What is Pelvic Floor Physical Therapy?

This is one of the most common questions that we get asked when people reach out about getting some help with their pelvic floor challenges. Most people have no idea what this sort of treatment looks like and have no idea that physical therapy could help them in the first place.

Physical therapy is a huge discipline that helps people in many ways AND there are so many specialties within physical therapy. Pelvic health is one of the many niche areas that we can help people with and impact their quality of life.

So, you may ask what does pelvic floor physical therapy help with?

As you can see there are so many reasons why you may seek out a pelvic floor physical therapist. In essence, we help you through any dysfunction that you may be dealing with in relation to your bladder, bowels, sexual health and around your pelvis (back, hips, abdominals). This is a huge part of the body that is commonly missed and not discussed mainly because people don’t know that they can get help for this. We help kids, adults and even the aging population with all these concerns.

So now you may be wondering what we would do from a physical therapy perspective?! Well, the first step is figuring out what is wrong and sometimes that begins with a free consultation to talk more about your story. Other times people jump right into the first visit, but that still includes a lot of history taking.

YOU know your body best because you have lived in it for your whole life. So, we like to hear how these symptoms started and what got you to where you are at now. It’s important to be heard and we are focused on making sure that happens. Then we have questions to ask you about your pelvic health. These questions are related to your bladder habits, bowels habits, sexual health, hip symptoms, back pain, abdominal symptoms and more.

We ask about all these systems because the pelvic floor muscles sit right under these organs and help to allow them to work properly. So, when you have dysfunction, as a pelvic floor physical therapist, we want to figure out what is going on with your pelvic floor muscles and why they aren’t doing their job correctly.

The pelvic floor muscles form a hammock or bowl at the base of the pelvis and attach to the tailbone in the back, hip bones on the side and pubic bone in the front. In addition to helping the organs to work properly, they also help to stabilize the lower back and help with lymphatic drainage.

Once we understand all your symptoms that you are struggling through, then we want to see how well the muscles in and around your pelvis are working. This starts with some education of the pelvis. It’s important that you can understand where these muscles are and how they should be working in relation to your symptoms. This is such a cool part of physical therapy because we get to empower our patients to know how their body and muscles work. It always helps to understand the WHY behind your symptoms and it helps to push yourself to implement the changes needed to see the progress that you are looking for.

Then we move on to the evaluation part where we get to take a zoom out and zoom in perspective. Zooming out includes looking at your alignment, your posture, how you move, your walking patterns, your hip strength, the ability to activate your core, your breathing patterns, the mobility along your spine and so much more. We take a broad look at all the muscles around the pelvic floor to see what is not balanced and needs some attention.

Then we zoom in to see what is going on with your pelvic floor. For some of our patients, that includes an internal check of the muscles. The value of an internal check is to determine what pelvic floor muscles are tight, what is your strength, the endurance of these muscles, check for any prolapse, see how the pelvic floor muscles work with deep breathing, see how the pelvic floor muscles activate with the deep core muscles and see how much control you have using these muscles. For others, an internal check is not indicated, or they may not be a good fit for this. That is perfectly okay, and we talk through this with you.

The most important thing to remember if you are considering going to see a pelvic floor physical therapist, we are going to meet you where you are at. We will talk through what we recommend and then let you decide how you want to move forwards. We give you the best options, but then you chose which option works best for YOU. Remember you know your body best and this is supposed to be healing in nature.

As physical therapists, it’s important to find the right balance of hands-on care (manual therapy) and exercise. Through the years of experience, what works best is a combination of both for most people. The body gives us so much information when we listen to it and use our manual therapy skills to help reduce any restrictions. This allows healing to happen faster and results to happen sooner.

But then it’s important that you know how to take care of your body through movement and exercise. You knowing what exercises are the best for your body as it’s recovering will help you in the short and the long-run. What if you are travelling and your symptoms start to ramp back up because all your habits have changed being out of town? We want to make sure you know what to do to help yourself in that moment in time.

The other value of exercise is that we don’t live our life laying on a treatment table. We tend to spend our days in an upright fashion – sitting, standing, chasing our kids, running meetings and so much more. To know how to use your body throughout the day is very valuable. To understand how to squat and use our muscles properly, how to bend over to load and unload the dishwasher, how to pick up our kids are such valuable movements we do every day.

We start with the homework exercises that will help you the most. We pick the top things that you need to work on that will make the biggest impact on your symptoms. That may be altering your bladder habits, that may be adding in bowel changes, that may be working on your breathing, it may be strengthening, it may be stretching, and it most often is a combination of these things.

That is pelvic floor physical therapy in a nutshell. We help you with so many different challenges that you may be facing and make huge changes in the quality of your life. Our patients tell us that they have improvements in their mobility, in their relationships, the confidence in their body, their sense of self and the quality of their health. My question to you is “What are you waiting for?”

Today is the day to change your life and we are here to help! Reach out for a FREE consultation at 410-721-6333 to find out if we are the best fit to help you reach your goals and improve your health. Our team of experts will guide you along the process and meet you where you are at so that you can live the best life possible!