As women the joy of pregnancy and birth doesn’t come along without its discomforts and its share of complications. Pregnancy and Birth can weaken your pelvic floor muscles.
A weakening of the pelvic floor muscles produces urinary incontinence. Leaking urine while you cough, laugh or sneeze is not only unpleasant but can be embarrassing.
Kegel exercises improve muscle tone and can control problems with the pelvic floor, such as urinary incontinence, fecol incontinence or can even help with women having difficulty to orgasm. It also helps with prostate pain. Kegel exercises are good with treating vaginal prolapse. Kegel exercises also benefit those who are aging, overweight or who have had surgery and no longer have muscle control.
Even men can do kegel exercises; it reduces premature ejaculation and erection intensity and size. They are called Kegel exercises because they were first described by gynaecologist, Dr Arnold Kegel in 1948.
Kegel exercises are a contraction and relaxation of the pelvic floor muscles. The can be done anywhere. You can do them sitting at your desk or couch. You can do them anytime and you can do them secretively. You should try to do them at least 3 times a day. To remember to do them, make a note to do them when you turn a light on and off or when you wash the dishes.
If you don’t know where your pelvic floor muscles are, when you urinate, try to stop urinating midway. Then you have found the right muscles. Do not do kegel exercises stopping and starting urinating as this can become harmful and you become at risk for urinary tract infection. Make sure you have emptied your bladder when you begin. Tighten the pelvic floor muscle or (pull in your vagina) and hold for 5 seconds then relax for 5 seconds. Do that a few times and then move on to holding it for 10 seconds. Like with any exercise, don’t forget to breathe. Start doing them 3 times a day and then try move on to 10 times a day to see results.
If you are struggling to do kegel exercises you can see you Gynaecologist and he can recommend using vaginal cone which you have to use your pelvic floor muscles to keep in place. There is also an option called biofeedback which can be invasive as it involves probes, electrodes and a monitor to show which muscle you contracted and how long for.
It usually tales about 12 weeks and doing them every day before you see any results. It is different from person to person. Just don’t overdo it because your muscles can become hard and that too can prove harmful. If you feel pain afterwards, then you are doing them wrong. You want to relax the rest of your body and not tense up.
Kegel Exercises are such a simple and easy technique but it really works and reverses incontinence and strengthens the pelvic floor muscles.