Pelvic Pain and How To Ease It

 I spoke briefly on Instagram this week about pelvic pain and exercise. Many women experience pelvic pain during pregnancy and symptoms can carry over into postnatal life in some cases. However, through a sensible exercise plan as well as adapting your day-to-day movements, managing your discomfort and keeping any pain at bay is completely achievable. This will certainly help with your post-birth recovery too.

 If you're currently experiencing pelvic pain, or if you want to be prepared to manage it should it occur during your pregnancy, here are some simple tips below which I guarantee will help. 

1. Gentle movement and exercise
   
   When carried out sensibly and with caution, exercise can help your pelvic pain tremendously. Keeping your body moving through exercise will strengthen your muscles, joints and pelvic floor which are all so important. A structured and specifically designed exercise program will ease symptoms and will often prevent the need to use crutches or a support belt and allow you to keep moving as pain-free as possible in your daily life. Movements simply need to be adapted, such as keeping your squats narrower and avoiding single leg exercises like lunges. We want to aim to keep the pelvis stable and the surrounding muscles strong.
   
   

2. Keep your pelvis stable in daily movement
   
   Depending on your level of pelvic pain, you may need to adjust some of your everyday movements. This is especially important if you're suffering from SPD (Symphis Pubis Dysfunction). My wonderful PT client Lucy, who is a yoga teacher (see her website Yoga Three60), gave some great advice on my Instagram post as she experienced SPD during both of her pregnancies. She also recorded a really useful video which she has shared with us, where she explains more about this condition as well as lots of tips to manage it. You can view her video here. To highlight a few points, keeping your legs together as much as possible is key. This can include getting in and out of the car or your bed carefully, sitting down to put your clothes on (so that you're not hopping from one leg to the other), taking the stairs one at a time and avoiding walking on uneven ground as much as possible.
   
   

3. Listen to your body
   
   One of the best pieces of advice I can give you is to listen to what your body is telling you. This means you should aim to exercise in a way that makes you feel good, but also to stop if something is too much. Pain and discomfort is a sign that your body is asking you to slow down and stop - this means you need to move more gently and rest as long as you need to. There's no ‘one-size-fits-all' approach when it comes to pregnancy and recovering from childbirth - every body is different and you need to make sure you listen to what yours is telling you.
   
   

4. Look after yourself
   
   In addition to the above point is the emphasis on the need to look after yourself! Some good old TLC can go a long way and I always try to remind my clients that there are many treatments out there to help your specific needs during pregnancy and as a Mum. A women's health physio is my go-to recommendation for women who need to address any issues linked to their pelvic floor and/or symptoms associated with pregnancy and child birth. There are also fantastic massage therapists who specialise in women's needs - I have heard that a pregnancy massage is one of the best things ever! Overall, my advice is not to wait until it's too late and you're in more pain that you would have been had you taken some preventative measures.
   
   

I hope you find some of these points useful. I want to reassure you that you're not alone if you're experience pelvic pain and I also wanted to make sure that you know there are things you can do to ease it.

Let me know if you have any questions at all on this topic or if you need a recommendation of therapists or physios in your area. I am part of several online groups for Women's Health Coaches and I am always happy to find someone that could help you!

Also, if you'd like to try a Natal Fit workout but you're unsure of what you can do due to your pelvic pain, send me a message and I’ll send you a specially designed workout designed to help your symptoms!