A pelvic workout
Ke·gel ex·er·cise
noun
an exercise to strengthen the pelvic floor muscles, in which the levator muscles are squeezed and held for five seconds, then released for five seconds, for a number of repetitions. They are used to treat urinary incontinence, or to prepare for or recover from childbirth.
It is difficult to avoid getting personal when talking about Kegel exercises. Why would I talk about that? Risking providing TMI (too much info), I know about Kegel exercises not only professionally but also on a personal level. Childbirth is an incredible, beautiful, wonderful thing. No doubt about that. So much that women go through it over and over again.
Certainly postpartum amnesia has something to do with the female willingness to repeat with joy that life-changing (and daresay forever-physically-changing) moment of the delivery of a baby.
There are multiple changes that come with childbirth. Your hormones change. Your mentality changes. Your priorities change. And also does your body. The stretching that happens to allow for a baby to fit through the birth canal is drastic. And even though muscles have the property of elasticity and recoiling, if the stretching goes beyond said muscles’ limits (such as with a baby passing through), said muscles become flaccid, and the fibers and even nerve ends break.
The pelvic floor is responsible for holding the pelvic organs in place, including the bladder, its sphincter and the urethra. When the floor is not strong enough and there is an increase in the intraabdominal pressure, a phenomenon occurs, known as:
Stress in·con·ti·nence
noun
a condition (found chiefly in women) in which there is involuntary emission of urine when pressure within the abdomen increases suddenly, as in coughing or jumping.
This is the part where Kegel exercises can solve a lot of problems.
It is known that pregnancy in general and vaginal deliveries in particular, increase the risk of long-standing incontinence. And even though things tend to go back to normal or close to normal in time, the immediate postpartum period as well as the late stages of pregnancy, are particularly difficult.
I can tell you that the Kegel exercises made a significant difference for me. After my first pregnancy, I couldn’t even laugh without having problems. So I took charge during my second. I started doing Kegel exercises during pregnancy and I have continued doing them after. My experience has been completely different.
How to do them?
First, you have to identify your pelvic floor muscles so you know which ones to workout. The best way to do that is by stopping your urine midstream. That’s the move. Now careful. Stop urine midstream ONLY to identify the move. Once you have accomplished that, you can choose any time and any place to do the exercises.
An easy routine is to squeeze the muscles and hold for 5 seconds, then release for 5 seconds, 15 repetitions twice a day. If you can do more, great!
The biggest challenge I encountered was remembering to do them. But then I figured I could do them during my daily commutes and since then, they get done every day, twice a day, with excellent results.
Good luck!
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