The Pelvic Floor

 

The Pelvic Floor muscles are there to protect your future AND to have a healthy enjoyable sex life! This article provides indepth information about the pelvic floor: what is the pelvic floor? Do I have a weak pelvic floor? How do I exercise the pelvic floor? Pelvic floor exercises during pregnancy and the post partum period.

The pelvic floor is probably something you haven’t heard too much about until you became pregnant. Most people associate the pelvic floor with incontinence reserved for the elderly. The secret is, that the pelvic floor muscles relax during pregnancy, are further stretched during vaginal delivery and a great number (latest estimates are a third of women) are walking around terrified to cough or laugh for fear of leaking a bit of wee.
If you don’t care for your pelvic floor now, there is worse to come. It can cause problems in subsequent pregnancies and when you hit menopause the bottoming out of hormone levels will make the pelvic floor even looser.

It’s not fun and something that can be avoided and remedied.

The whole pelvic floor phenomenon is actually centuries old. Exercises are often attributed to Dr Arnold Kegal and Kegal Exercises to tone the pelvic floor, but in reality the ancient Asian cultures were among those that taught girls how to care for their pelvic floor, mainly because it improved life in the bedroom – both for women and men.

What is the Pelvic Floor?

The pelvic floor is actually a number of muscles that hang like a hammock to hold your organs and sex areas in place. They also control the holes – the vagina, rectum and urethra.
The tightening of the pelvic floor during orgasm makes it more enjoyable, but they also serve to protect and support the womb.

Weak Pelvic Floor Muscles

During pregnancy these muscles are stretched extensively and once you’ve birthed, if you haven’t done your exercises the chances are you’ll suffer:

• Still other women notice that their tampons don’t stay in place as well or their sexual pleasure has diminished since childbirth.

It’s a taboo subject that many women do not like to discuss, even with their best friends.

Are your pelvic floor muscles weak?

One of the simplest ways to find out if you have weak pelvic floor muscles is to try and squeeze and stop urination while you’re on the loo. You only need to do this a couple of times, as doing it too much can cause a urinary tract infection – a very painful experience!

You can also find out if you have weak pelvic floor muscles by sitting down on a flat surface and placing a finger inside your vagina. You should be able to contract the muscles around your finger without moving your bottom or scrunching your stomach.

Another area of your pelvic floor is around the anus, and you should be able to squeeze this voluntarily as well.

These are two separate areas, and you should be able to control and squeeze them individually and together. This can be a bit of a shock to some mums, and it may take a bit of practise before you can succeed!

Pelvic Floor: Training, Exercise and Strengthening

It’s little wonder that so many women give up on their pelvic floor exercises when most information is so very boring. The pelvic floor, however, and it’s training is something that you can have a lot of fun with – it should be a pleasurable experience! And of course, you can always wow your partner later in the bedroom.

One method of training the pelvic floor (once you’ve got your head around the different muscle groups) is to:

- Squeeze the back passage together as long as is comfortable for you, aiming for short and strong rather than long and weak.
- Relax.
- Squeeze the muscles around your vagina together in the same way.
- Relax.
- Return your focus to your back passage and do 5 quick contractions.
- Relax
- Repeat with front passage.

You can do these simple exercises whenever and wherever you like. Try and do them often. Some women find that they have a ‘memory trigger’ to remind them to do the exercises: you might be in the car a lot and it could be every time you stop at red light, it might be every time you get a text message or the phone rings while another mum might choose to do them every time they get a drink of water (that’s 8 times a day – remember?!)

Other ideas for toning, strengthening and exercising your pelvic floor:

• Pilates

• Lay on your back so that you are comfortable. Bend your knees with feet flat on the floor. Tighten your stomach muscles and tilt your bum up at the same time, making sure the small of your back is pressed against the floor. Hold for five seconds (but don’t hold your breath!) and relax. Repeat this five times twice a day.

• During sex, squeeze his penis as you both lie still … you’ll know by the look on his face if you’ve got it right.

• If you’re looking for a little more little serious and pleasurable ways of strengthening your pelvic floor, you could try a ‘toy’. Available from most online sex shops or www.poppypads.co.nz they can include:

• Two weighted balls that are inserted into the vagina. As you move about they move around each other, providing a massage. At the same time, your pelvic floor muscles will be getting a fine old workout.

• Vaginal weights. These usually come in three weights, to be used progressively as your pelvic floor strengthens.

• If you can’t stomach the idea of the above, there are more ‘formal’ pelvic floor strengtheners on the market such as Dr Gyno 101 Pelvic Floor Stimulator, available online at www.drgyno.co.nz

• Keep your core muscles strong with regular exercise.

Pelvic Floor Exercises During Pregnancy

Try and begin exercises as soon as you discover that you are pregnant. This will strengthen the vaginal and perineal areas in preparation for delivery. They may also protect against tearing during delivery.

Pelvic Floor Exercises Post Partum

You can get right back into your pelvic floor training as soon as you’ve had your babe. One warning – don’t expect to be able to feel them! It may feel disheartening at first but persist with them! You might like to make your ‘trigger’ feeding time – while babe is happy suckling, you can be protecting your health and sex life!

Pelvic Floor Exercises for Life

Pelvic floor strengthening and toning is an ongoing job. Think of it as a form of protection for future prolapsed uteruses and incontinence while helping you have a more enjoyable, satisfying sex life.

Remember: Mums on Top does not replace doctor and midwife advice!

© Mums on Top 2008

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