What are the pelvic floor muscles?
Pelvic floor muscles are part of a broad sling that goes between your legs from your pubic bone in the front all the way to the base of your spine at the back. Pelvic floor muscles help to hold your bladder, womb and bowel in place and help to control the muscles that close the anus, vagina and urethra. When your pelvic floor muscles are damaged or weakened, through childbirth, they cannot do this effectively. This can result in stress incontinence and decreased satisfaction during intercourse. Stress incontinence means that you may leak a small amount of urine while sneezing, coughing, exercising or laughing. It is reported up to 25 per cent of new mothers suffer from stress incontinance.
How do pelvic floor exercises help me?
Pelvic floor exercises will help to strengthen these muscles. This will help the muscles to function effectively again. The more you use your pelvic floor muscles, the stronger they will be.
If you have strong pelvic floor muscles, they can help support the extra weight of pregnancy, be helpful in the second stage of labour and can assist in healing the perineum between the anus and vagina after birth. When pelvic floor muscles are done regularly, they can help to prevent stress incontinence later life. A benefit of pelvic floor exercises is that women with strengthened pelvic floor muscles are more likely to have a more satisfying sex life!
How do I find my pelvic floor muscles?
The best way to find your pelvic floor muscles is to Imagine that you are trying to stop yourself from passing wind and trying to stop your flow of urine mid-stream, at the same time. The feeling should be described as one of “squeeze and lift”, closing and drawing up the front and back passages. When you have been practicing this exercise for a while, you can also do this during love-making, ask your partner whether he can feel the effect.
That sounds easy right? But there is a catch that you have to squeeze and lift without:
• pulling in your tummy
• squeezing your legs together
• tightening your buttocks
• holding your breath
Only your pelvic floor muscles should be working.
It does get easier with practice. You might find it easier to place your hand on your abdomen while you are practising, this will make sure it stays relaxed.
When can I do these exercises?
You can do your pelvic floor muscle exercises standing up, lying down or sitting, or while you are carrying out your daily activities such as working, boiling a kettle, watching television or talking on the telephone. Here’s how:
• Hold the muscles of your back passage in and those around your vagina as if trying not to go to the loo.
• Tighten these muscles once, twice, three times.
• Hold, but keep on breathing all the time!
• Let go.
• When you return to your normal position, push the muscles out. With this last move it may help you in pushing your baby out and avoiding a tear. Then tighten up the pelvic floor again.
• Repeat this several times a day while doing everyday tasks.
Now try to do slow pull-ups and fast pull-ups. First: lie, stand or sit with your knees slightly apart. Then follow these instructions:
• Slow pull ups: Slowly tighten and pull up your pelvic floor muscles as hard as you can. Hold for as long as possible, then relax slowly.
• Fast pull ups: Pull up the muscles and relax immediately.
Repeat both of these exercises five times or until you are tired.
When your muscles get stronger, you can hold the contraction and more pull-ups can be achieved. After a few weeks of doing your pelvic floor exercises, improvements should be very noticeable. It is ideal that you exercise these muscles regularly for 6-8 months before they will gain their full strength.
How often do I need to exercise my pelvic floor muscles?
Depending on how weak the muscles are to begin with aim for 50 a day and then increase this over a few weeks to 120 a day.
To check and see how strong your pelvic floor muscles are becoming, try holding the flow of urine in mid-stream.
Categories: Tips and Products
Care to comment?
