Castor oil packs can help clear your skin because they address the root causes of hormonal acne.
Read moreExercise for prolapse
Strength training is ABSOLUTELY the way forward for anyone with prolapse.
We are told to fear movement and avoid it, but as someone that has CONQUERED prolapse and helped hundreds of other women do the same, I can tell you with absolute certainty, you need to strength train to beat this.
The question is HOW?
There are three requirements to using strength training to heal prolapse.
You MUST:
Harness the power of the breath-your breath is your core stability system and if you don't use it properly, your weak core will result in your pushing DOWN on your pelvic organs and OUT on your Diastasis recti.
Make room in the thorax. Without sufficient room in the thorax for expansion in movement and breath, we are left shoving too much pressure into the pelvic cavity, worsening existing prolapse. To get the LIFT you need, you have to make SPACE in the compartment above your pelvis, i.e. your thorax.
Stop trying to shed fat and instead learn how to build your body.
Chasing the same old exercise methods and mindsets is part of what got you into this mess. If you want to overcome prolapse, then you have to ditch the diet and weightless mentalities and focus on BUILDING a stronger, better functioning body.
Yes, that can and will involve leaning out, but in a holistic and health-promoting way. The binging, over-doing it approach to exercise results in women increasing their prolapse symptoms and sitting on the bench. The sitting out on the bench waiting for a miracle or surgery to fix everything doesn’t work either. If you want the confident and competent body of someone that is in shape, then you’ll have to try a new way that honors BETTER movement patterns, MUSCLE growth, REST and RECOVERY.
Using squats
to beat prolapse is just ONE way we strengthen the pelvic floor, quads and glutes!
If you’re ready to try a NEW thing, then it’s time for you to join Hold Up™ and conquer your prolapse!
In this program you will learn how to:
Exercise with and to combat prolapse for physique changes and feeling amazing in your body
Recover and restore after training
Change your mindset around your body, injury and exercise
Detox your liver for balanced hormones-this plays a role in your prolapse!
Improve your gut health-essential for better pelvic tissue, routine pooping and reduced pressure in the abdomen and pelvis
And SO MUCH MORE!
Use the code SQUATS for 15% off when you sign up TODAY!
Monthly payment options available.
Heal your prolapse
Exercise, education and the essentials for overcoming prolapse!
How your mouth-breathing is harming your gut and your pelvic floor
Airway health is all the rage these days with the popularity of James Nestor’s Breath and Wim Hoff’s breathing strategies, more and more people are awakening to the power of their breath.
I myself started my own airway health journey back in 2018, when I learned that my tongue was supposed to NATURALLY rest on the roof of my mouth.
Spoiler alert-it wasn’t.
As I studied breath mechanics more deeply I learned that my breathing limitations were MAJORLY contributing to my pelvic floor problems.
Yes. Mouth breathing and pelvic floor dysfunction are linked.
Mouth breathing and gut health struggles are linked.
And of course mouth breathing and pelvic organ prolapse are also linked.
Why?
Here’s the dirt on breathing.
When the tongue comfortably rests on the roof of the mouth, this signals to our nasal passages to open, making nasal breathing easier.
Breathing through the nose has NUMEROUS benefits.
Stronger immune system and less inflammation. Nasal breathing filters our air, stopping our immune system from having to clean up all the articles we would otherwise INHALE if we were mouth breathing, hello NOSE HAIRS have a purpose! When we don’t filter particulates with our nose hairs, the junk we inhale gets lodged in our lungs and our immune systems need to clear it which keeps them too busy to do other things like clear inflammation in the body well.
Better core and pelvic floor strength. When our tongue is on the roof of our mouth and we breathe through the nose, this signals to the diaphragm to MOVE when we breathe-if you don’t already know this, the DIAPHRAGM and the PELVIC floor move together to stabilize the torso and give you….CORE STRENGTH! So by simply pressing the tongue on the roof of your mouth when breathing you move your diaphragm and exercise your pelvic floor, it’s Better Than Kegels, which is why I made a FREE course on it.
Improves Posture. The tongue on the roof of our mouth ALSO sets our posture. Tongue position dictates head position, think tongue on the bottom of my mouth-head falls forward, posture collapses. Tongue on the roof of the mouth keeps the head over our skeleton, neutralizes our posture AND even stabilizes our pelvis (providing we are engaging the back of the tongue as well as the front. (See pics)
Keeps your gut health and digestion healthy. Mouth breathing is our fight or flight breath. It involves breathing INTO the chest which creates stiffness and lack of movement in our abdomen. This lack of movement slows digestion and leads to constipation, toxic build up of undigested food and can cause SIBO, bloating, cramping and overgrowth of pathogenic bacteria. Breathing through the nose is the type o breath we use when we are in the parasympathetic side of the nervous system, AKA “rest and digest”. Simply breathing through the nose and moving the diaphragm better can be a HUGE game changer for gut health issues as well as any thing else in the body mediated by the nervous system, so like EVERYTHING….
Calms your nervous system for better sleep and less pain. Some folks have found that by simply taking my free breathing course and dialing in their nasal and diaphragmatic breathing they have been able to alleviate pelvic pain caused to Interstitial Cystitis, hypertonic pelvic floors and pelvic organ prolapse. Why? Because mouth breathing actually changes your body’s biochemistry making muscles more tense and pain more INTENSE.
