This Popular Exercise May Not Be Beneficial for Everyone

If you suffer from bladder leaks, it is often recommended to perform Kegel exercises to keep your pelvic floor strong. Unfortunately, not all bladder leaks are caused by weak pelvic muscles, so in that case, performing endless amounts of Kegel’s won’t do much for preventing leaks from occurring.

For some women, bladder leaks are caused by stress, which requires a different mode of treatment.

It is estimated that 65 percent of women will suffer from incontinence in their lifetime, but only 31 percent will seek treatment for it.

Physiotherapist Sherin Jarvis explained, “People often firstly think of other medical or psychological contributors to the pain or the condition, so the pelvic floor muscles are often left out of the picture.”

It is most commonly believed that if we leak, then there must be muscle weakness of the pelvic floor, but this isn’t always true. Leaks can occur in women who have intercourse pain, endometriosis, non-bacterial recurrent cystitis, pudendal nerve pain, vulvodynia (pain in the vulva), difficulty voiding the bladder, and evacuating the bowel and constipation, for example.
Without getting to the route of the problem, you could be unintentionally practicing the wrong exercise.

Treating pelvic floor issues spans much greater than just performing Kegel exercises. In fact, you can seek out specific physiotherapists to help work past your pelvic floor issues with other techniques than just Kegel exercises.

If you experience bladder leaks and are not seeing results from Kegel exercises, then you should see your doctor who can recommend a more specific specialist so you can get better care. This could mean finding out of an underlying condition leading to leaks or recommending a physiotherapist who specializes in the pelvic floor.

Also read:

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• Natural bladder supplements: 18 herbal remedies for overactive bladder