The Benefits of Pelvic Floor Excercises

Despite their affect on our lives many people never think about their pelvic floor muscles.. Most of us become complacent and don't think about conditioning theses muscles. The P.C. muscles can be made stronger by regularly doing kegel exercises. The pelvic floor contains the group of muscles which support the bladder, uterus, and bowel. Many women first begin thinking about these muscles after the side effects of labor and pregnancy set in after their first child. It can be helpful to understand more about your pelvic floor and why it is important, as well as why it is necessary to strengthen it. Many things bring about the weakening of the pelvic floor. Pregnancy is a big one, but so is being overweight. Like many women I had both of these causes weakening my pelvic floor by my third pregnancy. As the floor weakens the pelvic organs may descend and sag into your vagina causing a vaginal prolapse. The worst cases of vaginal prolapse can require surgery to fix. A vaginal prolapse can be painful and lead to incontinence and even embarrassment. One way to prevent and sometimes even fix smaller tiers of prolapse is to regularly do kegel exercises. If you feel that you might have a prolapse it is best to see your OB/GYN before taking action yourself, you should first rule out the need for more intense physical therapy or even surgery. One way to discover your pelvic floor muscles is to try stopping urination while going to the bathroom. Squeezing the muscles between your vagina and rectum may also help you find the pelvic floor muscles. Another way is to insert two clean fingers into your vagina and try squeezing them with your vagina. As the walls of your vagina tighten you will feel the pelvic floor move upwards. How to Do Kegel Exercises - Squeeze tight the pelvic floor muscles and hold them for five seconds. Then relax for 10 seconds between each repetition and repeat the whole cycle 10 times. You can do this three or more times a day for the best impact. - Increase this to 15 contractions per set and then to 20 and more as you get stronger. Many women find that using Ben Wa balls for doing kegel exercises can make the process easier and more effective. Using the ball provides much better feedback for the body to react to while doing the kegel exercises. Many women find that they work harder during their kegel exercises when using Ben Wa balls. It does take more prep work to do my Kegel exercises since I have to insert the balls, so I often times save this for my nighttime set of exercises. One great thing about kegel exercises is that they are very discreet. You can do them in the car, in class, or with your morning coffee. To make a solid habit of doing your exercises my best tip is to integrate them into your current daily routine somehow. Do your first set with your coffee, the second set while your little ones are napping and the last set before bed. If you make a habit of doing your kegel exercises you'll see results. To learn more about kegel exercises and Ben Wa balls visit us at ben-wa-balls.org