The One Muscle Every Man Should Be Training

Most men never think about their pelvic floor... until something starts going wrong.

In this NSFB Quicky, Coralie explains why these overlooked muscles affect bladder control, core strength, pelvic pain, and even erectile function. Plus, she shares one surprisingly simple exercise you can start doing today.

Transcript

Coralie 0:00

Gentlemen, we are going to talk about the most important muscles that you've probably don't really hear about, think about that often, and that is your pelvic floor. I'm Coralie, and this is this month's Not Safe for Brunch quickie. What is your pelvic floor? Your pelvic floor is a group of muscles that goes from your pubic bone at the front to your tailbone at the back, and it's sort of like a hammock, like a supportive sling, and it's holding everything up. It's holding your bladder up, you know, your kidneys, your liver, your stomach, your brain. It's holding up basically your entire upper body. And those muscles, they help control your bladder, control your bowels, they support sexual function, they provide core strength and stability, and they support the bladder, the rectum, and even the prostate. They work together with your deep abdominal muscles and back muscles to support your pelvic organs. So not only is it important to think about doing pelvic floor exercises, but making sure that a core workout is part of your routine because if you don't have a strong core, then it's really counterintuitive to your pelvic floor. Like if your pelvic floor is really strong, it really doesn't matter because your weak core is gonna counteract that. So working with them both is important. And it doesn't matter if you're like, I don't care if I have a six-pack abs, it's not about that. It's not about your deep core muscles, no one can see. No one's gonna know if you have a strong deep core muscle for the most part. Like they're not, they're the they're not the top muscles, they're the ones underneath. And unlike most muscles in the body, the pelvic floor muscles are both voluntary and involuntary, which means they basically never get a break. Like they are working 24-7. And pelvic floor dysfunction happens when these muscles don't work properly. They might be too weak, they might be too tight, they might be poorly coordinated. And this can lead to symptoms such as urine leakage, frequent urination. We all know that person that seems to go to the bathroom every five minutes, constipation, erection difficulties, or even pain in the pelvis, genitals, or rectum. And in some people, these muscles can remain tense and really go into spasms, making the symptoms more severe and potentially worsening over time. So, some fast facts are about one in ten men will experience pelvic pain caused by pelvic floor dysfunction at some point in their lives. And that answer is probably a lot higher because stereotypically, sorry to say, men don't go to the doctor as much as women. They don't talk to the doctor, especially when it comes to something like this. For some reason, the pelvic floor feels sexual when it's I mean, it it helps with sex, but it's not a sexual organ. And even if it was, you got to be able to talk to your doctor about everything. If you can't talk to your doctor about sex, about your shit, about your piss, what are you even doing? What are you even doing? And if your doctor's making you feel uncomfortable and you talk about that stuff, find a new doctor. Really? Because men, because they don't talk about it, it takes about seven years to be diagnosed. And also, on top of not talking about it, because it's not talked about as much, it's often misdiagnosed because it mimics things, it mimics having a poor pelvic floor, it mimics prostate problems, it mimics bladder disorders, and it can even mimic an STI. So talk to your doctor so it doesn't take seven years to get that diagnosis and get some help. Because when your pelvic muscles are too weak or too tight, they can't bring or hold blood flow into the penis. So, and we all know you need to have blood flow there to maintain an erection, to achieve an erection. And a lot of times people don't think like, oh, whatever, I gotta go to the bathroom more often. Think about your boner, okay? Think about your future boners. Erectile dysfunction is so common in men over 40. And I this, I don't know the science behind this, but I'm gonna guess that some of that is because of the lack of care towards the pelvic floor. I know we have testosterone and hormonal changes, but you know, you gotta do things to be preventative, right? And having a strong pelvic floor can, you know, help make that make that happen later. Make that happen when you're much older. Now you can go online or you can go find a physiotherapist and you can get pelvic floor exercises or, you know, those deep core exercises to do. I'm not a physiotherapist, so I'm not gonna give you a bunch of exercises, but I am gonna give you one exercise that a physiotherapist um told me to suggest to men years ago when I was having this conversation with her about men's pelvic floor. So you got a wiener, okay? Now you might already exercise it. If you get out of the shower and you put, you know, a towel over it and you're like, look what I can do, and you go up and down, up and down, up and down with it. That motion works your pelvic floor. Think about the muscles you use to stop and start the flow of your urine, um, you know, or even to like squeeze at the back door. That's all your pelvic floor. Moving your penis up and down like this is working your pelvic floor. So you can work it if you're like, I can't do a towel on it, work it like this. Nice and easy. Then if you need some resistance, you're like, that's too easy, put a towel on it. You can this is just a face cloth. You can even get it wet. That's going to make it heavier, create more resistance. You can even just put it at the tip. That's going to make it harder to do. And if you're like, okay, that's easy peasy, move up to a hand towel. Do the same thing. Start at the end, get it wet, move it towards the tip. Everything you're just that's sort of like adding weights, right? If you're doing a regular workout, it's like adding weights. And if you can do that with like a Costco-sized bath towel, especially a wet one, you might be going into the Guinness Book of World Records, okay? So that is a quick, easy exercise you can do. And when you start your exercise regime, know that it takes anywhere from four to 12 weeks of consistently working out. That's three to four times a week, before you're going to notice a difference. Now, if you want to see it faster, do it daily. But you know, doing it three to four times a week, you're gonna notice it in anywhere from four to twelve weeks. Everyone is different, but you have to be consistent basically for the rest of your life. You know, a lot of these exercises like that, you can do it every time you get out of the shower, whatever, have fun with it. Because you do want to make sure that you are giving your pelvic floor a little bit of love. You want to be preventative towards everything that can happen as we get older, and your pelvic floor has been supporting your ass this entire time, so show it some love back.