New Bed causes lower back pain
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Hi Everybody, I recently bought a new mattress and it seemed fine in the store but after sleeping on it for a few nights I get pretty nasty lower back pain. It's focused on my spine slightly above my glutes but seems to dimish somewhat by morning and doesn't bother me during the day. The mattress I replaced was well worn with a pretty nasty depression in the middle and was stack on two box springs. Is my pain just a left-over from going to really bad matterss to new mattress or is this the wrong matterss for me? |
Re: New Bed causes lower back pain
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It's a queen size mattress by Serta, perfect sleeper is the model I believe. Specifically, it's an 'Aphrodite' although I know that the product names change between stores. It's a medium firmness mattress from what I could gather from the store and has a pillow top. This message was modified Nov 10, 2009 by plasmoid
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Re: New Bed causes lower back pain
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When my mattress(s) caused me low back pain I knew it was the mattress because it hurt the worst first thing in the morning...very stiff, tight low back muscles, spasmed. During the day, I sorta warmed up out of it pretty well, then when I went to bed, it I felt uncomfortable, but it worsened during the night, repeat, repeat. I found myself staying up later and later because I did NOT want to lay down on that mattress and start the pain cycle again! I went through several beds, each of them ended up the same way, dippy under my heaviest part, causing back pain. I went out of town for four nights and stayed at a lovely hotel and my back was so much improved after the first night, healed after the second, and I just felt great the third. Wanted to take that mattress home with me. I wrote down all I could and called the company(I think it was Sealy), researched online, and found out that it was an offset coil mattress, with minimal padding, over box springs with actual springs. Of course, this set was not made any longer, but its replacement was about $5K. I did not wish to spend even MORE money on the big S mattress companies than I already had, so got a local manufacturer to make a bed using offset coils, spring on spring, and padding to my specs. My back is pretty good these days, I've had the bed one year, which is 9 months longer than any other beds worked. BTW, when I got home from my trip after sleeping on the great bed I could not bring myself to lay down on ours again...so I performed mattress surgery on it. Sliced it open with an exacto knife...like gutting a fish. My husband was shocked. Anyway, that bed had pocket coils which did not do it for me. Stepdaughter has it now, she loves it(is heavier than I am, which is probably why, and younger too!). One thing you might try if your bed is simply breaking in is use a folded up handtowel(not bathtowel) under your low back or side waist when you sleep. It seems to help by keeping the curve in the low back at a natural angle. I also sleep with an almost flat pillow between my knees when on my sides. Generally the concensus is that the foam in new beds by the big makers is cheap P/U foam that breaks down fairly quickly. It probably depends on your bed whether that is the issue or not. If your back is not getting worse all night then it might not be a problem.. Good luck! Kait |
Re: New Bed causes lower back pain
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I agree with Kait. If it quacks like a duck and walks like a duck, it's probably a duck! If you wake up in the morning with your back hurting and then it gets better during the day, either you have a condition where your joints get stiff during the night or something like that, or your mattress is screwing you up. However, having said that, I will back up a bit and say that sometimes it does take a week or a month to fully adjust to a new mattress but it shouldn't be a majro difference, like giving you bad back pain vs. feeling like sleeping on a cloud. That is, it might be that you get more comfortable with it after a week or a month, but it shouldn't really HURT you the first week or month. A friend told me that when he switched from his old saggy mattress to the new one, his back did hurt for a while and then it got better and now he's fine with it. So that CAN happen. But I don't think it was killing him, I think it was just not perfectly comfortable at first, for him. So therein is the difference. My best GUESS would be that your Serta has too much cheap soft foam in it and you are sinking down too much into it, in the hip area and that is causing you to have lower back pain. I would exchange it for the firmest mattress they have, then try putting some latex on top, some very soft latex as a topper - 1 to 2". Preferably get 2 x 1" layers of different ild's then you can mix and match to get the right firmness. Try foambymail.com for the latex. Or wherever. If that still doesn't work then you can try mattress surgery... which isn't nearly as "serious" or scary as it sounds!  http://www.whatsthebest-mattress.com/forum/mattress-surgery-performing-foam-ectomy-my-englander-mattress-w-photos/6161-A-1.html |