Bed Blues

Over the course of our 7 year marriage, Steve* and I have owned/slept in three different mattresses. Our first mattress was acquired from a nice man who stored a surplus of mattresses in a storage facility in Provo. It was a good deal and a good mattress due to the fact that it was a double-sided pillow top. We couldn't bring it out with us to Illinois because our cars were packed as it was and the apartment we were moving to was already furnished. So we sold it to my sister and moved on, oblivious to the troubles ahead. The mattress that greeted us in our new place was pretty dented and saggy. I remember sleeping with Rowan after a troublesome night when he was a baby and awakening to find him smashed into my body because our bed was so slanted. It was literally W-shaped. I tried to amend the problem by flipping the mattress, but gravity was working against me. So I put textbooks under the bed to alleviate the sagginess, which worked, but still made for a sad mattress.

Then we moved to an unfurnished two bedroom which necessitated a new mattress. I was thrilled and determined to get the best one I could find that would fit into our budget. After test driving what seemed to be all the mattresses in our town, I settled a Sealy which felt like I was laying on air. I remember several times actually getting giddy about going to bed- it was that comfortable. It's been four years since we bought our bed home and the honeymoon period is definitely over- for the bed anyways.

You see, I bought a no-flip mattress with ample pillow top. I thought it would be so convenient not to have to flip the mattress and trusted that my 10 year warranty implied that the springs would live up to all they promised. They didn't and now we are left with a dented, W-shaped mattress.

Surfing USA


Steve would prefer to sleep on the couch or in our guest room, it's that uncomfortable. When he did so, I tried to sleep in the middle of the mattress in the hopes that I could redistribute something enough to make the mattress level. The only thing that amounted to was back pain. So I bought a memory foam topper and that resulted in even bigger dents. We tried flipping over the mattress on the side you aren't supposed to sleep on with our new memory foam topper and that didn't work either. I had had enough of sleeping alone in a horrible bed, so I told Steve we were buying a new mattress. There's nothing I hate more than spending money on something I didn't want to replace, but the dents in the mattress were not enough to take advantage of the warranty and I didn't know what else to do. When I went looking, the majority of mattresses I found had the same problem- no-flip with lots of pillow top. I don't like firm mattresses either. So, we are trying one last thing...





Yes, that is Steve inside our mattress ripping out some layers of foam. We figured we couldn't resell the mattress anyways, so hopefully by removing some of the dented pillow top, we'll get something that will last until we move in a year or so. Quite honestly, it was kind of therapeutic to rip the thing up too.

To all those considering a new mattress in your new future, please do your homework and don't get a no-flip pillow top unless you are okay with replacing in 4 years!!

*Yes, I'm reverting back to using our names because it's too hard to keep video and pictures anonymous.