What You Need to Know Once Pelvic Floor Physical Therapy Ends
You’ve been brave. You’ve been to a pelvic floor PT. You’ve learned WAY more about your body than you thought you’d ever want to know. You’re feeling better. You’re worrying less. And you’re being discharged from PT. What now?
Here’s what YOU need to know:
For many women, pelvic floor PT training is only part of the answer. A good pelvic floor PT can help release what needs to be released, help you strengthen muscles in your pelvic floor so that the contraction registers on their biofeedback detector, and help you connect mentally with that part of you that has been underperforming. But all this work and improvement may not translate into functional gain. Why? Because you need to take what you’ve learned, see if it holds up in different body positions, apply it to how your body functions as a whole, and put your system to the “real life” test with movement, exercise, and functional tasks.
So how do you do that?
For starters, you learn about your body... its parts and as a whole. You cannot train one part of the body and expect the other parts to just follow suit. Often when one part of you is weak, another part has taken over and become over-active, tight, and exhausted. Or the opposite may be true: if you’ve been to pelvic floor PT and found that your pelvic floor muscles have been tight or hypertonic, there’s likely a corresponding part of you that isn’t functioning at its best in association to the hypertonic pelvic floor muscles.
Learning where you are weak, where your body is overactive, and how to align yourself, breathe fully, exercise, and move to restore balance in your body will help maximize gains made in PT. But this takes detective work, and it absolutely should be done HEAD.TO.TOE. Consider this: tight pelvic floor muscles (which can be associated with pain and leaking) are often associated with low back pain, tight pecs and jaw muscles, tight neck muscles and headaches; a short, shallow breathing pattern; and stress. Most pelvic floor PTs simply don’t have the time in their schedule to address each of these components fully. So who’s there to instruct, coach, and guide YOU?
My years of specialized training and experience make me uniquely qualified to be your resource for this next stage. I can help you augment your progress and reach optimal functioning again- in a fun, safe, and effective way!
How can I help?
First, please know, I cannot overemphasize the impact that posture and breathing patterns have on the success of your pelvic floor. But unfortunately, many pelvic floor PTs do not have the capacity (be it through training or time allotment) to teach you how to align yourself for muscle (including core and pelvic floor muscles) success. If bones aren’t stacked properly, the success and order of muscle firing patterns can be altered, leading to impaired functioning. As far as breathing patterns go, an altered relationship between the diaphragm and pelvic floor muscles can impact your ENTIRE body! Neck tension, belly pooch, pelvic floor leaking and prolapse, low back pain... YEP! All can be associated with a disconnect within this internal breathing system. But here’s the catch: you need to be TRAINED to recognize what is good posture FOR YOU (everyone is different!) and how to RESTORE your diaphragm- pelvic floor connection. Through corrective exercise programming and Pilates, I can train YOU to increase your body awareness to help you recognize quickly when your alignment is helping you or when you need to make a change. Through customized, specific breathing exercises and strategies, I can help you restore your diaphragm-pelvic floor relationship to allow you to move and function in a safe, efficient way.
Second, once you’ve learned more clearly what needs to be balanced in your body, I’ll help you with specific, customized exercise training to do just that. I advise against picking up a book or general online program that is generic in nature and doesn’t target YOU specifically, because you may end up doing more harm than good. We are all different, with different histories of injury, different histories of body mechanics, different life experiences of sports and athletics. All of these differences have shaped our body experiences, muscle memory, and body awareness. So before you sign up for a generic program that is not tailored to you, please give it some thought: Is this specifically for ME, MY needs, MY limitations, and MY goals? If not, let’s talk.
Third, I offer a program that guides you through increasingly challenging and demanding tasks. You cannot expect stellar functional performance from your pelvic floor if you have not carefully increased the load demand on those muscles as well as your whole body system. Trust me, if you jump in (even literally!) too hard and too fast, you most likely will see your system struggle to manage the changes in internal pressure that come with increased effort and demand. This can lead to further pelvic floor issues, and even unwanted back and SI joint pain. A carefully thought out and directed plan for YOU can allow you to build on what you’ve begun in PT, keep you safe, and return you to full functioning in a mindful way.
If you’ve recently completed pelvic floor PT or are just considering it giving it a try, I’d love to hear from you! I work with women of all ages and all years postpartum. Through addressing alignment (making sure your bones are stacked optimally to allow muscles to fire properly), breath work (helping you re-establish that oh-so-very-important relationship between your diaphragm <muscle for breathing in> and your pelvic floor), and corrective exercise training (that progresses from foundational to advanced, head to toe), I will guide you along the way with education, tips, and skills to empower YOU on your journey. Connect with me so that you can complete the good work you’ve started!
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