How simply do you sleep?
 

When I was married, I did the traditional box spring and mattress routine. When I moved to Arkansas, I adopted a small air mattress for the duration. Several months later, I went back to pick up my things and spent a few days in the old bed. I found it uncomfortable. Recently, I was very busy when the air mattress deflated and I didn't have time to replace it so I ended up on the floor. And oddly, I found it comfortable enough that the replacement air-bed has yet to be inflated.

What has your experience been?

Sleep soundly with my wife on our box spring and mattress. Works quite well for us for the last 35 years and don't plan on any near term changes.

Kind of embarrassing.... I sleep in a recliner chair. I started this when I had a hand injury and two surgeries, with my right hand in a cast for two five-month periods. It was a lot easier to keep my hand propped up in a chair. This started ten years ago. At this point the hand is 85% good, but I probably couldn't sleep flat if I had to.

I have slept in situations from on the ground outside with nothing in the way of mattresses or blankets (randonneuring) to thin mats a small blanket along with quite a few other people in gyms or community halls (randonneuring) to foam mattress or air mattresses and sleeping bags in tents (touring) to regular box spring and mattress beds, and adjustable beds.

Most comfortable are the adjustable beds.

These days, Rowan and I sleep on a frame he has built, designed to go in the back of our van, with a large air mattress on top. Our usual bed is in storage, along with most of our household possessions. And this weekend, we're camping ... and using the frame and air mattress in the back of our van, as intended. :)

I sleep on a box spring and mattress but I'm starting to have lower back pain. Could be age related but I think it's because the mattress (Sealy) is too soft. Years ago when I was sleeping on a harder but cheaper folding bed, my back felt better. Go figure.

Machka made me think of Canada, and one of my most memorable night's sleep.

On a trans-Canada car trip, we had just gotten to the rain forest part of British Columbia after a few weeks in the Rockies. We hiked a ways from the trailhead until it was almost dark. There was a little hut where the others slept, but I decided to sleep under the stars, beneath an unbelievably huge fir tree. I bedded down on kind of a ledge made by one of the tree's enormous roots. It was like an incredibly soft and fragrant mattress, cushioned by the decaying bark of the tree. I felt safe and protected by this giant tree, and I slept like a lamb.

However, when I woke up in the morning, I looked at the bark a few feet above my head and observed long gouges scratched deep into the tree's surface. There was also matted fur tangled in the rough bark. I realized I had been sleeping all night oblivious to the fact that this was some bear's favorite scratching post! I decided that I was very lucky: either the bear hadn't visited his tree that night, or else he had been too polite to disturb my sleep.

I picked some of the fur out of the bark and took it back to Michigan with me. My mother spun it into yarn and wove a wall hanging for me--my best souvenir of the whole trip.

Asleep at the wheel....

I usually sleep on a box spring and mattress set... in a hotel somewhere along the road. I have my favorites and know which hotels are comfortable and which ones are not. At home I sleep on a higher end box spring and mattress set, they probably cost more than the whole bedroom furniture suite, but my wife paid for them :D.

I like Roody's idea of the recliner, need to find one to fit me though, most of them are set for people of an average height of 5'-10" and I am taller than that so they aren't as comfortable.

Aaron :)

One nice thing about the recliner is that it takes up much less space than a bed. My small bedroom is more like a cozy den, with another easy chair for company in addition to my big recliner.

Futon cushion on the floor that doubles as my couch. Next to a coffee table that doubles as my dining room table. The table is a 'kotatsu' that I made and I love it.

With my wife in a proper bed (or, occasionally, it must be said, on the sofa :cry:). If I were single I'd probably opt for a futon. Some of the best z's I get are when I'm on tour, on top of my NeoAir mattress and beneath a shady tree.

Two years ago now my box spring was getting sort of old so I donated it to goodwill.

Traded some bicycle maintenance for a hammock stand at a local place that sells new goods they buy at auction. Cut it a little shorter and put my Byers of Main mosquito net hammock in it.
Fits in my bedroom fine, and I sleep great in it. Been meaning to sew up another hammock for it that is a better indoor color than green, but other things to do. I can say that at least 300 nights a year for two years, it is holding up well, other than some tears in the net from my Russel mix jumping on me one morning.

Other nights while firing pottery I will set up a tent in my studio so I can watch the kiln. Then its a 25 year old thermarest on concrete.

Roody, my wife the massage therapist often stuffs pillows all around her - under her knees, between her knees, under her elbows, etc etc. It probably approximates the position one would be in in a recliner, and she says it's very comfortable. It's called a zero gravity sleep position, and it's supposed to be the least stressful on all your joints - they're not stretched out straight and they're not bent all the way, they're sort of floating in between.

