A love it or hate it bed - and I love it.
Written: Aug 14 '04 (Updated Feb 14 '08)
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Pros: COMFORTABLE (for me)! No pressure points. No water or air to leak or pillowtop gullies.
Cons: Not everyone likes it, and you won't know until you try. A bit pricey.
The Bottom Line: Keep an open mind and give it a try, but understand that it's not for everyone. Don't discard old bedding until you've had this for a few months.
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| mermaide's Full Review: Tempur-Pedic Swedish Mattress |
I've had my queen side T-P mattress (with split queen foundation) for well over a year now. I've decided that I'll never have another innerspring mattress; I've also found that I now dislike traveling because I don't get to sleep in my good bed! (I'm considering getting a twin-size visco-foam mattress overlay to take traveling so I can get some sleep.)
For ten years I have lived with _severe_ chronic pain, fatigue, and sleep disruption caused by chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia. So I spend a LOT of time in my bed (I even have a laptop computer so I can do things like post this from my bed) and I am hypersensitive to pressure and pain. Minor achies that other people would just find irritating are excruciating. I tried all sorts of different overlays (various foam thingies, featherbeds, woolen pads) for the very expensive and intolerably uncomfortable pillowtop innerspring mattress I had, and I would be comfortable for a short time, but then back to the pressure points, the aching, and the tossing and turning, the laying there in the middle of the night staring fixedly at the TV trying not to cry because I hurt so much, and waking up after 12 hours of broken sleep feeling worse than when I went to bed.
I purchased my Tempur-Pedic from a local furniture store that allowed a 90 day trial period, figuring if I hated it I could stuff it in my car and drive it back rather than trying to ship it back to Tempur-Pedic or Brookstone. They agreed to match Brookstone's price including shipping and threw in two pillows (which I didn't like and returned). Moving this thing is pretty interesting because it flops around like a "dead weight", but it did get arranged eventually. Mine was stinky - a yucky plastic smell - for a few days, but we left it unmade with the terrycloth cover off and the room's windows open for a few days, and it dissipated completely within a week. I'm glad the salesperson warned me about that so we could arrange to sleep in the guest room.
It takes a while to get used to the completely different feel of this bed. While I could feel that I wasn't going to get the pressure sores that I did with the innerspring, it did feel just plain weird for a while. Unlike others I do not find my bed hard, cold, or hot (although in the winter it makes a soft, warm nest that is SO hard to leave) and I have used it in a range of room temperatures from 55 to 90. Any bed's going to be hot if it's 90 degrees! We found that the total lack of movement the infomercials talk about is almost as dependent on the frame and foundation as it is on the mattress - our frame is not rock solid so there's a little joggle when my bed partner moves but it is still a significant reduction.
Making this bed is a dream. Since there is no hard metal-wire frame inside the mattress, the mattress is flexible enough that the corners of the fitted sheet just pop right on with no wrestling or lifting the mattress. I remove the terrycloth cover every month or so for washing (cold water, dry on low heat) and if we go away for a few days I strip the bed and let it air. That's all the maintenance it needs - no turning or flipping. It has not developed any kind of "gullies" from body weight despite both me and my husband not exactly being small people. I don't find it difficult to turn over, and I'm less stiff in the morning than I was with an innerspring mattress and the series of toppers. Another reviewer noted that she also had fibromyalgia and expected this bed to be a "magic bullet" for her ills - it's not. THERE IS NO MAGIC BULLET FOR FIBROMYALGIA. There are only tools that might help some people and not others.
What don't I like about this bed? Well, it cost a mint - almost $2,000 for a queen with a split foundation. However, now that there are less expensive versions that use identical foam when the time comes to replace this one I will probably go with a less expensive independent brand, probably from a small local manufacturer. And that's actually not that far different in price from a decent conventional mattress and box spring. Moving it is a real pain, it weighs a ton and is hard to control. It _would_ be kind of nice to have an adjustable version - now that they make a split queen one - but that would be a major luxury. The most important point for me though is no more 2AM tears, and for that alone I won't part with it.
UPDATE February 2008 - I still love it! It's pretty much unchanged from when I last reviewed it, still no gullies or compressed areas. I'm very pleased with its durability. Tempur-Pedic now has a whole slew of models, ours is what is now called the Original.
Recommended:
Yes
Mattress Size: Queen
Mattress Firmness: Somewhat soft
Amount Paid (US$): 2000
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Epinions.com ID:
mermaide
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Reviews written: 7
Trusted by: 0 members
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