Urinary Incontinence (UI) aka "Leakage" Or "Peeing Your Pants"

Did you know that 1 in every 4 women over age of 18 have experienced episodes of leakage? That is crazy! But nobody talks about it! On average, women wait 6.5 years from the time of symptoms until they seek and obtain a diagnosis. For those that have given birth, did you know that birth method vaginal or c-section had no bearing on whether or not they had urinary incontinence (UI) postpartum. So that means just being pregnant was the number one risk factor for UI in women that were pregnant regardless of birthing method.

Let’s talk about the 2 main types of UI: 1) stress and 2) urge. You can also have a combo of both (mixed). Stress UI is the loss of urine during an activity such as jumping, running, impact sports or with coughing, sneezing, laughing or lifting. Under the stress UI umbrella there are subsets 1) impact sport, 2) the coughing sneezing and laughing and 3) lifting. You could have leakage with all three or with only 1 or 2. They are all treated differently and differently within in each person because everyone has a unique body make up and circumstances that they bring to the table. With Impact UI, we look at the entire body from how the foot is hitting the ground to head and neck positioning along with how the person loads pressure on the pelvic floor. With coughing, sneezing, and laughing, we start with how the person loads pressure on their pelvic floor. With lifting, we look at both how they load pressure on the pelvic floor and how their body moves in space during the lift. And with all three types we always look at breathing patterns. Yes, breathing patterns matter! Breathing directly correlates to the pelvic floor. The diaphragm and pelvic floor automatically move together when functioning well.

Urge incontinence is an occasion sudden need to urinate it can have a large volume loss of or could be just the urge to go frequently. This is treated differently than stress. This treatment includes more lifestyle modifications: diet, fluid, bowel and weight management and timed voiding. Training techniques include but not limited to 1) urgency control techniques (deep breathing, distraction techniques), 2) bladder training (progressively trying to increase the time between intervals), 3) behavioral training (trying not rush to the bathroom every time you feel the urge) and could include pelvic floor muscle training aka “Kegels” (but could make things worse if not needed) and 4) how you pee matters (do you pee like a race horse and force the urine out or do relax and naturally let the urine come out?). Again, this treatment has to be so individualized because everyone is so different.

Please don’t wait 6.5 years to start treatment! When you could start to see results in just 3-4 visits. Nobody wants to pee their pants or wear a pantyliner the rest of your life and it isn’t your fault you didn’t cause this!! And it is ok to talk to someone about this issue chances are they might be going through the same thing!

Don’t let urinary incontinence tie you to this room!