Pelvic Floor Exercises For Women of All Ages
Many women experience pelvic floor problems at some time in their life.
Problems with your pelvic floor muscles can affect your bladder, bowel and
sexual function.
Layers of muscle stretch like a hammock from the pubic bone in front to the
bottom of the backbone. These firm supportive muscles are called your pelvic
floor. They help to hold the bladder, womb and bowel in place and to close
the bladder outlet and back passage.
Your pelvic floor muscles need to be strong but they also need to work in the
right way at the right time. Even women who already do pelvic floor exercises
may find that they have symptoms.
What causes pelvic floor muscle problems?
Our pelvic floors can be affected during pregnancy, childbirth or the
menopause and can be made worse by such things as being overweight,
smoking or being constipated and straining to empty our bowels.
Symptoms may include:
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Urinary leakage during activities such as coughing, laughing, sneezing
or during sports.
A sudden feeling that you need to rush to the toilet or leaking on the
way to the toilet.
Leakage of stools or difficulty controlling wind.
A prolapse which may be felt as general pelvic discomfort or as
“something coming down”
Reduced sensation or satisfaction during sex or leakage of urine during
sex.
How the Pelvic Floor Works
The muscles of the pelvic floor are kept firm and slightly tense to stop leakage
of urine from the bladder or faeces from the bowel. When you pass water or
have a bowel motion the pelvic floor muscles relax. Afterwards they tighten
back up to restore control.
How pelvic floor exercises can help
Pelvic floor exercises can strengthen these muscles so that they once again
give support. This will improve your bladder control and improve or stop
leakage of urine. Like any other muscles in the body the more you exercises
them the stronger the pelvic floor will be.
How to do pelvic floor exercises
1 Sit comfortably with knees/legs slightly apart. Try to squeeze the muscles
around your back passage as if you are trying to stop passing wind and feel
as if you are trying to stop yourself passing urine. You should feel the muscle
“lift and squeeze”
2 Try and relax your bottom/legs/tummy as you do this. Some women will feel
a gentle tightening in their lower tummy as they do pelvic floor exercises – this
is normal.
3 Try not to breath in and hold your breath as you do a contraction. Ideally try
and contract your pelvic floor as you gently breath out. This can take some
practice to master.
3 You can check if the muscle is working by:
 Using a small mirror to see if you are getting movement between your
vagina and back passage
 Feeling inside your vagina with your thumb or index finger and seeing if
can feel a tightening
 If you are sexually active you could try and squeeze the muscle during
sex and see if your partner can feel the squeeze
Your pelvic floor muscle exercise programme
You need to practice both long and short squeezes.
Long squeezes – see if you can squeeze your pelvic floor and hold for 5
seconds. Try and repeat 10 times relaxing for 3 seconds between each
squeeze. As your muscle gets stronger try and hold each squeeze for up to
10 seconds.
Short squeezes – squeeze you pelvic floor and hold for 1 second. Relax and
then repeat straight away. Aim to do 10 of these.
Your “exercise programme” therefore runs as 10 long squeezes followed by
10 short ones. This should only take about 2 minutes. Aim to do the
programme at least 3 times a day. Initially women might find it easier to do
the exercises in sitting or lying but as you improve you should aim to do them
in other positions too e.g. standing.
Whilst some women notice improvements in their symptoms soon after
starting the exercises it might take up to 3 or 4 months to see the full benefits.
Remembering to exercise
During a busy day it is sometimes hard to remember to do your exercises. Try
and fit them into your normal daily routine. Do them while you are brushing
your teeth, after meals, or every time you put the kettle on – whatever works
for you.
Support yourself during the day
In addition to your daily exercise sessions you should aim to tighten and hold
your pelvic floor muscles before you do anything that might put them under
pressure such as lifting, coughing and sneezing. This will give your pelvis
more support and will hopefully stop you from leaking urine if this is a
problem.
Do you need more help?
If you have and problems doing the exercises or find that your symptoms are
not improving you might need extra help.
You can ask you GP to refer you or you can refer yourself directly to a
Continence Physiotherapist or Continence Advisor within the Continence
Service.
Useful Contacts:
The Continence Service
Gaol Street Clinic
48 Gaol Street
Hereford
01432 378933
Physiotherapy Department
Hereford County Hospital
Union Walk
Hereford
01432 364026