Choosing the right mattress is not an easy process. This decision has a massive impact on both your health and your quality of life.
There is no one mattress that is perfect for everyone. Most often when you look at information on the Internet you’ll get web pages that are written by affiliate marketers trying to make a buck.
We have no interest in doing this we want to give you truthful objective information to help you improve your health and your sleep. The best mattress choice for most people depends on their age not necessarily their body type. Also, the stage of a person’s life makes a huge impact on the best mattress for them.
When people are younger they can get away with a firmer mattress. They haven’t had the trauma, haven’t built up the arthritic activity and haven’t had a long history of trauma. As such, they can usually choose a firm or an extra firm mattress that will provide lots of support. Additionally, they haven’t had years of poor eating to have an excess of body fat.
As a person approaches or enters middle age their body mass usually increases, we’ve had more impacts injuries and traumas. And the ravages of age usually start to show up. As such they should choose a moderately firm mattress and include a soft pillow top. The pillow top is usually designed for shoulder and hip health. It helps disburse forces that go into those two joints.
As a person matures and enters the golden years they should choose a mildly firm mattress or even a soft mattress. But that depends on their body weight. If a person is heavier they should choose a moderately firm mattress but absolutely include pillow top. As previously stated, a pillow top helps disburse forces that go into the shoulder joint and hip joint. Think about it, if a person is laying on their side for hours at a time the hip joint has been jammed into the pelvis by the weight of the body and gravity. This accelerates hip degeneration and can cause pain. This can also irritate the fluid filled sac by the hip joint called a Bursa and you can end up developing Bursitis.
To summarize, as you age your mattress should become less firm and have a softer pillow top. However, most people with increased body weight should choose a firmer mattress.
You should also consider having a quality pillow.
Through researching this article and our extensive knowledge of bio-mechanics, we have found the best pillow. It is the cervical curve pillow that can be found on Amazon. As far as we have found, there’s only one source of this pillow. If you go to Amazon and type in the search field ‘neck curve pillow’ and scroll through the listings and find the listing that says neck arc support and non-memory foam, this is the one to buy. It has several tubes that can be put into the pillow to help customize the pillow to your preferred firmness.
A properly chosen mattress and pillow are a winning combination for your sleep and your health.
We hope this helps.
Thanks, Dr.Brad