Ok so hopefully by now I’ve at least SOMEWHAT convinced you that nasal breathing is worth trying.
So what can you do to get started?
Sign up for my subscription library and get access to my digital courses, ALL of which teach breath work.
And for MORE information on how tongue and breathing habits impact your health, come and listen to a couple of my Dirty Strength Radio™ episodes on how your tongue is causing your pelvic floor problems.
My personal benefits experienced from using an Infrared sauna and also, scientism
There are loads of articles on the benefits of infrared (IR) sauna use, but this ain’t one of them.
If you want evidence-based research on these things, then I recommend checking out the articles I link below.
THIS ARTICLE is simply about the changes I saw in my own body.
Our modern culture and obsession with “scientism” (research considered science that may or not be repeatable, scientific method-proof or without bias, aka-funded by the people that stand to make money off of the “results”.
Yes I made up that definition.
In the quest for regular folks to ONLY post “scientifically- sound” information on social media or even share it in conversation with friends, we have done something very silly and unscientific and that is we have lost an appreciation for anecdotal evidence.
A friend’s or trusted person’s testimony about their own person experience can in many cases be MORE relevant and helpful to regular folks like you and me, than a peer-reviewed journal articles conducted by strangers, on strangers.
YES we have to be discerning and responsible about what we believe, what we are willing to try with our own bodies and pocketbooks, but the idea that something ISN’T valid if it doesn’t have citations and footnotes from articles that let’s face it, most of the general public can’t even read and comprehend, is silly.
I’m not saying we should ignore science and or jump on every fad that comes down the pike, BUT I do believe that people’s personal stories can actually lead us to scientific discovery.
After all, all science is is people making observations about responses to changes in variable.
We are PEOPLE and we can make observations too!
In fact we regular people and our observations can drive scientific exploration and funding because science is a business.
It costs money to do science so then science needs to make money and if the public show that they are willing to pay for things, then the science will follow.
But I digress…
Ok, so SAUNA!
I have an IR sauna.
I purchased it in 2018 from High Tech Health because of their VERY low EMFs and VOCs.
I love it.
I typically sauna 3-4 times a week for 30-40 minutes.
The temperature reaches 145.
I TRY to mostly just read in the sauna, since it seems silly to buy a low EMF sauna and then BRING emfs in the sauna with you (i.e. my iPad) but I’m a human and sometimes I just want to. zone out and watch a show OR I need to do some work while I sauna and I just “kiss it up to God”-is that a thing for EMF’s? I don’t know, but I do it.
I do not plan my meals around the sauna-I MOST often sauna after dinner once the kids are in bed because that’s what I can do consistently.
And I typically drink an entire mason jar glass of water while I’m in there.
Ok, now lets get to the good part!
Why did I get an IR Sauna?
Most of you know me here as someone that values strength training, has worked hard to rehab my own pelvic floor ( I have pelvic organ prolapse ) as well as others and I LOVE supporting the gut.
I’ve learned over the years that BOTH pelvic health and gut health are tied strongly to LIVER decongestion.
A congested liver is bad for the gut and proper tissue growth.
It drains the entire system which creates a sinking of energy, organs and mood.
AND so after trying various other strategies to improve my overall health, I decided that an IR sauna was in order.
I had talked with multiple people that had explained to me how the routine gentle detox caused by an infrared sauna was just the ticket to getting their bodies to slowly release toxins in return to homeostasis.
”It has been known for decades that sweating is a wonderful way to get rid of stored chemicals, including heavy metals. In fact, a sauna is one of the detoxification procedures used in the Environmental Units in Dallas (Dr. William Rea) and North Charleston (Dr. Allan Lieberman) where the sickest of folks go to heal.” Dr. Sherry Rogers, Total Wellness, May 2000.”
What changes have I noticed from using the sauna?
The most noticeable change is my sensitivity to food and digestive distress
When I purchased the sauna, despite having worked with TWO different functional medicine doctors that supposedly helped me clear out Candida and multiple parasite infections, I was still having random stomach aches, digestive issues and sensitive to various foods with no clear pattern.
Just BAM for no reason I was struggling.
After about 4 months of using the sauna routinely, I noticed that stopped.
Stomach aches and digestive challenges no longer just appeared for no reason.
I would get them, but for very specific reasons-more on that another time.
I also noticed that I just wasn’t nearly as food sensitive.
I could be less militant about avoiding certain grains and dairy because my body was cool with it.
I didn’t go off the rails or anything, but feeling LESS fearful or stressed about food triggers relaxed me which also contributed to my reduced digestive issues.My skin
Before the sauna I had noticed that my back was more susceptible to breakouts. I wasn’t getting them on my face so much, but my back, so annoying!
My acupuncturist explained to me that it’s excess heat or dampness in the body, which is ALSO associated with Candida.
Using the sauna seemed to resolve this in about 2 months.
While I do believe that sweating so much helped me to clean out my pores and clear my skin, I was pretty sure my back breaking out was a toxin/hormone/liver issue brought on my stress and Candida.
