?

dowen wrote:Bob

What was it about the memory foam mattress that caused you to change positions? Did it make sleeping on your side awkward in some way?

It does not make sleeping on your side awkward, its very comfortable in all positions. However memory foam beds are designed so that your body sinks into the foam and creates a sort of shallow crator which forms a supportive mold for your body. The awkward part is then is moving onto your side because you have to kind of lift yourself out of the crator then change position and form a new one. Its something you dont have to do with a conventional spring mattress. As a result of this i think i'm getting stuck more on my back.

Having just explained that i'ts just occurred to myself to try sleeping on my front

Uncle_Bob wrote:So now i'll have to tell my friends i sleep with a mask, a hose and now tennis balls

i'll do some searching but can't attach anything to PJs as i dont wear them just boxers

This is often told to pregnant women. They tell us to use a really large men's white undershirt and tie the ball in the back. I didn't do this and instead bought a body pillow. I would start out the night by throwing one leg and one arm over it. It seemed to keep me on my left side like you are supposed to be when pregnant.

I have a mini schnauzer who weighs about 16 pounds he curls at the base of my spine and doesn't budge an inch. He's alot cuter than a tee shirt with tennis balls. Just make sure the breed you pick doesn't snore or your dog will need a cpap or you will once again have to invest in the cpaper total look, headphones or ear plugs. We opted for a latex mattress as the foam was so hot.
Good Luck!

Bob,

The 2002 issue of Am. Fam. Physician (65:339-36) talks about Position Therapy in OSA:

"Position Therapy (Avoiding the Supine Position). A large study of patients with OSA who were diagnosed in a sleep disorders unit recently demonstrated that "positional patients" (those who have more than twice as many abnormal breathing episodes when sleeping in the supine position than when sleeping in the lateral position) represent more than one half of patients with OSA." . . .

". . . In the tennis ball technique, a wide cloth belt with a pocket that a tennis ball is placed into is worn around the chest so that the pocket with the ball is positioned in the middle of the back. When the patient rolls onto his or her back, the pressure of the tennis ball causes the patient to roll onto their side again."
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Another article refers to Positional therapy: (J. Oral Maxillofac. Surg. 54:1103-1108, 1996.)
Nonsurgical Management of the Obstructive Sleep Apnea Patient.

"Both snoring and sleep apnea are usually worse while sleeping in the supine position. The contribution of sleep position has been recognized as more than a trivial matter in the manifestation of OSA. One study has shown that in a group of 24 unselected patients with a diagnosis of OSA, the Apnea + Hypopnea Index (AHI) was twice as high when the patients slept in the supine position as it was when they slept in the lateral decubitus position. This finding of a substantial positional effect has lead to home and commercial remedies intended to train apneic patients who have a marked worsening of their condition while in the supine position to avoid this sleep posture. The two most common home devices are a tennis ball placed in a sock and sewn in the midline of the pajama top, and a pillow attached to the sleeper's back by a belt around the waist. whenever the patient becomes supine, the tennis ball causes enough discomfort to make them reposition, whereas the pillow, if large enough, completely prevents the supine position. "
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Here are a few possible solutions to keep you off your back:

1. Try putting a tennis ball into a wide cloth money belt worn around the chest so that the ball is in the middle of your back.

2. Snore-no-More Belt: http://www.rogersideas.com/Snorenomore.html (tennis ball fix)

3. The Zzoma Belt: http://www.zzomasleep.com/order.htm (back-pillow fix)
http://www.dotmed.com/news/story/7070/ Shows the Zzoma pillow being worn.

4. Homemade rolled foam sheet & velcro belt - by Scriptdog (homemade back-pillow fix)
http://www.apneasupport.org/post-94602.html

5. The Pajama Pillow: http://www.sleepapneapillow.net/ (back-pillow on PJ top)

Good luck, Bob!

Joy

bob,

if your matress is comfy dont blow the bucks for a new one . you got osa reguardless of what matress you sleep on. figure out a way to make your therapy work , and the solutions may only be specific for you. lots of good suggestions here , probably more to come. i had a waterbed for years so i learned to lift my arse to roll and still do it today!in my sleep even!
but on the other hand if it's uncomfy by all means you'll never get a good night no matter how good the therapy is.

i recently posted on sleep number beds and we bought one. the wife loves it but i'm waitng for my jury to return. seems ok still tweaking it

good luck

Hmmm... My wife not only sleeps on her back but sometimes deliberately puts 2-4 hard rubber balls under her lower back for pressure points for her backache - I doubt the tennis ball method would work for her!

We desperately need a new mattress. I don't like the memory foam ones, as the way they close around me makes me feel too hot (it's not unusual for me to kick off *all* my covers and sleep exposed for much of the night). We tried a sleep number bed in a store; when my wife and I dialled in the firmness we thought started to feel good we both found we were in the 95%-97% range - we decided we weren't interested in dropping $1800+ just to find we'd have it pinned at max all the time.

So how do you really go about finding a mattress you like? It seems to me that the whole mattress industry is very consumer-hostile. The manufacturers go out of their way to make price-comparison impossible (every retailer has their own model numbers), warranties are worthless, even "satisfaction guarantees" are highly annoying (more than one shop we visited say in the fine print that they only allow tradeup to a more expensive mattress, and box springs have to go with it).

10 years ago we bought a new king-size mattress. We shopped, compared, tried them out (lying in the store), found one we liked which was somewhat pricey. It was delivered, the frame was NOT what we were shown (when we went back for the "correct" frame we found it was a bait-n-switch). Now 10 years later the mattress has visible cupping even with nothing on it (but of course less than the 1.5" off level needed to trigger the warranty) and the middle is shot such that I feel like I'm lying in a hammock (of course how it performs under load is expressly disclaimed in the warranty). I admit we don't turn or flip it as often as we're supposed to; it's a major project to do it because of the weight (we just aren't strong enough to lift it) and the need to disassemble everything (we have this four-poster canopy-ish thing).

OK, my apologies for turning this into a rant.

So does anyone have any suggestions for making the procurement of a new mattress less daunting?

kennethryan wrote:We desperately need a new mattress. I don't like the memory foam ones, as the way they close around me makes me feel too hot (it's not unusual for me to kick off *all* my covers and sleep exposed for much of the night).

So does anyone have any suggestions for making the procurement of a new mattress less daunting?

Not all memory foam mattresses are the same. I have a TempurPedic, and I love it. It's very comfortable, all year 'round - no "warmth" issues for me at all. There's something about this bed's foam that accounts for body temperature. I don't have to flip it or turn it (which is a good thing, because it weighs a TON); the foam is very dense.

I've been sleeping in this bed every night for the past 18 years, and it still looks like I bought it yesterday. There's no slump in it anywhere (no hammock effect), and it's just as firm as it was on Day One. In fact, I'm so spoiled by this bed that I have a hard time whenever I'm sleeping away from home.

I gave my parents a TempurPedic adjustable bed several years ago, for their golden anniversary. They love it. If I ever have to replace my own bed, I'll get the adjustable version for myself.

TempurPedic beds aren't cheap, but neither is any "name brand" bed these days. I guess the question is, "How important is it to you?"

Just my $.02. Good luck, whatever you decide to buy.