Posted By Laura in Featured, In the Home, Review | 2 comments

Back in December Aerobed sent us one of their Platinum Raised Air beds to review. I tried to tell them I wasn’t the best person – my husband hates airbeds and would never sleep on it, and the only guests we had coming were my elderly in-laws for Christmas. How could an Aerobed be suitable for an elderly disabled relative ? My Father in law has a crumbling spine, plus a hip that is in such poor condition that it is due to be replaced next week.
But Aerobed insisted – they were absolutely confident the bed was up to the job.

So we accepted – thinking that we’d simply try it for ourselves, and we’d still have time for the 2hr-palaver of retrieving the various parts of the spare double bed frame from the loft and the mattress from the garage and constructing it before they arrived.

So we tried it out – and as you can see we were astounded at how good it was. So good that we called Father In Law and asked how he’d feel about sleeping on an airbed. He’s a very polite man, so the loaded silence we got in response was rather telling – but we explained how good it was, and that it was  a’normal’ height bed, and that we could get the proper bed out of the loft if he got here and simply couldn’t sleep on it.

And as he’s not one to cause a fuss, he agreed to give it a go. I’m pretty sure he was convinced he’d not be sleeping for a week, but he agreed.

When they arrived for Christmas, he made his way slowly up our uncomfortably steep stairs, and when he entered their bedroom (recently vacated by Jolly, but I know the grandparents always appreciate the wall-to-ceiling mural of the Avengers…) he stopped, puzzled.
“I thought I was sleeping in an airbed?”

I just grinned – admittedly once I had put on the valance and the sheets and made the bed up properly, at a glance you would never know there was an airbed under there.
He was happy to just go ahead and try it for the night, so we wished him a good night’s sleep, crossed our fingers and hoped we weren’t woken by him pacing the house in pain at 3a.m…

Next morning, having spent an entirely undisturbed night, we anxiously awaited his verdict…

“I slept incredibly well!” was his first morning greeting. He admitted he hadn’t been at all keen to sleep on an airbed, knowing how uncomfortable he is even in his own bed at night, but he hadn’t wanted to be awkward (*sigh*) and so had agreed to give it a go.
He wasn’t pleasantly surprised – he was completely astounded. He continued to sleep well on it all week (better than he ever does on our old and knackered spare mattress), and whilst he found getting in and out took a little getting used to, finding that he was slipped out onto his feet before he was ready if he wasn’t careful, once in bed he was genuinely astonished at how steady and solid and supportive the bed was – and how easy it was to sleep in.

And once they were back home I received his usual letter of thanks for a lovely Christmas stay. But this year this is what he said:

I thought I would drop you a line to say, first of all, thank you for a lovely Christmas; it was very pleasant, with good food & good company as always. Thank you both for making it once again a truly special Christmas.

Last night I had a terrible night in my own bed, my back and hip gave me real gyp and I was so uncomfortable, everything hurt. Yet over Christmas I was so very comfortable on the Aerobed. I cannot believe that it was so. I have to be honest – I really was not looking forward to sleeping on it, but I felt I had to give it a try and thank goodness I did! I was very pleasantly surprised.

Please do thank Aerobed from me – I will definitely be recommending them to anyone who asks in the future!

So there you go.

If you have a disabled elderly relative with joint issues coming to stay, have them sleep on the Aerobed – they’ll love you for it.

(and no, Aerobed didn’t ask me to write about them again – they’re so good I simply had to tell everyone!)