Firstly, ALL WOMEN should be doing pelvic floor exercises daily whether you’re old, young, have had children or not, they should be part of our routine to treat and prevent pelvic floor issues such as incontinence and prolapse to name just a few. But how many repetitions? How many times per day?

You may have heard the phrase: “3 times a day until you’re dry, once a day until you die”

Sounds easy enough but its actually very hard to give an exact answer to this question. Everyone is different and the numbers you should be doing may be different to someone else.

Generally speaking 3 times a day to improve the strength of weak pelvic floor muscles is a good idea and this can take 3-4 months before you see results.

HOWEVER, if your muscles are very weak, this may need to be adjusted so you build up to this number. If we over-prescribe the amount of exercises, you may fatigue and start using other muscles to compensate resulting in poor technique.

Another spanner in the works is if your pelvic floor muscles are actually overactive (this can be a leading cause of incontinence) then we would prescribe a very different exercise regime for you and over-doing your pelvic floor exercises may actually worsen your symptoms.

No two women are the same and the best way to know what you should be doing is to have a pelvic floor assessment with a pelvic health physiotherapist to find out your baseline and get an individualised exercise programme specific to your pelvic floor. Then, like any strengthening programme, the exercises will need to be progressed to ensure progress is continued.

If you would like to know what pelvic exercises you should be doing then book your pelvic floor assessment with Imogen at PhysioSpace Pontcanna via the link below.