I slept on a waterbed through the 70s and part of the 80s. For some reason I got rid of it and got a “regular” bed.
However, in reminiscing about the Olden Days, I decided to buy myself a waterbed for my last birthday.
It all came back to me:
1. It took my brother and I about 3 hours to put it together; blood was spilled.
2. Filling it took about an hour; it used enough water to irrigate the front yard for a week.
3. The mattress that came with it stank to high hell. It took 3 weeks for the smell to go (mostly) away. I had to open the windows in my room every day and blow the smell out. I ended up buying a new mattress.
4. Once it is assembled and filled, don’t even think about moving it. This was a “Super single” sized and it weighed over 400 lbs.
Once put together, my sleeping experience was not enhanced; this is what I found:
1. I felt like I was sleeping on top of a basketball. Not at all comfortable. I tried several levels of water in it, not much improvement. I tended to roll over to the frame, which was hard and uncomfortable to sleep against.
2. I must have cracked my knee on the damn frame 20 times a week, especially getting up and going to the bathroom at night.
3. Getting out of it is a nightmare, especially at my age. I could well see me getting stuck in there and dying of thirst, and THAT, my friends, would be irony.
4. I had to wake up to turn over, every time. Moving about was an effort, turning, sliding over, every motion required more work than I want to do in bed.
Yesterday, I tried to drain it, but the damn “waveless” mattress refused to drain. I finally went to Lowe’s and bought a 10 gallon ShopVac to suck the water out. Took about 15 fills to get enough of the water out to get the mattress out. Thankfully, disassembling the thing was much less of a chore than putting it together was.
So if you are thinking of revisiting your youth, keep this story in mind. There might have been a very good reason for you to have sold that VW Van, or stopped doing xStacy or telling your Significant Other to hit the road. Try to remember what that was before you make the same mistake I did.
Meanwhile, anyone want to buy a gently-used waterbed, cheap?