Get truly restorative sleep with TEMPUR-Pedic {Q&A with Jonathan Alpert}

This post about restorative sleep with TEMPUR-Pedic is not sponsored, I just wanted to share our love of all things TEMPUR. 

It was almost a year ago when we received our TEMPUR-Cloud Supreme Breeze to review {now called the TEMPUR-Breeze}. It was replacing an older Tempur-Pedic mattress we got back in 2006 when we first moved into our house, which honestly still had tons of life left in it. But, we heard about the “breeze” line that keeps you cooler than other memory foam mattresses and was asked to pick one out for review. Let me tell you, I was on Cloud 9. Memory foam mattresses have come so far in the past 13 years, and we were so excited to get a mattress with all the new bells and whistles. Staying with Tempur-Pedic was a given, but it was an incredibly big decision which mattress we wanted to review. We spent far too long testing them all out as a family, which I was worried the employees at the store would mind. But, they seemed to delight in the mattress shopping experience as much as we all did, and readily encouraged us to lay on each and every one. In the end, we went with the TEMPUR-Cloud Supreme Breeze because it was the perfect mix of firm and soft, cool but cozy, and we all agreed it was supremely comfortable.Once it came home, we were crazy excited. In fact, we all got sad that we had to leave it for a family vacation the week after it arrived. Returning was even more joyous than usual because we couldn’t wait to break in our bed and sleep in, enjoy the cooler sleeping temperature, and experience the bliss that is Tempur-Pedic. As the months went on, we decided we loved it more and more every day. We loved it so much so that we decided to upgrade our frame to the Tempur-Ergo Extend adjustable base. Let me tell you, it is glorious. Glor-i-ous. We’re talking the ultimate in relaxation and convenience, with adjustments made at the touch of a button. We have presets we have customized that we can adjust to with one click of the button, a lay flat mode, and the option to fine tune any position we would like by moving either the head or foot of the bed up and down.

The only thing we were missing? A new Tempur-Pedic pillow to complete the full Tempur set. You see, the Tempur-Pedic pillows we have are from the nineties, and they have seen so many better days. We each got a Tempur-Pedic pillow as one of our splurge gifts when we were first dating, and while they have held up well over the years, a lot has changed in those decades, including how we both sleep.

Tempur-Pedic Breeze Pillows

I knew hubby especially needed a new pillow, and the upcoming holidays seemed as good of time as any. Since we already knew how much we love the Breeze line, I wanted to get him a new pillow with the newest technology to keep him cooler when sleeping. When you really think about it, not having a matching Breeze pillow makes no sense if cooling is one of your main reasons for going with the Breeze mattress, and I’m going to fix that for him and give him the full Breeze experience.

Come Christmastime he’s always going to have a cool side of the pillow thanks to his Tempur–Pedic Breeze Pro Advanced pillow that just arrived. Their cooling technologies keep you comfortable all night, all while giving your neck the proper support it needs.

He won’t even have to mess with flipping it over and over in order to get that cool side feeling, since the Breeze cooling means you never have to flip it! I think I just might be giving him the gift of restorative sleep with TEMPUR-Pedic.

Restorative Sleep Q&A with Jonathan Alpert

 

What is the hardest change for most people to make regarding restorative sleep? 

For many of my clients, one of the most difficult issues they face when it comes to sleep is anxiety.  This manifests as mind chatter at the very time that they’re trying to settle down and get to sleep.  For many that time when their heads hit the pillows is the first time all day that they have nothing to do, yet they have trouble turning off the mind chatter.  They think about all the things they need to do the next day or the things that happened during the day that they don’t feel good about.  This is entirely inconsistent with what they ought to be doing: relaxing.

 

My suggestion is to set yourself up for success and a good night of sleep by doing the following: turn off your devices an hour or so before bed time — phones, tablets, TV, computers – power them down.  Stimulation is also incompatible with sleep/rest, so by shutting these devices off you’ll be eliminating some of the external stimulation.  Also, shut the shades and dim the lights.  This will hep to create a sleep friendly environment.  Further, use the bed for sleep and sex only — don’t watch TV in bed, eat dinner, read, and by all means, do not do work in bed.  By eliminating these wake-time activities you’ll eliminate the association to wake-time activities.  Finally, an hour (or more) before bed, write out the things you need to do the next day and put it with your bag or keys.  By writing them down you’ll get them off of your mind and better allow yourself to rest.

What are your best tips for those that might get woken often during the night? 

For people who may wake at night, understand this is a normal occurrence as people age. Often they need to use the bathroom.  Be mindful of beverage intake close to bedtime and adjust how much you drink close to bedtime if you find yourself waking to empty your bladder. For other people though it’s something emotional that wakes them.  It might be stress or anxiety from the day or what they face the next day.  There might be an annoying need to check their email or phone in the middle of the night just to make sure nothing needs their attention.  My advice is to set boundaries with work and know that most of the time, work can in fact wait until the next day. Set a time to stop checking emails, e.g. 9:00 pm, and stick to it.  If you wake up and get the urge to check, resist it and do your best to roll over and go to sleep, knowing that you’ll address any work issues at work.

What are your favorite products for getting the best restorative sleep? 

I’ve been a user of white noise machines for years and like the simplicity of the Marpac Dohm.  It creates a pleasant white noise that helps to block out any outlier noise such as sirens, door slamming, and traffic.  Also, as a psychotherapist and performance coach, I aim to equip clients with a sense of control.  The Tempur-Pedic brand does just that by putting power and control literally in the hands of the sleeper.  The base can be adjusted and customized with a remote to the desired position of the sleeper.  In addition, with the available sleep tracker system, valuable data can be obtained that will help the the person to make changes and be an informed sleeper.  By getting data about awake v. sleep time and sleep efficiency misbeliefs about sleep can be corrected.  For example, many people complain “I didn’t sleep at all last night” when in reality, they did.   By making a simple correction to that narrative, anxiety can be lowered and sleep improved.

 

Happy Sleeping, I hope you get truly restorative sleep with TEMPUR-Pedic!