Sex & Relationships

Could the Cuddle Mattress cure snuggle troubles?

Sleeping next to your sweetheart can seem like a dream — until it turns your bedroom into a war zone.

There’s the battle for blankets. The snoring sneak attacks. The middle-of-thenight bathroom runs and the skirmishes over lights out.

“I once dated a man who insisted on sleeping with a pacifier,” says Randi Newton, a 33-year-old writer from Hell’s Kitchen. “It’s amazing what people in this city will put up with when they’re trying to find love.”

But in cramped NYC, where separate bedrooms are a one percent luxury, the greatest nighttime struggle of all may be over cuddling.

“I love cuddling while I sleep but hate waking up with a sore back and neck from having [my boyfriend’s] big, muscular arm under or around me all night,” complains Rebecca Johnson, a 27-year-old teacher from Harlem.

There’s even a medical condition referred to as “honeymoon palsy,” a tingling sensation resulting from too much extended pressure on an arm — the kind that comes after someone flops their dead weight across your bicep all night long.

Enter the Cuddle Mattress.

The innovative design features several padded slats, allowing snugglers to gently wedge their arms down into the mattress beneath their partners, who remain fully supported. That means no added pressure on arms, and no worries that you’ve had a stroke the next morning.

“I couldn’t stand cuddling my wife for more than a few minutes,” explains Cuddle Mattress inventor Mehdi Mojtabavi. “I’m a cuddling person — but physically I couldn’t. I decided it was something I had to solve.”

His cuddle cushion design concept earned acclaim, winning the 2007 Red Dot award and an Industrial Designers Society of America finalist honor in 2008. Mojtabavi’s even come up with special stretchy sheets that accommodate the slats.

Most importantly, he says that because the slats are positioned only at the head and foot of the bed, couples can still use the middle of the mattress for . . . anything that might lead to a midnight cuddle.

“Don’t worry, you’re not going to get trapped in the slats!” Mojtabavi assures.

Which is music to the ears of troubled cuddlers.

“It is a genius idea!” Johnson says. “I would pay big bucks for this.”

Unfortunately, she can’t just yet. Mojtabavi is still raising money for the production of his prototype. He’s optimistic that the mattress will be on the market by early 2014 — just in time for Valentine’s Day.

But couples should start stashing away money in their mattress now: Mojtabavi estimates his idea will retail for around $2,000.

Still, not even a Cuddle Mattress can convince some New Yorkers to snuggle up with their steadies. As Amanda Chatel, a 35-year-old from the East Village who works in real estate, put it: “I won’t be tying the knot unless I know I have my own bed to go to when I feel like sleeping diagonally, spread-eagle, with a box of Fig Newtons at my side.”