Pelvic floor therapy can transform your life for the better in more ways than one. It can help with pelvic floor dysfunction and alleviate symptoms such as weakness, pain, and incontinence. Female Pelvic floor therapy exercises can help you feel strong and confident again!
Usually, if you experience any sort of pain or discomfort of the pelvic area, the easier option is to ignore it rather than to address it. It is also very common for women to feel disconnected from this part of their body. But we are here to let you know that it doesn’t have to be this way.
A physical therapist trained in female pelvic floor therapy can understand your troubles like no other and can help you fix them. Your therapist will address all those awkward questions and concerns about pelvic floor physical therapy, so you know your body better. Most patients after they experience the results of pelvic floor therapy have been known to say that they wished they had come to physical therapy sooner.
How do you know if your pelvic floor is weak?
Your pelvic floor is a group of muscles, ligaments, and connective tissues that line the bottom of your pelvis, like a hammock. The pelvic floor has the important task of supporting everything on top of it including the urethra, vagina, anus, bladder, uterus, bowels, abdomen, and spine. If your pelvic floor is weak, it can cause dysfunction in any of the parts that it supports. Fortunately, because the pelvic floor is just a group of muscles, it can be controlled and therefore strengthened with physiotherapy.
There are multiple reasons for the weakening of your pelvic floor. It could be a result of the after-effects of injury in the pelvic area, due to genetic predisposition of your body, age, obesity, stress, high impact exercise, long-term coughing, straining yourself while using the bathroom as well as due to pregnancy, and childbirth.
The signs and Symptoms of Pelvic floor dysfunction
A weak pelvic floor is an issue, but so is a pelvic floor that is too tight, which can cause problems and pain. For normal function of your pelvic floor, you need balance in these muscles.
Some signs and symptoms of Pelvic floor dysfunction include:
- Endometriosis: In case of severe pain, the muscles that form the pelvic floor can tighten in response. This is caused by inflammation of the endometrial tissue.
- Bladder Incontinence: Incontinence is common in women who have given birth. It can also happen after pregnancy or due to weakening of muscles with age.
- Pain during intercourse: This is related to muscle tightness of the vagina during sex. Depending on your condition, manual stretching and strengthening exercises can help and if needed your PT can recommend you for dilators to help further.
- Constipation or difficult bowel movement: Incontinence means losing control. A healthy bowel control is when it has full control of bowel movements. Failure to have bowel control can lead to accidents associated with loss of stool or gas. A pelvic Floor therapist can help people learn to strengthen their pelvic muscles so they can control their bowel movements.
- Pregnancy and post-partum: Even if you do not experience any pain, pregnant and women who gave birth can benefit from pelvic floor therapy to strengthen and restore proper, pre-pregnancy muscle function.
- Vaginismus: Some women experience pain and involuntary contraction of the vaginal muscles during vaginal penetration. This too can be addressed with pelvic floor therapy.
- Menopause symptoms: With the onset of menopause, many women find themselves dealing with pelvic pain, urinary incontinence due to weak muscles etc. Pelvic floor physiotherapy can help reduce these symptoms of menopause.
What to expect in your pelvic Floor physiotherapy session?
During a session of Pelvic floor therapy, the therapist spends a lot more time with patients than most doctors. Hence, they’re able to look at your past medical care and help pair them up with your current condition and formulate a plan that can effectively manage the symptoms.
In the case that your pelvic floor is overly tight, your therapist might recommend manual therapy, to relieve the tense pelvic floor muscles. The procedure will not be accompanied by pain, though slight soreness afterwards is totally normal. Pelvic floor therapy will also include teaching you some contracting and relaxing exercises to train your muscles to work properly again. Besides manual massage and muscle training, many other methods like electrical stimulation and biofeedback therapy can also be used to increase effectiveness. Their approach will always be tailored to what your individual problems are.
Sometimes, the muscular pelvic system may not even be the root cause of your pain. But due to the interconnection of the different systems, the muscles are almost always involved in some way. It is quite common for women who feel pelvic floor pain to find relief with pelvic floor physical therapy because of that muscular skeletal involvement.
Ready for Pelvic floor Therapy to change your life too?
When your pelvic floor muscles are in good health you feel more active, and confident about your body. Pelvic pain is so misunderstood within society and the causes for pelvic pain sometimes can be very personal. Therefore, we always encourage open conversations about pelvic health and physiotherapy with your physician and your therapist.
Caring Hands Physiotherapy are experts in Female Pelvic floor therapy. We can help solve your problems and ensure you are equipped with ideas, exercises, and pain-relieving techniques, so that nothing can stop you from reaching your goals.
