gussiegrips is a physio who specialises in prolapses and how to exercise your pelvic floors to reverse this to some extent. She is brilliant . This was on a thread but there is also a more recent one somewhere where most of the ladies didn't have surgery but had managed to manage their prolapses.
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gussiegrips Tue 23-Oct-12 12:18:28
Sorry to hear you felt like you were timewasting, Tadpoley - and well done for not giving up.
Makes me cross - link to a website and do your exercises for six months and nothing else? No wonder women don't comply, that's not great care!
First of all - don't panic. There's a train of thought that says that if a woman's had two vaginal delivery it is normal for her to have a grade 2 prolapse. Does't mean she has to put up with it, just that it's essentially a normal consequence of birth because it's soooooo common.
Second of all - do yerblardyexercises. That really is key. If you do them, you'll notice a difference within 6 weeks. If you don't notice an improvement (not neccessarily a cure) by then - see your GP again.
So, what webpage did they direct you to?
I keep it simple - it's compliance that does the trick.
- hold for 10 secs. Really squeeze - you should feel a "drop" when you let go
- 10 quick flicks
- Imagine you've got a tiny wee lift in your vag. Bear with me! Lift the elevator to the first, second and third floors and then back down again.
Do those three exercises at least three times a day. Every day. Without fail. Until you die.
Simples.
If it doens't help, then you can get assorted tools that will assist in doing the exercises, or give you feedback from doing the exercises. GP can prescribe some - like the pelvic toner that advertises on mn.
So, questions to ask are:
what sort of prolapse do you have?
What should you avoid doing?
What exercises should you be doing?
How much strength do you have in your pelvic floor? (ie, can you squeeze)
How long will you have to wait to see a women's health physio?
Will they prescribe you a pelvic toner?
Take a list of all your symptoms - any peeing/pooping/farting when you don't want to needs to be reported. Also, any loss of sexual function - so can you feel anything, and can you orgasm the way you want to? Any feelings of things "falling out" or bulges?
And, at the risk of sounding like your GP won't do her job - don't take no for an answer. Continence is not on the QoF scheme, so anecdotally, sometimes patients need to shout a bit louder than they'd like for a referral. THough, please don't shout at your GP!