5-MINUTE FRIDAY: Should I Be Working My Pelvic Floor with PVOLVE's Chief of Training
Feb 02, 2024
Danielle Donovan
Welcome to 5 Minute Friday - your weekly wellness pep talk! Today we are talking to Antonietta Vicario - Chief Training Officer at PVOLVE all about the pelvic floor and answering the question, should I be working my pelvic floor?
Antonietta shares, your pelvic floor is the set of muscles that help support the pelvic organs, and more importantly, can help give your body the balance and stability it requires for daily life movements. While the pelvic floor is often overlooked in most workouts - Antonietta shares insights into what exactly your pelvic floor is and why it is essential to focus on these muscles.
Tune in for a quick 5-min pep talk on:
- What is the pelvic floor, and why is it important for women to pay attention to
- Answering the question, 'at what age should I be paying more attention to my pelvic floors' on your pelvic floor?'
This is part 1 of our 4-part Pelvic Floor Series with PVOLVE. Next week we will be back with Antonietta to focus on the top exercises to strengthen your pelvic floor.
Welcome to 5 Minute Friday - your weekly wellness pep talk! Today we are talking to Antonietta Vicario - Chief Training Officer at PVOLVE all about the pelvic floor and answering the question, should I be working my pelvic floor?
Antonietta shares, your pelvic floor is the set of muscles that help support the pelvic organs, and more importantly, can help give your body the balance and stability it requires for daily life movements. While the pelvic floor is often overlooked in most workouts - Antonietta shares insights into what exactly your pelvic floor is and why it is essential to focus on these muscles.
Tune in for a quick 5-min pep talk on:
- What is the pelvic floor, and why is it important for women to pay attention to
- Answering the question, 'at what age should I be paying more attention to my pelvic floors' on your pelvic floor?'
This is part 1 of our 4-part Pelvic Floor Series with PVOLVE. Next week we will be back with Antonietta to focus on the top exercises to strengthen your pelvic floor.
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Speaker 1:
Hey squad, I'm your host, danielle Donovan, and you are listening to Five Minute Fridays, a five-minute pep talk and a boost of inspiration to take with you into your weekend. Today we are talking with P-Vol's chief of training, antonietta Vakaro, and today's topic is pelvic floor. Antonietta, can you share with us what exactly is your pelvic floor and why is it so important for women to pay attention to this area?
Speaker 2:
Absolutely, and thank you, danielle, for having me. I'm so excited to talk about the pelvic floor. I always say that the pelvic floor is a really misunderstood muscle group. It's starting to become more a part of our conversation, thankfully, but there's still so much misinformation about the pelvic floor, so always excited to dive in so you can think of the pelvic floor.
Speaker 2:
It is part of our core musculature, which is one of the main functions of the pelvic floor. I think a lot of times when people think core, they just think of their abdominals. But the pelvic floor sits at the base of our pelvis and when we talk about our core at P-Vol, we're talking about our abdominals in the front, our back muscles in the back, our diaphragm, which helps breathe right it's the muscle responsible for our respiratory function and the pelvic floor at the bottom of our trunk, and all of these muscles work together, they work in concert. The pelvic floor specifically, yeah, it's part of our core. It's part of our core strain to help with stability and support. So that's one part of the pelvic floor, the fact that it's actually part of our core musculature. It helps us stabilize.
Speaker 2:
On top of our pelvic floor, though, we have really essential organs, so our bladder, our rectum, our sex organs sit on top of the pelvic floor. You can think of the pelvic floor like a hammock or like a slingshot. That's the way. The muscles sit at the bottom of the pelvis and all of these organs are on top of the pelvic floor and the pelvic floor has the essential role of helping with the function of these particular organs. So you know, I think now people understand that when you know they might be experiencing potentially incontinence, either bladder or bowel, or a whole host of other symptoms of pelvic floor dysfunction, that we'll get into things like lower back pain or potentially even pelvic prolapse, hip pain or having a challenge orgasming. All of these things can actually be systemic from a dysfunction in the pelvic floor. So you know the pelvic floor again, it's at the bottom of the pelvis, it's that hammock of muscles responsible for helping with stability and support overall and also assisting with all of those functions that I mentioned.