I was lifting heavier at the time, which means more testosterone and other hormones, which means the liver has to work harder to clear out old expired hormones.
I also wasn’t resting as much as I needed too, too much life in the sympathetic and not enough parasympathetic.
AND I knew I had tested with some high levels of Candia multiple times.
Since we know that sauna helps to gently detoxify the body especially of heavy metals and toxins associated with liver congestion and Candida, I’m not surprised that using it for a couple of months cleared my skin.
Learning to value the process of resting and detoxifying the body because I saw the value of it via the sauna, ALSO contributed to my shifting my training program and expectations for my body that no doubt helped with toxin load as well!Soreness
I pretty much sauna every day that I train and I’m now rarely very sore from a workout.
Keep in mind that being sore from EVERY workout is not normal.
It can be a sign of over-training, so if you’re reading this and you do experience lots of soreness form every workout, I would recommend getting with a professional that can take a second look at your training program and make sure you are getting adequate rest and recovery-a MUST for good gains and results.
But yeah, there are workouts that I do that challenge my body in a new way and I expect to be sore from it and it’s just not the case if I sauna and I usually do.Sleep
When I first started with the sauna it would knock me out.
I would sauna, shower and get in bed and pass out and sleep the entire night.
And that was mostly the case for months.
I don’t notice that as much any more.
My body has adapted to the sauna and I think I have also caught up on a lot of MUCH needed sleep.
I don't pass out and I may wake up from time to time, but in the beginning when I was probably severely sleep-deprived after a sauna sesh, I was ZONKED!
I typically sleep 10 hours a night now, but if you are someone that struggles to fall asleep and stay asleep, I tell ya, try the IR sauna-just don’t bring your blue light screen in there with you which will wake you up!Sickness
If any of us (my husband or one of my three boys) feel under the weather, run down or like we are fighting something but are neither dehydrated or nauseous, we do the sauna.
My boys (10, 8 and 5) do abbreviated sessions at lower temperatures and MAN it’s remarkable.
They rarely get sick as it is, but when they feel a little run down, we put them in there for about 15-20 minutes and not only do they sleep harder, but they don’t get sick!
Same goes for my husband and I.
Any indication that we are not feeling well or are fighting something off, we get in the sauna and we don’t get sick, Praise the Lord!
**I will say, having this baby over the past year (2020) has been a HUGE blessing.
I totally trust in our immune systems and the decisions we’ve made/work we do in this household to invest in, exercise and protect them and to me having an IR sauna is part of our prevention program at the Smith household!
Ok well, in the words of the great Levar Burton, “Don’t take my word for it, find out for yourself!”
Get in a sauna!
Many cities have IR sauna and cryotherapy spas that you can join and use.
I think the lowed model for the HighTech health sauna is about $4k or so.
Not cheap, I get it, but when I tallied up all the money I was spending on tests and solutions for my gut health issues, I have to say that sauna has paid for itself OVER and OVER again!
We know that parasite infections, Candida (and I had both detected by various tests) are connected to heavy metals in the body.
In fact, some research shows that Candida is PROTECTIVE against heavy metal poisoning because Candida complexes with the metals in the body to render them less harmful.
Using the sauna to GENTLY detox my body seemed to help me with the symptoms associated with high levels of Candida in the body AND improve the overall health of my microbiome and intestinal lining.
Now for some science!
Most of these sources are enjoyable to read and cite peer-reviewed science too!
Resources on IR saunas:
Mercola on sauna use for protection against disease
Detoxify or Die
Ten Scientifically Proven Reasons I’m Addicted To A Daily Sauna
Candida and saunaScience behind heavy metal detox and sauna
Maximize the benefits of sauna detox
Sauna’s are AWESOME, but if you want to maximize the benefit of your sauna time, then take my nervous-system relaxing breath course, Better Than Kegels and literally change your body!
“Having pelvic floor problems for about 16 years, I have tried many, many different methods for treatment and relief. Not until Sarah’s program of diaphragmatic breathing have I begun begun feel better and not had a need for daily medication to relax my pelvic floor. My new breathing practice has helped me to fall back asleep if I awaken in the night — a many years’ struggle for me. I am a convert and true believer in her programs and so thankful to have found her!!!”~Amanda ❤️
”It’s a miracle! I already have less pain and I haven’t been dizzy after just three days of breathing like this!”-R. Boer
Tap into the power of your breath
to soother your pain, digestive distress and pelvic floor problems!
Detoxing your liver to support your pelvic floor
It’s NOT uncommon for the women I work with to in addition to having pelvic organ prolapse or pelvic floor dysfunction, to ALSO struggle with poor gut health.
It’s SUPER important to address gut health if you want to experience pelvic healing, BUT you can’t TRULY heal the gut and restore health to your vital organs if you don’t ALSO address your liver.
Your liver’s job is to produce bile. Bile helps your enzymes break down fats so you can extra energy from them and prevent them from clogging the digestion process.
Livers also filter your blood and removes toxins (ahem, booze) and old expired hormones.
It also stores pieces of protein (amino acids) can synthesize fats, break down cholesterol and store sugar for energy to be used when necessary.
