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by chairmankaga 3840 days ago
I'm also a side sleeper and had trouble with normal earplugs. A month back I bought these DIY custom molded earplugs. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003A28OW6 I use them every night with no discomfort, they do a better job of blocking out noise and they stick in all night regardless of my tossing and turning.
2 comments

Also a side sleeper with the same issues.

I tried two pairs of these Radians and couldn't get them to work well. They don't form a proper seal I think, not exactly sure. Def. not as effective as normal ear plugs when it comes to blocking out sound for me. I'm not sure if I did something wrong during the molding process or my ear shape is somehow incompatible with them but I did carefully try twice to no avail.

Any tips?

How long do they last you, on average? I've seen these before but worried about them breaking down.

I may look into getting some custom molded silicone sleep plugs in the future, I have some noise attenuating ones already for concerts and they're pretty comfortable.

Here are dirt cheap earplugs for you, Home Depot sells many similar variations by 3M:

http://www.homedepot.com/p/3M-Orange-Disposable-Earplugs-7-P...

You can take a pair of scissors and slightly trim from the big (non-rounded) end, so that they aren't long enough to interfere with side sleeping, but they are still long enough that you can easily pull them out in the morning.

I haven't tried custom silicone earplugs, but these disposable ones are very soft and comfortable. You twirl them into a smaller thickness and they gently expand once you insert them.

I started using them a number of years ago when the guy in the house next door got a very loud dog that he insisted stay outside at night and/or early morning. So of course the dog did nothing but whine and bark! Fortunately he finally got rid of the dog.

A single "disposable" pair of plugs can last a week, or even a month if you want. The sound effectiveness decreases slightly over multiple uses. But that's OK. They start out really quiet, they claim something close to 30 dB. So if they're only 15 dB after multiple uses, that's OK. You probably don't want total isolation anyway.

I've had them a little over a month and show no signs of breaking down.