Beauty Rest as Your Life Cycles

April 12, 2024
by Ursula James
Filed under: Mattresses

Mattress for Every Milestone

From the moment you bring your infant home, to lying him or her in a crib on a mattress, you are giving your child the gift of rest. During each growth transition, you give your child a new mattress. Each phase is a special moment and a time to commemorate. While you might feel sentimental and sad that your child is growing up, you also feel a burst of pride at how big they are getting. In this article, we will talk about ten lifecycle changes you and your family grow through and how your mattress can support you in each one.

Life Cycles with Your Mattress

Your needs—comfort, ability to rest and recharge, how often you sleep, how long you sleep, if you wake with or without pain, if you radiate heat or feel cold all night—change as you transition to different life cycles.

When we say life cycle, what we mean is a series of stages a living person will experience during the course of her or his life. No matter where you are in your life cycle, you have either experienced some of these changes or you will. As a parent, you will experience the cycle changes through the eyes of your child. As an elderly person, you will experience these changes with the eyes of wisdom, having had several experiences from multiple perspectives. No matter where you are now, we hope this speaks to you at your particular stage.

Aging with Your Mattress

Let’s start at the beginning with new life and count down the major life cycle changes that will require you investing in a new mattress that supports where you are going in life as you transition and live. It’s important to mention that all change, even good change, can start a grief cycle. Give yourself grace as you consider what you need to age well and be healthy. Remember sleep is one of the most important factors in that process.

1. Infant Crib Mattress

Babies spend over half of their little lives sleeping. Babies must sleep on their backs. Here’s the recommendation: Infants need to sleep alone in a crib on a firm, high-quality mattress with a tight, fitted sheet. Your baby will be sleeping on this mattress for a few years so it’s worth investing in a nice one. The mattress you choose is important. You can even consider swaddling them in a sleep sack like this: https://www.halosleep.com/shop/sleepsack-swaddle to keep your baby from rolling. A sleep sack can help keep your baby in a safe sleeping position.

2. Toddler Mattress

Also known as the “big girl” or “big boy” bed, toddler mattresses comes with a variety of options. There are cribs that can convert to toddler beds and there are more styles than ever to choose from, but we are going to focus on the mattress your toddler needs to transition from an infant to a big kid. The right mattress will be:

Safe from harmful chemicals
Waterproof
Breathable
Hypoallergenic
Comfortable

For more information on the right bed and consumer ratings, you can become a member of Consumer Reports.

3. Teen Mattress

Just because you have a teenager doesn’t mean you have to settle on a twin bed. In fact, some teens are too tall for a twin bed. In that case, the mattress for your teen might be a twin XL, which is approximately five inches longer. Our suggestion is to take the same approach with your teen you would take yourself. Let your them try out beds and decide on what works best.

4. Adult/College Mattress

This can be the mattress you buy when you settle where you plan to be after high school graduation, college, or trade school. You might have to leave your mattress behind at your parent’s house. You might have been sleeping on a terrible, thin, dorm mattress while you attended college or a trade school away from home. Wherever you’ve been, you are settling into your first place and it’s time to consider what adult mattress will serve you the best.

5. Marriage/Couples

This is the stage where you go from one person on a mattress to two people sleeping on the same mattress. This is a particularly symbolic life cycle change because you are learning how to communicate and agree on the mattress that best suits you both. The word compromise gets a lot of attention when it comes to relationships but compromising about your bed should not be a thing. Your sleep is vital to your health. So is the sleep of your partner. In fact, lack of sleep can affect your new relationship in a negative way. There are bed bases and mattress options that make it possible for even two people with polar opposite sleep habits to be able to sleep peacefully and optimally through the night. Mattresses have really come a long way in helping your relationships!

6. Aging into the Forties

For women at forty, their bodies experience a significant change. Hello, pre-menopause. You wake and feel creaky and sore simply because you stayed inactive in one position overnight. If you sleep in a position for too long, your joints and muscles can feel stuck, sore, or downright painful. Or maybe you have to get up multiple times to use the restroom in the night. According to “8 Ways Women’s Bodies Change After 40 & What to Do About It,” metabolism in women begins to slow down after you turn forty and your “brain goes AWOL.”

For men, you might notice steady weight gain which can increase the risk of diseases as you age. If you feel less rested, more soreness and discomfort, and downright grouchiness after what should have been a full night’s sleep, this might be the perfect phase to consider a new mattress to take you gracefully to your next phase.

7. Aging into Fifties

Like it or not, this age is considered middle age. For men, middle age is when the hormones and muscle mass in your body will begin to decline. Here are some other factors that affect men in this stage:

Steady weight gain
Increased heart disease
Muscle and bone loss
Lower testosterone
High blood pressure
Thinning skin

Don’t lose hope. According to “A Man’s Changing Body,” weight training can help slow the decline. As you become more physical in the gym, you might find the need for a more supportive mattress to repair and heal you after the new workout regimen.

Women might have a different reason to shop for a new mattress at this stage. According to “A Woman’s Changing Body,” women might experience decreased:

Strength
Endurance
Activity
Nutritional efficiency
Lubrication and cushion of joints
Ability to recover from stress

8. Menopause

Brain fog is a normal side effect of menopause, but there is good news! Your brain will normalize again after menopause. We know that body changes during this time such as hot flashes, body sweats, and general irritability can cause insomnia. According to “Sleep Problems and Menopause: What Can I Do?” there are things you can do to help aide in sleep and help take you through this life transition, such as:

Sleep regularly
Develop a bedtime routine
Keep your room temperature comfortable
Exercise earlier in the day
Avoid caffeine at night
Don’t eat large meals too late at night

Remember there are mattresses that aid in keeping bodies cooled down at night. For example, the Tempur-PRObreeze mattress from Beautyrest Sleep Gallery is cool when you lie down, cool when you fall asleep, and cool all night long.

9. Aging into Sixties

Though you need the same amount of sleep at this age, you tend to go to bed later and get up earlier than when you were younger. According to “What to Expect in your 60s”from Web MD online, your body will produce less melatonin. There are many changes as you transition to this stage of life. A good night’s sleep on the right, supportive mattress will help you with the following normal body parts and functions affected by aging:

Bones and joints
Vision
Brain clarity
Heart
Skin
Weight
Hearing

10. Elderly

According to the National Institute on Aging’s article “A Good Night’s Sleep,” insomnia is the number one sleep problem for people over sixty. There are a lot of changes of life transitions happening such as moving in with children, going into a nursing home, or in-home health care. In all of these new situations, you need a new mattress that will make you feel more comfortable in this new space in this next stage of life. The following are struggles with sleeping that you might face at this age:

Restless leg syndrome
Periodic limb movement disorder
Rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder
Sleep apnea
Feeling sick
General pain
Medicine side effects keeping people awake

Embrace Your Transitions and Sleep Well. Wake Up and Be Happy.

No matter where you’re at in your current stage of life, your mattress plays a vital role in getting you the sleep you need to transition gracefully and embrace life. If you are looking for a new mattress to support your next life cycle phase, start here to view our mattresses. We have a wide selection to meet your needs. Above all, we want you to relax, sleep well, wake up and be happy with Beautyrest Sleep Gallery.