It’s a WONDER of an organ.
In Traditional Chinese Medicine , “stagnation of the flow of liver qi frequently disrupts emotional flow, producing feelings of frustration or anger. Conversely, these same emotions can lead to a dysfunction in the liver, resulting in an endless loop of cause and effect.” (link)
And did you know that the LIVER is a PRIMARY organ involved in your menstrual cycle?
When your liver isn’t functioning properly, emotional problems, rib pain or fullness, dizziness, headache, cramping, tendon problems, menstrual problems, jaundice, weak or blurry vision, and digestive disorders can ensue.
**Attn: pelvic floor peeps,
The liver stores blood when you’re resting and releases its to your tendons when you’re active.
When liver blood becomes limited due to congestion and stagnation in the liver, one can experience “tightness” in the tendons of the pelvic floor and throughout the body, neck, shoulders, etc.
So you can see why it’s worth devoting some attention, right?!!
Your liver is directly connected to your gut via the portal vein.
If we are suffering from gut dysbiosis, inflammation and toxin overload or toxic microorganism build up in the gut, that vein can directly transport these issues to the liver via that vein.
For example, lipid polysaccharides (toxin released in large numbers by bacteria in the gut) are one of the major culprits and that causes liver damage and inflammation in the body.
Poor liver health results in:
hormonal imbalance
gut health and digestion struggles
nutrient deficiency
muscle tightness and restricted blood flow
low energy
and more!
If you want to learn more about why gut health, nutrient deficiency and hormones impact the pelvic floor, then head here and here.
So what to do?
There are TONS of supplements and “cleanse diets” on the market to help “flush out” your liver and help you lose weight and I would caution you to be super discerning when they come across your path.
Many people rightfully find some of these approaches ridiculous.
After all, the liver detoxes, you don’t need to “detox” the liver.
Right??
Well, yes and no.
As I mentioned above, livers in bodies that have been struggling for a while DO in fact benefit from some support.
Individuals with adrenal fatigue, hormone imbalances, chronic gut health struggles or all three, DO in fact benefit from some liver support, when applied gently.
So today I’m sharing my THREE favorite ways for you to support your liver!
But first, who should consider trying these strategies?
Individuals with prolapse and pelvic floor dysfunction
Peeps with a history of under-eating
Folks with current or a history of gut health issues
Anyone struggling with exhaustion, depletion and lack of vitality
Those that take or have taken a lot of prescription medications or routinely drink alcohol
Dandelion Root Tea
I’ve talked here before about the benefits of bitters for your liver and digestion ( read here!)
Sipping on dandelion root tea throughout your day is a gentle way to detoxify your liver because it gently stimulates your liver to produce bile to help remove toxins from the body and get digestion moving again.
I’ll warn you, it kind of tastes like dirt, but then again, so does coffee.
You can purchase bags of dandelion root tea, loose tea versions OR you can simply find dandelion in your yard and make your own which is the MOST effective form of any herbal tea, IF you’re up for the challenge!
Additionally, Dandelion root is used for the treatment of muscle aches, loss of appetite, upset stomach, intestinal gas, gallstones, joint pain, eczema and bruises. It also increases urine production and serves as a laxative to increase bowel movements.
Some people use dandelion to treat infections, especially viral infections and even cancer. It’s also used as a skin toner, blood tonic and digestive tonic. (Dr. Axe)
Milk Thistle
Milk thistle is a member of the daisy family and probably my FAVORITE liver supplement. I take milk thistle nightly in the form of a pill.
It’s incredibly mild so unless you decide to start taking 3 pills a day or more, you’re not going to experience much of anything, but may start to notice some changes in liver-function related symptoms of the body.
Sleep for example improved for me when I started taking milk thistle.
Wakefulness at night, particularly waking around 3 or 4 am is often related to your liver detoxing.
Milk thistle is SO pretty and such a cool looking plant, that I’ve decided to cultivate it in my garden in order to make my own extract. But a simple over the counter supplement made by a trustworthy supplier is certainly adequate for getting started on your liver support journey!
**discuss all supplements with your healthcare provider, I am not prescribing it or diagnosing conditions. This is purely educational information.
Liver
Interestingly enough, one of the BEST things you can do for your liver is to consume LIVER.
Yeah, I’m not really a fan of the smell, taste or consistency of it, but organ meats have LONG been contributing to the health of humans on this planet and I do think it’s a shame that many of us have lost our palate for them.
Fortunately there are FREEZE-dried pill options that don’t taste or smell at all!!
And that’s more my jam.
But IF you like liver, then I would say start there.
Fried chicken livers are quite popular as is beef.
Just be sure to choose organic and or pasture fed versions.
There’s no sense in you eating the liver from an animal that is chock full of antibiotics, pesticides and herbicide from their GMO feed.
Movement and breathing
Can movement help your liver?
100%!
Your lymphatic system is part of your circulatory system but unlike the the circulatory system if doesn't have a pump like the heart, it’s pump is YOU, you’re movement and your breath!!!
It’s job is to remove toxins from the blood and help them exit the body.
The lymphatic system of the liver is not super well understood, EXCEPT that we know lack of movement and stagnation is BAD for liver function.
