My old bed is so worn out my back is freakin killing me. I have decided to get a new bed soon. I tried out a Sealy Posturepedic at the shop and it was very nice. It had the exact type of back support I was after. Anyway, when researching mattresses people on line discuss outgassing, and will have you feeling that a typical mattress is a fast track to agonizing death and disease via VOCs outgassing and absorbing into your skin while sleeping. I’m not sure anyone around me sells “natural” or “organic” beds so what choice do I have really… I have heard some say new beds only outgas for a few weeks and then the levels are so low it’s insignificant, so I figure I buy a floor model that has been sitting on the floor a while. But seeing comments like this:
It makes me want to opt for something else less toxic, but then again I think a lot of these natural mattress companies could be flooding the net with this fud to scare paranoid people like me into buying their mattresses. Have there really been any studies to back any of this up? I know a lot of super fit and healthy folks… vibrant, full of energy, happy etc and they have a typical bed like everyone else. These damn internet sites make you feel like, ‘buy a new bed and you’re a dead man walkin’
I also wonder if a smell or odor even means ‘toxic’, just because there is a smell from a new product does this mean “toxic deadly gas”?
Also, some say get organic wool and latex non-toxic mattresses… but latex does not grow in giant blocks so isn’t this latex extruded and held together with “toxic” glue? I bought a “natural latex” pillow once and it smelled like hell.
One of the worse smells associated with buying a new bed was the smell of the brand new futon - 100 % cotton, 100% cotton shell, 100% cotton mattress cover. Nasty. It took at lesat a month of taking it outside every day and laying it out on the table on the balcony in the sun to get it de-stenched. Our Sealey posturepedic smelled vaguely latex/vinylish for about 2 days and that was it. If given the choice, screw the natural futon and give me better living through modern chemsitry.
There should be a new Rule 34 for the Internet – If it exists, there’s a claim it will kill you.
I’ve seen claims of lethal VOC attached to everything from carpeting to automotive dashboards to camping gear. We’ve apparently been exposed to them every hour of every day of our entire lives. If you’re really worried, leave your window open a crack at night.
I bought a new mattress a couple of months ago. The salesman warned me about outgassing and suggested that I jump around on it to break up the surface foam and release the gases more quickly. I didn’t do that. I stopped noticing the smell after a few days.
I don’t know about toxic, but the smell of my memory foam when it first arrived was certainly evil. I had to leave the windows open for about a week, and even then I left my bedroom door shut and the windows open in there during the day.
What there are not millions of, of course, are people who died from their new mattresses posting the revelation all over the net. Make what you will of that.
I’m thinking about a latex mattress from these guys: Heveya - Organic Latex Mattress
Similar in price to a high end mattress, similar to memory foam without the outgassing. They also offer a 7 day trial, if returned you only pay 50% of shipping cost. Might be worth a shot.
Make what you will of that.