Are Strong Pelvic Floor Muscles Really Important?

YES! I'm not going about this in a round about way, it is so bloody important to do your pelvic floor exercises, take it from someone who pushed out an almost 10lb baby, and then didn't really think pelvic floor exercises were for her. Thankfully, the effects of incontinence can be easily managed and actually reversed. Just like any other muscle in your body, if you don't exercise them, they're not going to be as efficient, but if you begin to slowly use them again, you can build them up to be strong. As you can imagine, I did just that and waved goodbye to my stash of supplies next to the loo.



So what is the pelvic floor? If you imagine a sling made of muscles, sitting nicely in your pelvis, then you can envision your pelvic floor, it really is what it says on the tin. There are so many ways to strengthen your pelvic floor and so many benefits for doing so, such as knowing you're not going to suffer from stress incontinence, something my waters breaking was actually brushed off as, had I been confident in my pelvic floor, I would have known this wasn't the case. So some methods in which I recommend trying to strengthen them, is by trying to stop your flow when having a wee, sounds a bit crazy but that's exactly how I knew what tensing my pelvic floor muscles actually felt like, as before that it was all a bit of guess work. Then make a habit of tensing the same muscles when you're not on the toilet, hold for ten seconds and gradually increase as you feel you're getting better at them. One of the huge bonuses of working your pelvic floor muscles, is nobody actually has a clue you're doing it, you can be sitting up, lying down, in the shower, driving, it's completely unknown to everyone but you.

However it isn't all about exercising pelvic floor muscles, lifestyle choices can affect incontinence too but simple tasks such as watching your weight, cutting back on alcohol or caffeine call improve it drastically. It's important to remember, that although incontinence after childbirth can be really distressing and a bit of a pain, it's completely normal and manageable. Almost 50% of women who give birth 'naturally' experience some form of incontinence, as well as 20% of women who give birth via a c-section. It's kind of 'one of those things', we hear about in motherhood, but just putting a few of these little tips into action, can see drastic improvements.

*this is a collaborative post