Pelvic Floor Muscle Strengthening – A 3-part GUIDE

The pelvic floor is one of the muscles of the deep stabilization system and is found on the underside of the pelvis. These muscles are made up of three layers of muscles that attach to the pubic symphysis, coccyx and ischium. In the pelvic floor muscles are the openings for the rectum, urethra, and in women also for the vagina.

We should all have a fully functional and active pelvic floor regardless of age or gender. The pelvic floor muscles are adversely affected by sedentary jobs, stress, and lack of exercise. Furthermore, reduced pelvic floor function is associated with pregnancy and childbirth. If the pelvic floor does not work as it should, problems with back pain, incontinence (i.e. spontaneous leakage of urine), dysfunctional abdominal muscles, etc. can occur.

What will strengthening the pelvic floor muscles help?

1. Proper pelvic floor function serves as prevention from incontinence.
2. It contributes to the quality experience of sexual pleasure, helping to achieve orgasm more easily.
3. A properly strengthened pelvic floor helps in proper posture and appearance of the tummy.
4. If women want to use menstrual cups, without properly strengthened muscles they won’t stay in the right place.

Pelvic floor exercises should be included in our daily routine not only for women, but also for men (especially those who have erection problems). Exercise is easy, but it is important to exercise intensively and above all PROPERLY! Perform the exercises in a calm manner, taking slow breaths and not holding your breath.

Pelvic Floor Strengthening Methods

It is advisable to include exercises in a muscle-strengthening routine that breathe into the abdomen, into the chest and generally strengthen the whole body.

Belly breathing:

1. Lie down on your back, place your hands loosely along your body, relax your shoulders, bend your legs and perform breathing only into your abdomen,
2. breathing should be slow and regular,
3. breathe in slowly through the nose and try to breathe into your hands (if the exercise is done correctly, the belly bulges and expands, WATCH OUT FOR BELLY BREATHING),
4. then exhale slowly and long through the mouth until the exhalation is complete. Here the abdomen drops and sinks.

Deep abdominal breathing provides a powerful massage of the heart and internal organs, which supports and stimulates their activities. If you learn proper deep abdominal breathing, you will also strengthen your abdominal muscles at the same time. If the deep abdominal muscles are weakened, the diaphragm and internal organs are weakened, which put significant pressure on the pelvic floor.

Kegel exercises on VIDEO

breathing into the chest:

1. position is the same as for breathing into the abdomen,
2. Lie on your back, place your arms loosely along your body, bend your legs and relax your shoulders,
3. then inhale only into the chest,
4. breathing is slow and regular.

Firming the whole body:

1. perform a elbow stand,
2. Belly inward,
3. strengthen the buttock muscles and try to stay in this position.

The important thing is not to move, not to tilt the head and keep the body in one plane.

In the next section, we will show a set of 5 specific exercises that will help to significantly strengthen the pelvic floor. The exercises can be supported by the use of special medical devices – ben wa balls, venus balls or vaginal dumbbells. All have a positive effect on the condition of the muscles in the pelvic area.

Pelvic Floor 5 Exercise Set

Above, we’ve covered the basics of why to actually strengthen your pelvic floor. We also mentioned the important breathing exercise that we’ll be building on today as the foundation of the house. Without proper breathing, you won’t get such significant results, so don’t forget that…

Exercise One:

1. Lie down on your tummy, fold your arms under your forehead with your palms facing the ground, extend your legs and place your toes on the ground,
2. Knees off the ground and stretch the whole legs,
3. then pull the buttocks together, drawing in the anus, vagina and urethra,
4. breathe regularly, without holding your breath,
5. stay in contraction for a while and relax.

We can repeat several times.

Exercise two:

1. Lie down on your back, lift your legs perpendicular to your body, place your arms loosely along your body,
2. Lift legs up and lift pelvis as high as possible off the mat and then lay back down.

It is important to perform the exercise with a pull, NOT with a SWING, not bending at the lumbar spine and pushing the legs towards the abdomen and NOT over the head.

