Weak Pelvic Floor Muscles Symptoms

What is Pelvic floor?

The pelvic floor is the structure that contains all of your vital organs. The true pelvis or lower part of our abdomen includes a cavity known as "the Pelvic Cavity" which houses these important parts within it!

A pelvic floor is a group of muscles and ligaments that stretch from the pubic bone in the front to the coccyx, or tailbone, at the back. The pelvic floor acts as a supportive sling to keep your organs supported and in place. At the same time, it helps to support your low back by giving you something to press against with your abdominal muscles.

The pelvic floor muscles act as sphincters to control urination and defecation. They also contract during sexual intercourse, giving extra feeling to the man and helping the couple reach orgasm at the same time! The pelvic floor works with the vagina, bladder, urethra, and rectum to provide support.

Pelvic floor women diagram

Symptoms of weak pelvic floor

Pelvic floor of men and women

One of the most embarrassing symptoms of weak pelvic floor that can happen to you is when your pelvic floor muscles are too weak and not able to do their job properly. This leads many people to have discomfort during physical relation, leaking urine or stool through small tears in their anus (known as fissures), sometimes even passing out because there wasn't enough air getting into our body while we were trying so desperately hard just let go!

How does this happen? First of all, it has been known for a while that people who have gone through some kind of trauma in their lives (either just before or during puberty), usually females and teenagers, can develop weak pelvic floor muscles. It is said that this condition can be caused by accidents, surgeries, endocrine or nervous system disorders (such as stress), and even childbirth.

pelvic floor structure
pelvic floor structure

Since this is such a common problem, it has been researched quite thoroughly, and although no definite conclusions were made, there are some ideas on why they might happen. Researchers think that when you go through any of the mentioned events, you can develop vaginismus. Although this symptom cannot be identified right away by your doctor (it usually takes some time until it starts to cause problems), everyone who experienced these issues should know that if their pelvic floor muscles are not strong enough, they might need to do some special exercises or contact a physiotherapist in order to recover.

Pelvic Floor exercises

  1. Kegels

Weak Pelvic muscle training or Kegels can help if you experience urine leakage from sneezing, laughing and jumping. It is also the perfect solution for people who feel an overwhelming need to urinate just before losing large amounts of liquid in their body!

Many women experience pelvic floor weakness after giving birth to a child. They may notice that a small amount of urine escapes when they cough, sneeze or laugh. This can be very unpleasant and embarrassing for those affected by it. Fortunately, the exercises called "Kegels" are a solution to strengthen the pelvic muscles and prevent further leakage.


2. Bridge
The bridge is a great exercise for the glutes, and it also activates pelvic floor muscles. Even without weight, you can feel this movement as it pauses at one point with short pulses in-between positions of lying down on your back to sitting up straight with legs extended out before rotating both forward until they are resting against each other again .

To execute the bridge, lie on your back feet flat on the ground and arms by your side. Use your glutes to raise your hips off the floor towards the ceiling until straight. Slowly lower yourself back down to starting position with control. To increase intensity try holding yourself up in an elevated position putting all weight in just two legs without any support. Once you need to take a break, pause and use short pulses of glutes in between sets before returning back.


3. Split tabletop
Split-tabletop is a wonderful tool for many of the moves in Pilates routines. By adding this to your workout, you’ll be activating muscles such as those found at the hips and pelvic floor which can help give an all-around great feeling!

Split-tabletop exercises are so great because they really help open up the hips at different angles. The muscles used here can be extremely tight due to overuse of daily activities such as sitting, standing with locked knees, and even by using poor exercise techniques!


4. Bird Dog

The bird dog is a perfect movie for anyone who wants to work their entire body. This exercise requires balance and stability, but most importantly engages the pelvic floor muscles which will give you an incredible foundation of strength as they are so often targeted when working out with weights or coaching other athletes on how they can safely utilize these areas to win!

Here is my interpretation of how to do this exercise depending on whether you are leaning forward or backward. I like to use these two variations to engage slightly different muscles within the pelvic floor region. If you are looking for something truly unique, make sure to try both back and front bird dogs!


The Front Bird Dog:

Step 1: Get in a pushup position with your arms completely straight. Your shoulders should be stacked over the wrists and hips directly above the heels. Note: Make sure to keep your stomach muscles contracted throughout this exercise.

Step 2: Brace your abs tight and curl your toes under so that you are balancing on top of them.

Step 3: Keeping your hips still, lift the opposite arm and leg off of the ground. Try to get your elbow and knee to touch without letting your hips move at all.

Step 4: Hold for a count of 5 seconds while keeping tension on the abdominals. Repeat with another side. Perform a total of 10 reps.


The Back Bird Dog

Step 1: Get in a pushup position with your arms completely straight. Your shoulders should be stacked over the wrists and hips directly above the heels. Note: Make sure to keep your stomach muscles contracted throughout this exercise.

Step 2: Brace your abs tight and curl your toes under so that you are balancing on top of them.

Step 3: Keeping your hips still, lift the opposite arm and leg off of the ground. Try to get your elbow and knee to touch without letting your hips move at all.

Step 4: Hold for a count of 5 seconds while keeping tension on the abdominals. Repeat with another side. Perform a total of 10 reps.

Tip: I like to first do 5-10 reps of regular bird dogs before switching up to the front and back variations. This will help strengthen the same muscles you are targeting with these exercises while also working on your overall balance.