When you take my Breath Like A Bad Ass, It’s Bettter Than Kegels, course OR Connect Your Core and Pelvic Floor ™ you will learn how your BREATH and movement practice creates a PUMP effect that moves and massages your vital organs in your abdominal cavity, liver included!
When we stop moving and breathing fully with the diaphragm, then the lymphatic system is stalled and can become stuck, contributing to congestion of the liver.
So if you want to keep your liver healthy and functional to improve sleep, pelvic health, digestion and detoxification, you BEST move your butt AND your diaphragm!
Learn to breathe, strength train AND care for your liver all in one digital course!
Check out HOLD UP!
Conquer prolapse by getting to the root cause of your problems in one simple, self-paced digital course!
Sarah Smith is a Functional Pelvic and Gut Health Educator Level, Strength Coach, Original Strength Pro, Level 2 Russian Kettlebell Instructor and postnatal fitness specialist and functional pelvic floor and with a Masters in Soil Science and Agriculture.
She helps women feel confident, capable, content and STRONG in their bodies. As someone with pelvic organ prolapse, Sarah understands the mental and physical challenges of over-coming this condition speaks frankly about the most progressive strategies for moving forward and finding your strength IN SPITE of prolapse and pelvic floor problems!
Sarah is a published author and has a decade experience conducting research at The National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute, University of Arizona and North Carolina State University.
She uses evidence-based strategies to help her clients grow strong, and conquer their pelvic floor dysfunction, pelvic organ prolapse, diastasis recti and gut health complications and other injuries or health conditions.
Sarah is a mom to three wild boys and one English Bulldog.
She loves kettlebells, leisure walks, chickens, soil, coffee, not folding laundry and watching people move-in a non-creepy way.
Did you know these were solvable symptoms of an over-recruited pelvic floor?
Have you ever wondered why intercourse often feels burny or painful?
Or why you struggle to keep a tampon in or why it’s painful to insert?
What about spasms in your pelvis?
Painful feelings in and around the vagina?
Tailbone pain?
Constipation?
ALL of these symptoms can present together or alone and can be indicators of an “over-recruited” pelvic floor.
What does that mean?
Your pelvic floor muscles in organic pink. The magenta signify from top to bottom, your rectum, uterus and urethra attached to your bladder) Image used with permission from Pelvic Guru.
Well, basically it means that the muscles of your pelvic floor are working too hard, too often or in an imbalanced manner.
This can be due to breathing habits, nervous system stress, inflammation in the body, movement mechanics, and other stressors.
In a sense, your pelvic floor is lifted, tight, tense and it needs to relax.
In fact, your pelvic floor needs to relax and recruit, move UP and DOWN like a trampoline, all day long everyday.
That’s called “moving through its full range of motion”.
When it can’t relax, insertion of anything (tampon, etc.) will be painful.
There is also a persistent tugging on the tailbone/sacrum that can start as pain during sitting and then radiate all the way down the lef.
Elimination is also difficult. The pelvic floor needs to relax in order for stool to exit the rectum.
Without that routine relaxation that makes regularity happen, stool hangs around, becomes dry and more difficult to excrete.
I know. I know. You’ve been told that a “tight” vagina is a good thing, “strong” pelvic floors are better for sex and for not peeing your pants.
But the truth is that supple, responsive, pelvic floors that move their their full ranges of motion (recruit AND relax) are what you want for good sex, strong bodies and insurance against incontinence.
Why it’s time to take action!
Let’s be real here.
If you are dealing with ANY of the above listed symptoms, your quality of life isn’t what it could be.
I’ve worked with MANY women that shy away from becoming intimate with their spouses because they just can’t seem to enjoy sex.
They often blame themselves or on occasion, their partner’s inability to make sex enjoyable.
But either way they are avoiding sex because let’s face it, it stinks.
Which puts that aspect of the relationship in an awkward place.
I mean enjoyable sex and sustainable intimate relationships HAVE to be based on a “give and take” system.
White knuckling it and tolerating sex just to get through it even though it’s really uncomfortable and not enjoyable is just one giant problematic elephant in the room.
I also have clients that find sex can be incredibly painful and uncomfortable due to constipation.
Gas, bloating, and discomfort that is associated with constipation or sluggish elimination causes us to lose confidence in our bodies and not wish to be touched in any way.
But EVEN if you can push all that suffering aside, the truth of the matter is that your ENTIRE body relies on a healthy pelvic floor.
The pelvic floor is the BASE of your torso.
It stabilizes that body all day long every day and impacts the health of everything from your neck to your ankles.
Think of your house or apartment.
If you found out that the foundation was over-stressed and incapable of it’s job of supporting everything above, would you feel confident and safe?
Would you continue to invest in the house by say remodeling your kitchen, when you knew at any time you could have MAJOR support and balance problems?
The longer pelvic floor problems persist the more likely it is that you will begin to experience problems up and downstream from them.
Shoulder injuries, foot pain, ankle and knee issues can ALL stem from a torso that’s struggling to move and stabilize well, which stems from a pelvic floor that ain’t going its job.
What to do if this is you?
Step 1. See a pelvic floor physical therapist.
