Whether it’s improving your sex life by reducing pain during sex and improving the quality of the sex or helping to prevent leakage from the badder or bowel, pelvic floor exercises for women are important. Pelvic floor exercises strengthen the muscles that support the bowel and bladder, they also help when you’re pregnant by providing support for the baby and aiding during labor and delivery. When you have strong pelvic floor muscles, you won’t worry as much about wetting your pants when you sneeze or cough, which can occur after pregnancy or later in life.
You need to identify your pelvic floor muscles and can easily do it.
When you urinate, it takes muscles to try to stop the flow of urine once you start. Try it the next time you go to the toilet. Notice the muscles you’re using and work on those. The Kegel exercise is one pelvic floor exercise you can do any time, anywhere. It’s simply contracting and relaxing the same muscles you use when you stopped your urine. Nobody will know while you’re doing it, but it can build strength in those muscles and help prevent urine leakage. Start with ten to fifteen squeezes and don’t forget to breathe as you’re holding them tight. Work your way up to more.
Try a clamshell exercise.
While the Kegel is a great exercise for the pelvic floor, but it’s also good for core muscles, the bottom and hips. Lie on your side with your head resting on the hand of the lower arm. Your knees should be bent at a 45-degree angle and the arm on top should be at your side to steady your frame. Keeping your feet together, raise your knee like a clam shell opening. You need to pull in your abdominal muscles to keep your spine and your pelvis stable.
Squats can help the pelvic floor.
The type of squat makes a difference on whether it builds the pelvic floor exercises. Shallower and narrow squats are far better than ones that you go down deeper that don’t work the pelvic muscles. Stand with your feet at hip-width, keeping your feet flat on the floor. Lean forward slightly and keep your back straight as you bend your knees, lowering yourself toward the ground. As you return to standing position, focus on tightening the pelvic floor muscles. Do a set of ten, rest and do another set.
- You can do pelvic floor exercises if you’re pregnant and even before you get pregnant. It makes delivery easier and can prevent incontinence after delivery.
- Pelvic floor exercises can help prevent back pain from standing prolonged periods. They help posture and prevent developing pelvic organ prolapse.
- A strong pelvic floor not only helps prevent leakage, it can mean a flatter stomach. As the pelvic floor weakens it causes your organs to droop, pushing against the spine and stomach, causing the stomach to develop a pooch.
- The focus should always be on technique and not on how many you can do. Many of these exercises are ones we do a The Worx. We’ll help you with technique because doing them right is important.
For more information, contact us today at The Worx
