When to Replace Mattress? 

Whether you have a memory foam, innerspring, latex or hybrid mattress, there will come a time where a replacement is needed. No mattress is immortal, no matter how durable they are supposedly claimed to be.

Your health should always come first, it is a central aspect in our life, and we can sometimes overlook how paramount sleep is to ensure our health and happiness.  A mattress change may be the answer to improve your sleep and health, and if you are having a nagging feeling you may need a new one, hopefully this blog can help your decision.

1. Your Mattress is 8 years old

If you have had your mattress between 6-8 years, then the likelihood is that your better off investing in a new one.  The older a mattress gets, the less comfort it has to offer as the materials in the mattress wear out overtime. Also, the mattress would have accumulated a lot of dirt, odour, sweat and dead skin, possibly staining the mattress and becoming generally unhealthy for you over the years.

2. Your allergies and asthma are getting worse

Are you waking up with watery eyes, sneezes, coughs, or a feeling a little wheezy?  It could mean that your mattress is triggering these allergy-like symptoms or your asthma. This is a result of dust mites, dirt, bacteria, and allergens which have soaked up in your mattress.

Dust mites feed of dead skin and can trigger allergic reactions – they are distant relatives of spiders and ticks. As well as this, inhaling these harmful toxins are not great for allergies or asthma.

Other conditions, such as chest and throat irritation, can also arise in these conations. Just imagine how much you are breathing in these toxins, in such proximity and lengthy period.

3. Waking up with soreness and stiffness

Are your mornings filled with discomfort? Though its usual to have a little stiffness when we begin to move out of our beds in the morning, it is however, alarming if you are feeling pain or soreness. This includes any muscle pain, back pain, neck pain, hip pain and so on. Your mattress should relieve pain and give you comfort, not the opposite.

One study reported that 63% of people suffering from backpain had a better sleep when using a new mattress (from the Journal of Applied Ergonomics)

4. Squeaking noises coming from the mattress

This is most evident in innerspring mattress.

If you’re hearing some creaks and squeaks coming from the mattress during your sleep or whenever you sit on it, this may mean a new mattress is needed as the coils are wearing out. The loosening of these coils means that they won’t be able to offer the same support and sometimes may even poke out at uncomfortable angles in the mattress as they have lost the ability to recoil back to their original elastic position.

This is usually a result of the mattress being used a lot, as well as the withstanding of weight and pressure.

5. A dip in the mattress

A mattress will commonly begin to sag or ‘dip’ when it is used for too long. It may feel lumpy, and even the coils will be sticking and jabbing your through the fabric in an uncomfortable way. Your mattress has now lost the ability to provide support to your body, such as spine alignment and alleviating pressure points. A mattress that has been misshaped, like sagging, will give issues such as neck pain and back pain too.

6. Poor Sleep

Is it taking you longer to fall asleep? Don’t blame insomnia, it probably isn’t the culprit. If your sleep takes more that 15 minutes to fall asleep, and your sleep is constantly disrupted through tossing and turning where you just can’t seem to get that comfortable position, then your mattress is most likely to blame.

You may even notice that you prefer to sleep over your friend’s house, a hotel, or on other beds in your home – its due to your mattress, and its inability to give you a good, comfortable sleep.

7. Feeling your partner moving

Lastly, a good mattress should be able to reduce motion transfer and not disturb you if your partner is moving. For example, if they are turning or getting out of the bed, you shouldn’t be able to feel this through the mattress too much. So, if you are constantly getting a disrupted sleep through this motion, it isn’t their fault – but probably the mattress!