This is a type of PT that specializes in muscles of the pelvic floor.
She will evaluate your hip and glute strength, check your posture to help you understand some possible reasons why your pelvic floor is working overtime.
She can also manually release those tight muscles to give you instant relief.
You can search for one local to you here.
No access to a PT?
Check out this program!
Step 2. Watch this video to learn more about why you may be over-recruiting your pelvic floor!
Step 3. Take action and begin to change your breathing and movement mechanics.
The BEST way to start down-training and relaxing your pelvic floor is with your BREATH!
Breathing deeply with the diaphragm will:
calm your nervous system
begin to relax your pelvic floor while moving it through its full range of motion
increase your core strength so your pelvic floor isn’t doing all the work..
I know that breathing seems soooo simple and you may thing that it’s not enough action to make big change and impact your pain/
But you’ve GOT to TRY IT!:
Set an alert on your phone and spend 3-5 minutes practicing your diaphragmatic breathing 3 times a day and take note of your symptoms.
For you focusing on the INHALE/ RELAX part of the breathing cycle will be ESPECIALLY important.
Don’t know how to breath with the diaphragm?
Click here! To Grab my Breathing For Pelvic Health Jump Start Guide to start TODAY!!!
About Sarah…
Sarah Smith is a Functional Pelvic and Gut Health Educator Level, Strength Coach, Original Strength Pro, Level 2 Russian Kettlebell Instructor and postnatal fitness specialist and functional pelvic floor and with a Masters in Soil Science and Agriculture.
She helps women feel confident, capable, content and STRONG in their bodies!
Sarah is a published author and has a decade experience conducting research at The National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute, University of Arizona and North Carolina State University.
She uses evidence-based strategies to help her clients grow strong, and conquer their pelvic floor dysfunction, pelvic organ prolapse, diastasis recti and gut health complications and other injuries or health conditions.
Sarah is a mom to three wild boys and one English Bulldog.
She loves kettlebells, leisure walks, chickens, soil, coffee, not folding laundry and watching people move-in a non-creepy way.
Zooming out from our health problems to get perspective, answers and real solutions!
I'm sort of on a roll this week with blogs posts and emails, but I have so many things that I want to share with you, that I sort of can't even help it!
Today I want to chat briefly with you about perspective.
In the West, our healthcare system is largely one based on treating symptoms.
We experience a problem in a specific part of the body and both we and our healthcare providers often problem solve as if the problem originated in said part.
Consequently, the treatment is solely focused on this one area.
For example, if you go to the doctor with persistent knee pain, they will typically recommend you:
take an anti-inflammatory,
wear a knee brace,
receive steroid shots to the knee
and if all else fails, get knee surgery.
But ALL of theses solutions are about STOPPING the uncomfortable symptoms that are coming from the knee, which is in actuality a RESPONSE to other issues taking place in the body.
Anything from the hips, to the ankle, toes, pelvic floor or head position....
diet, stress management, shoes, movement habits and lifestyle...
is IN FACT OFTEN behind the knee pain, but we are often so ZOOMED in on the location of problem and consumed with stopping the symptoms that we fail to realize that the knee's current state is not because of the knee at ALL, but due to many other factors.
I see this same problem a LOT with the pelvic floor.
I receive emails and DM's all of the time from people that had prolapse corrective surgery and how find themselves having symptoms again.
This is because the surgery only took care of the symptoms of a larger problem of strength, stability, pressure management, lifestyle and tissue health.
Surgery doesn't change the health of your gut microbiome, which determines the health of your pelvic tissue and hormones.
Surgery doesn't stop constipation, change your breathing habits or how you regulate intra-abdominal pressure.
Surgery doesn't sustainably lift your tissues or teach you how to move in a way that activates your pelvic floor as needed.
And so because surgery is often just a big ol' expensive bandaid, we find ourselves back in the same ol' pickle.
**There are absolutely instances when trauma merits surgery and or situations where we need surgical intervention to stop or slow damage to the body. But even with surgery, it's imperative that we not see it as a solution, but as something that is staving off problems...and the problems will return if we don't change how we live!
THIS is why I advocate that we all take a step BACK from our health problems and try to better understand the many other aspects of health in our body, to which our problems can be related.
When I hurt my shoulder, I tried stretching it and resting it...but I never got any healing or was able to move past the chronic pain until I sought out someone that understand how my shoulder was responding to my ENTIRE body's movement mechanics. Shoutout to Kate Galliett!
And when I developed prolapse, my breakthrough moment that lead to progress and healing was when I began to understand that my prolapse was only sort of about the pelvic floor, but was MORE about how I was carrying my body around all day long every day...
how I was breathing....
how my body was struggling with major gut dysbiois and this was resulting in malnourished tissues and elimination struggles
and lastly
how my stress and failure to take care of my body was increasing my stress response and worsening symptoms.
And so today, whether it's pelvic health, knee pain, food struggles or motivation to move and train your body, I want to encourage you to zoom out!
Whatever narrative you've created about your pain or condition, I want you to put it on the shelf today.
Instead of "I have a bad back", consider that your back pain is a message to you that something or things in the body aren't functioning optimally.
What is it connected to or impacted by in the body?
