If you are under the impression that your duvet is unrelated to your wellbeing, think again. Your bedding could well contain stuff that nightmares are made of and not only keep you awake at night, but could also seriously compromise your health – relentlessly, every night.
Start with the feather/down duvets; expensive and gorgeous to snuggle under. But duck down and feathers are a primary cause of breathing difficulties and will aggravate respiratory allergies, especially conditions like asthma. Problematically, the issue gets worse as your down duvet starts ageing. The down/feathers begin to deteriorate after a couple of years, leaving a protein dust. Not only do you inhale this dust every night, all night, the dust also attracts dust mites that eat the protein. These accumulate in their millions in your bedding and can cause all sorts of health issues, especially chronically blocked sinuses. So if you are waking up congested, unable to breathe freely and with watery, itchy eyes, the chances are you are sharing your bed with a horde of nasty critters. And they are not just in your duvet; they are also squatting in your feather/down pillows.
On the subject of nasty, 70% of the down and feathers for the international bedding industry come from China – a region not known for its concern for animal rights. We are not going into details here. If you are interested, YouTube will reveal all, about what’s in your duvet, but it’s not for the faint-hearted and you need to ask, do you really want to support such a cruel industry when there are humane, better alternatives?
So much for down and feathers. But what about the myriad of synthetic duvets now offered? They are a lot cheaper than their feather/down cousins, but as with most things in life, you get what you pay for. What’s in your duvet can start to cause significant health drawbacks, for synthetic duvets the foremost problem is the dreaded night sweats. We all sweat, it’s our bodies’ thermostats operating normally, but excessive sweating can plague children, the elderly and women experiencing the menopause. The problem is, at night, a synthetic duvet traps the sweat around you, so you wake up with that ghastly hot, clammy feeling which is only remedied by shedding the duvet. Then you begin to feel cold, so you grab the duvet again and the whole restless, uncomfortable cycle of on/off with the duvet, hot then cold, starts again. The upshot is a disturbed nights’ sleep and the demeanour of extreme grumpiness in the morning. Quite understandable, but seriously – poor quality sleep over a prolonged period of time is debilitating and to say that it detracts from overall wellbeing is an understatement.
See also: 10 Ways You’re messing up your Sleep – Accidentally!
So is there a product that can deal with all these issues? Yes and the interesting thing is it’s neither new nor high tech. It’s sheep’s wool – a fibre that has been part of man’s life for literally thousands of years and with good reason.
When washed and scoured correctly, all trace of lanolin is removed from the wool. This means what’s in your duvet made of good wool will not smell like a barnyard. But more importantly, in the absence of lanolin, the remaining wool fill is chemically inert, physically stable and of no interest to dust mites. With the dust mite problem addressed, the wool bedding is perfect for asthmatics or anyone with any breathing or sinus problems. The term hypo-allergenic is indeed justifiably applied to wool.
On the question of animal rights, sheep don’t like being sheared. It’s undignified to be plonked on your bottom and given a number one haircut. But the shearing is an essential and humane part of ovine husbandry and when it’s over, the sheep welcome being free of their huge fleeces.
But the clincher for wool, however, is the fibres’ ‘wicking’ properties; a technical term for wool’s ability to absorb moisture away from its source. This addresses head on the night sweats problem. Under a wool duvet, you will still sweat, but as the wool wicks the moisture away from you (from where it just evaporates through the duvet), leaving you comfortably warm without feeling overly hot and clammy. Further, unlike feather/down duvets, the wool fill will not deteriorate over time so your duvet will last for decades, quietly ensuring you get a decent night’s sleep.
So are there any downsides to owning a wool duvet? Yes, but they are certainly not deal breakers. They are more expensive than synthetic duvets. A good one will be the cost of a quality down duvet but it will last for decades. Also, some wool duvets are dry-cleaned only, not machine washable. However it’s dry clean only when absolutely necessary – so keep that cute puppy off the bed! In any case, a King size duvet is far too big to fit into the standard domestic washing machine, so you have to take it the cleaners in any case.
There are a number of wool duvets, pillows and mattress toppers on the market; each slightly different, the final product depending very much on the type of wool that is used. The best is short fibred light wool, such as Southdown. Other wool types, which have longer fibres, tend to give a denser, heavier duvet. The perfect wool duvet should never smell sheepy. It should be quilted in large squares throughout the duvet to correctly anchor the fill with no lumps or bumps in each quilted square. It should be cased in 100% percale cotton (soft and gentle against your skin) and should come with a no-questions-asked refund or swap policy if it doesn’t suit you. Buy wisely and it’s most unlikely you will want to return your duvet. Quite on the contrary, you will have joined the quiet revolution back to wool and you will no longer lie awake counting sheep.
Jessica Cross founded Southdown Duvets in 2010, a family business that has found its niche as a supplier of the finest quality wool duvets, affording customers a perfect night’s sleep. To find out more go to southdownduvets.com
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