Speaker 1:
Amazing. I feel like I just learned so much in just a couple minutes that I've learned Just there's so much you dropped that is so important and so essential to know. So is there a specific age to focus more on public for work and exercises, or can women of all be AJ's benefit and something they should be focusing on?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, great, great question. So you know I believe in preemptive, preventative movement as medicine. For sure, I think you know that's part of what we do at Peevol right Functional movement, so moving your body in a way that really supports the demands that are on your body every single day. So the pelvic floor I think for a lot of people you're introduced to the pelvic floor kind of later in the game. Usually around that perinatal period is when people start thinking about the pelvic floor. And why? Because, as you know, a person who is pregnant as their belly grows, it's a lot of weight right sitting on top of the pelvic floor and the pelvic floor has a big job to do so. A lot of times that extra added weight, you know, will have people running to the bathroom. Childbirth having whether it's abdominal surgery or a vaginal delivery, though you know the act of having a child asks a ton out of the pelvic floor, and so it's very common that we see certain dysfunctions happening, you know, during that time of life. But you know, the pelvic floor is a muscle like any other muscle, so the earlier that we start to think about it, connect to it. It's like a bicep, it's like a glute muscle, right. We want our muscles to be strong. Our muscles support our muscular skeletal system. Especially when we're talking about the pelvic floor, it has a big job to do overall in terms of our posture. In terms of, you know, our posture is everything when it comes to our shoulder, our neck, our back, health. There's almost nothing that the pelvic floor doesn't, you know, influence in some kind of way, because we really are these interconnected. You know, beings and our muscles are all there. I always say, like, every muscle in our body is there for a reason and they all work together to keep us moving. Well, so, you know, the pelvic floor is just, it's part of it. It's really important and I and definitely you know, we say you should be working that muscle and not waiting until there's a symptom that you're trying to manage.
Speaker 2:
You did bring up, though you know, specific ages and I do want to just call out specifically that you know I mentioned a little bit that the perinatal journey is a lot of times when people are introduced to their pelvic floor. It's definitely plays a crucial role in helping, you know, support, even support the baby as the baby grows. It's helping keeping everything kind of lifted and not weighing on the bowl of the pelvis and all the organs in the pelvis. We'll probably get in more detail into postnatal recovery and the importance of the pelvic floor and that, but also just knowing that the pelvic floor muscle actually fluctuates in terms of strength during the menstrual cycle. So estrogen, I like blew my mind when I learned it.
Speaker 2:
Estrogen really helps us maintain muscle strength, muscle mass, muscle strength and also to keep our connective tissues pliable in our bodies. So throughout the menstrual cycle right, our menstrual cycle we see peaks and we see declines in estrogen, and there are times throughout the cycle where that decline in estrogen makes us more susceptible to pelvic floor symptoms. So you know, if you're jumping on a trampoline and you happen to be at the point in your cycle where your estrogen levels are declining like that might be why you're leaking, then but not throughout the entire month when your estrogen levels rise. And the other thing that's so fascinating, that's really really important, is that our estrogen does decline. When we're in that perimenopause, you know, and especially postmenopause, your estrogen levels decline.
Speaker 2:
So pelvic floor becomes so important to ensure that we're keeping a whole like the contents, the organs of our body supported. And you know, I think we hear a lot of people later in life, you know, having to wear that adult diaper right pelvic prolapse is a condition that can occur later on in life. The stat is 60% of women experience some kind of urogenital issue within their lives and as estrogen declines we're more susceptible to all of those you know issues, all of those challenges. So we talk about the pelvic floor. A lot of our content talks about it in relationship to the perinatal journey, but then specifically in menopause and in healthy aging. You know, if somebody has not tapped into keeping that muscular church strong, it becomes even more, you know, important at that period in time due to some of those natural hormonal fluctuations.
Speaker 1:
Becomes even more important. Honestly, all the information that you shared was so powerful, so mind blowing and just as far as knowing the cycle and leaking, and that is so helpful. So, Antoinette, thank you so much. That is wrapping up our five minute Fridays. You guys stay tuned because we've got another series talking about the top three exercises to focus on strengthening your pelvic floor. There you guys have it five minute Friday. To connect more, I'm over at the squad underscore co on Instagram and we'll link Antoinette's and P vol info in the show notes below. Cheers and happy Friday.