Your hips, abdominal muscles, glutes, shoulders, feet....
How often do you "train" your back to be strong and able to do the things you need it to do?
Even standing or sitting up straight takes energy and work!
Do you simply stretch it, or do you build it and its capabilities?
Is back surgery or pain reliever going solve the root cause of your problem?
If you stick your finger in the back pain "hole in the dike" will the water start coming out another area of the body?
Chances are pretty great that it will.
Instead of, "I have always been a fat kid" or "I can't help but binge at night", "I don't like moving or exercise,"
Stop blaming yourself or your body and find all the tiny or big threads that are attached to these actions and tendencies and see where they lead you?
What is this behavior a RESPONSE to?
What is it telling you about yourself and your life and what's ONE little thing you can do today to try to address the LARGER issue?
And most importantly, where can you find someone that can HELP you get perspective and zoom out??!!
For ease of understanding and discussion, we have split up the body into lots of little pieces and given those pieces names.
But make no mistake, EVERYTHING is connected.
Zooming out from your problems is going to give you PERSPECTIVE and OPPORTUNITY to find LOTS of different solutions and areas of impact in t he body to calm your pain and give you LASTING healing.
Which reminds me, you are invited to join my seminar on mindset strategies I employed to finally get some healing from my pelvic health struggles!
If you're struggling now, still battling the same level of symptoms you had when you were diagnosed or WORSE, then you're going to want to attend.
It wasn't until I got my MIND right around my prolapse, that I was able to find solutions, strategies that worked and healing!
Come join us!
SIGN UP HERE
xoxo,
Sarah Smith
Sarah Smith is on a mission to help women conquer their pelvic health struggles and build STRENGTH and SKILLS!
She is a strength coach, RKC2 Kettlebell Instructor, Original Strength Pro Instructor, certified personal trainer, postnatal fitness specialist and pelvic floor and gut health advocate with a Masters in Soil and Agricultural Science.
Sarah works online and in Raleigh, North Carolina.
She is a Believer, wife to her best friend, Jeremiah, a mom to three boys and one English Bulldog.
She loves soil, coffee and not folding laundry.
Come follow her on Instagram or Facebook.
From bitters to breathing, here are FIVE things I bet you're not doing to help your gut and pelvic health struggles
The gut (pink area #3) and the pelvis (green, #4) are CLOSELY related neighbors.
When once is in suboptimal condition, often the other suffers!
These two important parts of the body are so tightly linked to one another as well as OTHER systems in the body.
Therefore it’s in our best interest to “zoom out” , stop hyper-focusing on our pelvic floor struggles, begin to look for other problems that we can address in the body to improve the health and function of our pelvic tissues.
Today I’m giving you FIVE action steps you can take to improve gut and pelvic health and restore balance to the body!
Let’s start with adding more bitters to your diet
Photos from Country Living Magazine
What are bitters?
Bitter greens like chicory, dandelion, arugula, radicchio, endive and burdock.
Licorice, gentian root, artichoke leaf, mugwort, black walnut leaf, sarsaparilla and there are manyY more!
What do they do?
We are STILL learning about the many benefits of bitters, but the quickest explanation is that because they have a strong and pungent taste, like a poison, but do not have an poisons properties, the brain signals to the digestive tract to GET TO WORK!
The liver begins to detoxify and digestive juices start flowing to help the body process what’s coming down the pipe.
Bitters are “cooling” so they help to reduce inflammation which can results in anything from a reduction in stress to pain!
Why are the beneficial?
Consuming bitters stimulates the release of gastrin, a digestive hormone that signals to the body to secrete saliva, hydrochloric acid, pepsin (a digestive enzyme that breaks down food), and intrinsic factor (responsible for vitamin B12 absorption).
The liver and the gallbladder produce and secrete bile in response to bitters, ALSO helping with the digestive process.
If you’ve read my other blogs on the gut/pelvic floor connection, then you KNOW that digestion is DIRECTLY related to the health of the pelvic floor.
Tissue health confers structural stability and responsiveness to neural signaling and requires adequate nutrient absorption and nourishment.
The better we digest and absorb nutrition from our diet, the better our tissues and muscle health.
When we are malnourished, we see muscle wasting and a lack of regeneration of tissue.
Additionally, sluggish, inefficient digestion causes constipation or a viscous cycle of diarrhea and constipation.
Straining in the bathroom applies lots of pressure to the pelvic floor.
Anyone struggling with rectocele OR an over-recruited pelvic floor, knows how important, easy, routine elimination is for their pelvic health and comfort.
Bitters stimulate the liver and therefore help it to better do its job!
Because bitters are a “cooling” chemical, which means they can fight inflammation that is causing your pelvic or abdominal pain. (reference)
For more reading about the benefits of bitters click here and here.
How to incorporate bitters?
First! Always ask your healthcare provider/functional medicine doctor before starting any supplements.
1.Drink dandelion root tea daily. This is a SUPER mild and low dose of bitters that you can easily incorporate into your diet. There is such things as too much of a good thing, so read the box to see how many cups per day are recommended and START slow!
2. Eat more bitter greens! Arugula, radicchio, chicory, and artichoke leaf can all be easily added to a salad and grown in your own yard or container garden on a balcony!
