There’s a peculiar sadness in waking up exhausted. You did the right thing. You went to bed early. You stayed off your phone. You even skipped the wine. And yet, morning arrives with a weight behind your eyes. You sit up slowly. Rub your neck. Drag yourself towards the kettle like someone who’s walked ten miles in their sleep.
It’s tempting to blame the day before. Or the one ahead. You tell yourself it’s stress. Or age. Or the weather. You never think it could be your bed.
But it usually is.
People underestimate how deeply a bad bed affects them. It doesn’t throw tantrums. It doesn’t scream. It just chips away at you, night after night. You lie there, thinking you’re asleep, but your body’s fighting to find comfort. Your spine twists. Your shoulders drop. Your legs shift and shift again. And then, five hours in, you wake up tired and can’t quite work out why.
The truth is, most of us are sleeping wrong. Not in the sense of how we lie, but in what we lie on.
When buying a new mattress, make sure it is not too soft as it can drag your body into strange shapes. One that’s too firm can push your joints out of line. A tired bed—flattened from years of use—offers no structure at all. You end up holding tension in your muscles for hours, like someone clinging to a rungless ladder.
Your body never fully lets go. It never rests. And you feel the fallout every morning.
Now, this isn’t about chasing luxury. You don’t need a velvet base or a mattress with a name that sounds like a racehorse. What you need is something honest. Look for a bed that gives you proper support. That holds your weight evenly. That lets your muscles go slack, because they’re no longer bracing against uneven ground.
Pocket sprung mattresses do this well. Not the expensive kind sold as a status symbol—but the simple, well-made ones. Each spring works on its own, which means they don’t pull against you when you shift. You’re not fighting your bed for space. You’re not jostled awake when your partner rolls over.
Memory foam works too—if you get the right depth. Too thin, and it’s just a novelty. Too thick, and it feels like being swallowed. But get the balance right, and it supports your shape without flattening under it.
The base matters just as much. A mattress sitting on old wooden slats won’t do you any favours. Over time they bow. They flex. They leave parts of your bed unsupported. A divan base, firm and stable, keeps your mattress steady. No dips. No soft spots. Just a flat, reliable foundation.
Then there’s the age of the bed. Most people keep theirs far too long. They say ten years, but if it’s used every night and never rotated, it can wear out faster. If you wake up more tired than you went to bed, and it’s been more than five years since you changed your mattress, you already know what’s wrong.
We’re not built for broken sleep. Our backs remember every uncomfortable hour. Our brains pick up where the mattress left off. You can drink all the herbal tea you like, avoid blue light, meditate before bed—but if your mattress is failing you, none of it will help.
Fix the bed, and the sleep often follows.
You’ll notice it the first morning. The silence in your joints. The lack of that dull ache behind your eyes. You’ll get up without thinking. You’ll forget to feel tired.
And for once, you’ll start the day with something you haven’t had in a while.
Rest.