We sleep on two twin mattresses (shoved together to make a king) - they're 8 inches of three different types of memory foam. We bought them years ago when we were rich from working in a ski resort town and have lugged them around in our several moves since. They lay right on the floor, though they have occasionally been atop simple low platforms I built, and when we first got them they went on top of a box spring on a traditional frame. They're pretty comfortable, though lately I have thought a thinner memory foam topper would probably be just as good - and certainly easier to move! Even a twin is heavy when it's all memory foam! There's no way we could have ever brought a single king mattress this far. On our one cross-country move we strapped them to the top of the truck topper and used them in our tent a couple of times on the trip.

We used to have a queen-sized memory foam bed topper, we took it camping one year when my wife was pregnant. It got stolen at the end of the trip, but on the way to our group camp, we stopped one night and slept under the stars with the topper on a tarp and us under a down comforter. Like Roody, we found soft ground and it was so comfy! Unlike Roody, we didn't sleep in a bear's backyard - though we did wake up with slugs on our stuff and in our shoes!

After decades of sleeping either on a waterbed or a camping pad, I can't sleep on a regular mattress without experiencing back pain. I currently sleep on a latex mattress that sits on a bed frame that I built. The only problem is that my wife would prefer a softer mattress than the one we opted for. We may have to put another one on top. Fortunately, they make them as halves, so the second layer could be a combination of firm/soft side by side.

Or a Sleep Number bed where you can adjust the sides independently.

Most of my life I have slept on different mattresses with box springs. For a few years I slept on a futon on the floor. The last few months I've been on a mattress with no box spring, in a bed frame with just slats under the mattress. As long as my bed is level and pretty firm, I'm fine.

I have a harder time with pillows. I like a thin pillow where the material inside isn't too fluid, so I can adjust it by folding or rolling it to just the right shape, and it will stay that way. If the material inside is too loose, and flows away, that makes it harder for me to get comfortable.

a few years ago we bought a king size bed from www.bedinabox.com Before that we had a sleep number. This bed is by far the best I've ever slept. The best price on memory foam...check them out. But yes, memory foam is HEAVY! I don't know what we'll do when we move. It's very difficult to even move it away from the wall!

I used to sleep this way, and it was very comfortable. I slept so deeply. I might have to return to sleeping that way again, given my shoulder issues.


We encountered this a lot when we toured Europe, and it was also very comfortable. We didn't disturb each other in the night.

We looked at those before we bought what we have. My wife was going to buy one, but she decided to go see what troubles people had reported on the internet. The mold issue was enough to change her mind, especially since we live in a very humid climate.

I want to get the biggest, baddest, LZboy recliner rocker. And when I do, I will sleep there 90% of the time.

When I was living in a living room I slept on the floor for about seven months. I sleep in a bed now.

Same here. I have a box spring mattress -- good quality -- so there's no reason to send it to the landfill.

I broke 4 ribs a couple of years ago and couldn't lie flat. I slept 6 weeks sitting up at one end of the couch. At the end of the recuperation, it didn't seem that uncomfortable.

It's surprising to see how many of you have an unconventional bed! I use an air mattress myself. I guess that just fits with the car free mentality.

I cracked a rib or two a number of years ago, and that's when I started sleeping like attercoppe describes with all the pillows. I couldn't sleep on my left side, or risk rolling onto my left side, so I bought a body pillow and tucked it under my shoulder and hip on the left side so they would remain elevated. Then tucked a pillow under my knees for extra comfort.

I slept like a log that way!

my ex-wife got the bed, 4½ years ago. i spent the first couple of years sleeping on a "futon couch" that's not really a futon, and really uncomfortable. for the last couple of years i've been sleeping on the floor... on a closed-cell camping pad (RidgeRest)... with a blanket and sheet kind of folded in half, like a taco. if it's cold, i throw an old (read: ripped, destroyed) sleeping bag on top.

for me, it's at least as comfortable as most beds i've slept in. being single and celibate (not to mention comfortable and broke) means i'm not in any rush to get another "real" bed.

my "pillow case" is an old t-shirt. lately i've been experimenting with sleeping sans pillow.

it's a good thing i'm content being celibate :lol:

"will i still hop on my bike,
and ride around town...

"will i be rich will i be poor,
will i still sleep on the floor"
- Descendents, When I Get Old

Descendents - "When I Get Old" Epitaph Records
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvrnXpIBQ1k

Descendents - When I Get Old (Lyrics)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcoBtgvyY-M

What I've found comfortable is that I take a towel, fold it in thirds length-wise and then roll it up. Just about the right height. :D

All this talk about beds has got Rowan and I talking about a new mattress setup ... something that is a bit more comfortable than what we've currently got.

We'll be interested to see what you come up with.

This cold weather has me thinking that a cupboard bed similar to a traditional swedish cupboard bed would be a good idea. Much easier to keep warm.

http://s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/enha...45752312-2.jpg

I'd be concerned about all the bad air in that "cupboard". (Wouldn't it be actually a closet...???)

Much better IMHO would be an airy bedroom with good down comforters on the bed.

Well I thought closet too, but cupboard beds is where I found the most images. I don't see "bad air" as much of a problem unless you really have a gas issue. But I think it would be nice to have a little hideaway that is warmer and doesn't require warming up the whole room, or the whole house.