Moving on to training the parasympathetic nervous system…
Market Watch .com
I can not stress enough how important it is to train your body to spend LESS time being stressed.
I have ALL of my clients train activating the parasympathetic nervous systems throughout their days and in their workouts!
Many of us, especially those with Type A personalities like me!, are living our lives in a chronically stressed state.
We have shallow breathing patterns.
We tense our bellies.
We clench our jaws.
We go, go, go until we crash.
You and I, we need to train ourselves to spend MORe time in the parasympathetic mode of our nervous system, rest and digest, vs. FIGHT OR FLIGHT!
Why is this important?
When we are in the sympathetic mode of the nervous system (fight or flight) our body chemistry changes. We create more acid, cortisol, and adrenaline.
This makes our muscles tense and twitchy. We are over-stimulated and often times have difficulty being present or mindful of our decision.
Blood flow is diverted away from the intestines to the heart, muscles and brain so that we can ReSPOND quickly, but health of the gut, digestion and nutrient absorption suffers.
When we chronically produce adrenaline and cortisol, over time the body becomes LESS sensitive to them and we then have to resort to stimulants like caffeine, sugar, lots of exercise and taking on more and more projects to feel good and energized.
Why does this impact pelvic health?
Well it impacts your pelvic health in any number of ways.
Digestion and elimination is compromised which again causes lack of nourishment to the tissues and elimination struggles like constipation.
The health of the gut microbiome suffers too because the loss of blood flow and constant stress kills your good bugs. Your good gut bugs reduce stress and inflammation in your pelvic tissues and hormone regulation. Without them you can experience and increase in pelvic pain or symptoms of prolapse.
Fight or flight mode means shallow, short breaths and the diaphragm is NOT moving through its full range of motion. This impedes adequate relaxation and recruitment of the pelvic floor, pelvic position and core stability (check out my handout here) which will increase or worsen you symptoms, stall your rehab!
What can you do?
In extreme cases, some individuals (and this is becoming more and more common) need vagal nerve therapy. The vagus nerve is what tells the body whether it should be in the parasympathetic or sympathetic state of the nervous system.
When it comes disregulated from trauma, surgery or chronic stress, sometimes it needs to be “reset” so that the body can re-learn how to move smoothly in between the two modes of the autonomic nervous system.
But let’s say you don’t have signs of vagus nerve dysfunction, here are THREE more things you can do YOURSELF to stimulate the parasympathetic mode of the nervous system.
3. Stomach massage
Massaging your own belly and manually moving around abdominal contents can help to relieve stress, and tension and relax the body.
Massage in a counter-clockwise direction and don’t every push on anything painful.
Working with a bodywork specialist and having them demonstrate how you can self-massage is a GREAT idea!
Click here for more info!
Bonus, if you’ve been struggling with digestion or constipation this should help!
If you are experiencing an increase in prolapse symptoms or over-recruitment, this can help to relax the tension in the belly and pelvic floor and take pressure off of your pelvic organs too!
4. Diaphragmatic breathing practice.
Breathing with the diaphragm (tongue on the roof of your mouth, inhaling through the nose) is a sure way to calm the body and get into Rest and Digest mode!
If you are prone to stress, it’s a good idea to do some diaphragmatic breathing right when you wake up, before you go to sleep, before your workouts, and periodically throughout your day. Set an alert on your phone!!
When I feel symptoms of pelvic floor tightness or prolapse OR feel like my digestion is suffering, breathing has ALWAYS helped to decrease the symptoms and calm more mind and body.
If you’re never practiced it, start here and here.
5. Start ROCKING daily!
Rocking on all fours creates space in the pelvic and abdominal cavities. It calms and soothes the body and it’s how you learned posture and alignment in the first place as a baby!
Rocking can be a TOTAL game changer, if you do it consistently.
It will calm you AND set you up for future diaphragmatic breathing success, because of how well it aligns your body and facilitates the movement of the diaphragm.
Get started with it here!
If you’re ready to get serious about your pelvic floor problems.
If you’re trying to avoid surgery but are tired of this subpar existence that has you sitting on the sidelines and struggling to feel POWERFUL in your body.
Then you have to check out Hold Up! The strategies I teach in this course address the root causes behind your prolapse and will help you find HEALING while conquering your prolapse!
Come and learn more!
Sarah Smith is on a mission to help women conquer their pelvic health struggles and build STRENGTH and SKILLS!
She is a strength coach, RKC2 Kettlebell Instructor, Original Strength Pro Instructor, certified personal trainer, postnatal fitness specialist and pelvic floor and gut health advocate with a Masters in Soil and Agricultural Science.
Sarah works online and in Raleigh, North Carolina.
She is a Believer, wife to her best friend, Jeremiah, a mom to three boys and one English Bulldog.
She loves soil, coffee and not folding laundry.
Come follow her on Instagram or Facebook.
Gut health struggles Part 2: Solutions for postpartum mommas
Gut health struggles for postpartum mommas Part 1; No matter how far postpartum, this could still be you!
I hear it all of the time. ”My digestion was just never the same after I had the baby…”
Read more