Exercise three:

1. Lie on your back, arms loosely along your body and legs extended,
2. Knees pressed together, drawing in the belly, urethra, vagina and rectum,
3. hold for a moment and relax.

Repeat the exercise several times. Try to breathe regularly, do not hold your breath.

Exercise four:

1. Lie on your back, arms loosely along your body,
2. legs bent at the knees and feet on the ground,
3. lift the pelvis off the mat while contracting the urethra, vagina and rectum.

The movement inmoves the pelvis up and down. Breathe regularly and repeat the exercise.

Exercise five:

1. Kneel on all four limbs, arch your back and place your chin towards your chest,
2. pull in the abdomen, squeeze the buttocks and pull in the vagina, urethra and rectum,
3. flex your back, head upwards and relax.

Repeat the exercise several times and try to breathe regularly.

BONUS: VIDEO pelvic floor exercise

We are adding VIDEO with exercises for extra exercises.

How to get rid of incontinence? Or prevent it in the first place? Improve the experience of sex? This guide to strengthening your pelvic floor muscles is for just such cases – in the first part we discussed breathing exercises, and in the second we progressed to a set of 5 effective exercises. Another way to strengthen the pelvic floor muscles are Kegel exercises.

Kegel exercises in video and practice

These are exercises in which the vaginal muscles are actively stretched. The set of exercises was designed in 1948 by the American gynaecologist Arnold Kegel. In addition, Arnold Kegel also invented the perineometer (or vaginal manometer), which is used to measure the force of contractions of the pelvic floor muscles (i.e. measuring vaginal air pressure).

Before you start practicing Kegel exercises, it is important to learn how to locate the pelvic floor muscles, learn chest and abdominal breathing, as well as learn the exercises associated with regular breathing.

VIDEO 1

VIDEO 2

VIDEO 3

How to learn them

To engage muscles correctly, it is essential to understand where each muscle is located and learn to feel them. To do this, it is possible to use a mirror to view the external genitalia and imagine the pelvic floor distribution. In addition, you can try joint contraction of the anus and vagina and realize where we perceive the contraction.

The last option is also to perceive the vaginal muscles while stopping the flow of urine. This exercise is best done in the morning when the muscles are not yet as active and the exercise is more difficult. Try to perceive the difference between the sensation when relaxing and when contracting.

Retracting the muscles throughout the lap

Next, it is important to learn to separately contract the rectal and vaginal muscles from the gluteal or abdominal muscles. These muscles have nothing to do with the pelvic floor, so their involvement is undesirable. To properly practice isolated contraction, it is advisable to insert two fingers into the vagina, spacing the fingers slightly apart, and then trying to contract the pelvic floor muscles. If the pressure you exert forces the fingers to move closer together, you are assured that the exercise is being performed correctly.

Then try to hold the contraction itself for one to seven seconds. The number of repetitions of Kegel exercises is recommended to be 80 to 300 contractions in one day. Which means we try to exercise throughout the day.

Alternatives to improve pelvic floor

Other options for exercising the pelvic floor muscles with Kegel exercises include using Venus or Ben Wa balls. The woman inserts the balls into her vagina and uses her muscles to squeeze the balls as strongly as possible and may also try to pull them out despite the resistance the woman puts up.

A very popular and effective exercise for pelvic floor strengthening is the single orgasm. During orgasm, the individual muscles contract uncontrollably, causing them to strengthen spontaneously.

YOUR experience with strengthening intimate muscles?

Write in the comments your experience with strengthening this area after childbirth, with incontinence problems, etc. We will be glad for every opinion and practical experience…

Author

Natalie

Editor / author

Natalie has been a member of our team for several years. Although this girl is very shy, she still likes to engage in titillating topics. Aid reviews are the basis of her work and she also likes to work new entries into the dictionary. She draws inspiration not only at home but also abroad. Her articles are full of sexual positions - however, she is the author of a "series" of erotic positions with practical information and sometimes funny stories.