We are all concerned about common ailments like heart disease and diabetes, but women have some unique conditions that make our health care a little different than men.
The pelvic floor is one of those areas that may give rise to specific health concerns and conditions which can be different for women than men. If you suspect you have one of these conditions, it’s important to get a proper diagnosis and seek treatment. In some instances, these conditions can also be prevented.
What are the most common pelvic floor issues for women? Let’s take a look.
What is the Pelvic Floor?
In knowing what can go wrong, it’s vital to first understand the pelvic floor and its importance to our overall health.
The pelvic floor is a group of muscles and other tissues that span the bottom of the pelvis and support your pelvic organs. In the case of women, that includes the bladder, bowel, and uterus, along with the urethra (which carries urine from your body), anus and vagina, which all pass through the pelvic floor muscles.
Think of the pelvic floor as a kind of hammock, holding the organs in place. It also forms the base of your core muscles, which work with your deep abdominal and back muscles, and your diaphragm to support your spine and control pressure inside your abdomen.
Your pelvic floor also supports important bodily functions. These muscles, when contracted, allow you to hold in urine and stool until you are in the bathroom. When it’s time, the muscles relax, allowing the passage of urine and stool from your body. This usually happens without you having to think about it.
Finally, pelvic floor muscles play a role in sexual function, as voluntary contractions contribute to sexual sensation and arousal, and provide support for the baby during pregnancy and childbirth.1
What Can Go Wrong With The Pelvic Floor?
Conditions that affect the pelvic floor are usually referred to as pelvic floor disorders.
Problems can arise when muscles are too tight, or from overly relaxed or weakened pelvic floor muscles.
Balance is key: Your pelvic floor muscles should be strong enough to stabilize your core and secure your organs but flexible enough to stretch and relax.2
What Are The Most Common Pelvic Floor Issues For Women?
The National Institutes of Health reports that there are three conditions that are most common. While other conditions can cause these issues, all three are prevalent when the pelvic floor muscles are weakened or injured.3
- Urinary incontinence: This is a loss of bladder control that can take different forms, and range in its severity. Stress incontinence is when urine leaks when you exert pressure on your bladder, for instance by coughing, sneezing, or laughing. Urge incontinence is when you have a sudden, intense urge to urinate followed by an involuntary loss of urine. Overflow incontinence is a frequent dribbling because your bladder doesn’t empty completely. And, some people suffer from more than one type of incontinence.4
- Fecal incontinence: Similar to urinary incontinence, this is when you accidentally pass solid or liquid stool, when you can’t can’t get to a toilet in time, or when you don’t sense you need to get to the toilet.5
- Pelvic organ prolapse: This is when one or more of your pelvic organs drop from their usual position, creating a bulge in the vagina called a prolapse. Prolapse can happen to your bladder, vagina, bowel and rectum.6
Other Pelvic Floor Issues
While those three conditions are common, there are other problems that can arise.
Muscles that are too tight are not as common, but can happen. Pelvic muscles that are too tight are known as hypertonic pelvic floor. This can lead to constipation or difficulty moving your bowels, pelvic pain, pain in your back, hip or leg, pain during sex, difficulty peeing, and urinary urgency or frequency.
Tight muscles may be caused by sexual trauma, other types of trauma or accidents, childbirth, stress, and other gynecologic conditions.2
There’s also a condition known as pelvic floor dysfunction or pelvic floor dyssynergia. This when you are unable to correctly relax and coordinate your pelvic floor muscles to pee or poop. Your body tightens the pelvic muscles instead of relaxing them, causing a tension that may lead to you having trouble completing a bowel movement, you may leak pee or poop, or you may have to strain on the toilet.
In addition, you may experience unexplained low back pain or ongoing pain in your pelvic region, genitals or rectum.7
Why Are My Pelvic Floor Muscles Weak?
Weakened muscles lead to the most common pelvic floor issues for women. How do they get weak?
Here are some reasons:8
- Childbirth: In some instances, pregnancy and childbirth, including a vaginal delivery, or the use of forceps, may weaken muscles. But women who never get pregnant or those who have a cesarean section can also have pelvic floor problems.
- Factors that put pressure on the pelvic floor: Such as being overweight or obese, chronic constipation, chronic straining to have a bowel movement, heavy lifting, and chronic coughing.
- Getting older: The pelvic floor muscles can weaken as women age and during menopause, but that doesn’t mean conditions like incontinence are an inevitable consequence of aging.
- Other factors: Genetics might mean you have weaker tissues; you may have had surgery such as a hysterectomy or prolapse surgery; and certain groups of women, such as white or Latina women, appear to be at higher risks for some forms of pelvic conditions.
Keeping Your Pelvic Floor Healthy
Women can suffer from other conditions like endometriosis, polyps, fibroids, and urinary tract infections, but these are not related specifically to problems with the pelvic floor muscles. And unfortunately, chronic pelvic pain is believed to affect as many as 15% of women in the United States.9
Don’t be discouraged by the list of what can go wrong with your pelvic floor! If you suspect a problem, the first step is proper diagnosis. Pelvic conditions can be treated, and in some cases, they can even be prevented.
For instance, Kegel exercises are ideal for your pelvic floor, unless you have muscles that are too tight, or those that are injured — in either instance, check with a doctor first.
Otherwise, Kegels, as they are commonly known, are one of the best ways to look after your pelvic floor. These pelvic floor exercises strengthen those muscles, and you don’t need to wait until you have a problem to add them to your routine. In fact, women of any age can add them to a daily regimen.
How Do You Do Kegels?
Many women have heard of Kegels, but do you know how to perform them properly?
Here’s how to do Kegels:10
- Squeeze your muscles that prevent gas from passing, or how you would stop urine from flowing. That should create a “pulling” feeling in your vaginal or rectal area.
- Contract those muscles for three seconds, followed by fully relaxing the muscles for three seconds.
- Work up to 10 to 15 repetitions each time you do Kegels.
- It’s suggested that you do three sessions a day, once sitting, once standing, and once lying down. Using all three positions makes the muscles strongest.
It’s important that you perform Kegels properly, however. If you’re not sure, ask your health care professional to help you, or seek the advice of a pelvic floor physical therapist.
Or, you can use a tool that will make it easier for you to be sure you are doing Kegels regularly, and with proper technique.
One example is the Gynesis pelvic floor trainer shorts. These shorts use exclusive Multipath Technology to deliver targeted muscle stimulation to help retrain and rebuild your pelvic floor. This electrical stimulation is delivered to multiple areas of your pelvic floor muscles, not just one part of your pelvic floor. It’s a solution that has been cleared by the FDA and is designed to be comfortable for everyday use.
Research has proven that pelvic floor exercises help keep pelvic floor muscles “fit,” and can be used as an effective treatment, for instance, for women suffering with stress urinary incontinence. Kegels can give you better control over your bladder and bowels, and prevent your pelvic muscles from getting weak.11
Ask Your Doctor
If you want to know more about your pelvic floor muscles, or if you suspect you have a pelvic floor disorder, use our Physician Finder to find a doctor near you with expertise in women’s health. Pelvic health conditions can be diagnosed and treated effectively. Don’t suffer in silence.
