Some help on things getting worse (would love it if Christine could see)

Hi lifegoeson. You've been a member here for a long time, so you've heard everything I'm going to say, probably several times from any number of people.

First, 4 months PP is probably not a good time to be assessing your progress; you have a long way to go, and you are probably not really able to focus on your own needs any time soon. So stay patient. There are still many changes to come.

Second, there is no cure for prolapse, and you will be experiencing ups and downs for the rest of your life. We are managing our conditions. We all have bad days, we all have setbacks. The organs move around all the time, and you aren't ever going to be able to keep them in line all the time. They will misbehave.

Third, it's entirely possible that there is something missing in your understanding of WW posture. You talk about the hunched back.....what about the rest of it? It isn't enough to just stand up straight and not hunch. All the elements of posture are important. If you stand in correct alignment, with your belly totally relaxed and your chest is pulled up strongly, then the abdominals are pulled up (never pulled in) which is what closes that separation of the muscles that is experienced as a diastasis. This will become clearer with the release of Goddess Belly and Christine has a new workout routine that will be a part of this.

Christine has a lot of exercises and moves, and I'm not sure which ones you are specifically referring to (the ones that feel good but you think are making your symptoms worse). You also seem to be concerned about your belly and the fact that you think you still look pregnant. This leads me to wonder if you are not, maybe at a subconscious level, sabotaging your efforts by trying to tighten or hold in those muscles.

A belly in true WW posture is long and strong and rounded and curvaceous. Relax the belly, pull the chest up, and see if that pull doesn't help close that gap. This is what we all have to work with. You aren't getting your old body back, but your new one can actually be an improvement, prolapse and all.

What else do you do to keep the organs forward? Do you jiggle/firebreathe regularly? No one with 3 prolapses is going to keep things under control without a few extra tools, and these are the bare minimum that you can get away with in addition to posture, exercise, good diet and toilet habits.

OK, so you know all this and you're doing all of it? Then just keep in mind that you will have to learn to accept bad days as well as good ones. - Surviving

Hi,

What a great answer Surviving60 - I always learn a lot from you. I am too new to add much but I have found pulling up my chest the hardest part but it is helping me. I thought maybe you had trouble with this too since you said you had a hunched back. I assume if your chest is pulled up you would not have this. Of course that will take a few years for those muscles to change.

I have all 3 organs prolapsed too but am nearly 2 years pp so a bit further along but I have only been doing this for 6 months. I found relaxing the belly ok (surprisingly as I was very experienced at pulling it in) and I did have to get over having a belly (and a bum). I still wear loose tops over leggings but will get there with showing my curves. I try to copy my daughter and get that long round belly that Surviving mentioned.

Good luck, it is so hard with young kids isn't it but I hope our body and organs are more able to move with our younger age on the plus side and we should all end up with great hips in the long run!

Am looking forward to goddess belly. Oh I want to lose about 4kg and then show off my WW figure but taking things slow as prolapse demands.

One last thought lifegoeson04 (which you probably know) but I remember Christine mentioning that pp women will have a slight abdominal separation always and this is probably normal. It was mentioned in her book. Is your separation quite big. I don't like to tense my abs to feel mine but I think it's about a finger width. It will be interesting what life goddess belly sheds on this area. I cringe that less than 2 years ago in the pelvic physio talk at the birth centre (kegals of course) that for any girls with abs separated more than two finger widths were told to buy belly binding and it was available then and there. Thankfully I was deemed ok so never wore any. Oh and the picture they gave of our organs was wrong. Angry, angry, angry - deep breaths. Thank you Christine for your wisdom!!!

Yes, thanks for pointing this out A&L. I did find this section in the pregnancy chapter, where Christine states "pulling the abdomen up instead of in causes tightening along natural fascial planes and a drawing together of the recti toward the center". This will be explained in great detail in Goddess Belly.

Yes, I did have a pretty rounded back when I started this. I still fall into slumpy posture a little bit from time to time, especially when I'm tired, as Christine herself noticed when I traveled to the conference this past August. But here's the thing: My persistent issues have more to do with my shoulders continuing to round towards the front. Though WW posture calls for shoulders to be down, not pulled back, I have discovered that I need to pull mine back somewhat just to compensate and get the chest really opened.

But as far as pulling the chest UP, this was pretty easy for me to grasp once I got the relaxed-belly thing figured out. The main thing that helped me remember to pull up my chest was my desire NOT to look pregnant. I have my share of belly fat and if I stay strongly pulled up in the front, I don't mind how I look. And if I could ditch about 10 pounds, I'd be right where I'd like to be. When I started this work I refused to wear anything remotely body-hugging, but over time I've become more proud of that Goddess Belly. And I'm 64!

I do have the greatest respect for those of you younger ones trying to deal with this and small kids at the same time. But on the plus side, as A&L has pointed out, you have such great potential to remold your bodies back to natural posture. If you can truly train your bodies to live in this shape, then it doesn't matter how busy you are.....in fact, the more active, the better. - Surviving

Thanks lifegoeson for posting. I'm guessing I have ab muscle separation as I still look very pregnant for 9 weeks pp. I also looked up the pregnancy ch in the saving the whole woman book and got that pulling up the chest is the most effective thing to do. Doing that also makes me feel more confident. I'm focusing on not caring what anyone else "might" think about it as I'm so happy to have my children and that is most important. I'm also hopeful that by improving posture and losing some excess fat, the preg look will diminish. I do recommend the 2nd wheel DVD. There is a sqatting exercise on it that i dont do as i dont think im doing it properly and makes prolapse feel worse. I will have to check out the first aid one again too - I just wasn't sure when I can do fire breathing etc? I will probably go to doc again soon to make sure my uterus has gone down etc. but after reading I think it's just the muscle separation. Although I just tried to feel how many finger widths and can not work that out? Not sure if you are talking bout going to floor in general or with exercise but either way if I'm thinking properly I try to maintain lumber curve.
Thank you surviving 60 & activeandlapsed - your replies have helped me too. Also, are belly bands like what you wear when pregnant but tighter bad to wear with prolapse if tummy is still somewhat relaxed?

It's OK to use support during pregnancy as long as it is well underneath the belly, not constricting it in any way. Post partum I don't know why someone would put something tight over her belly. If you understand WW posture, it's clear that is one of the worst things you can do prolapse-wise. If you have typical muscle separation, pushing the sides of the abdomen together is a misguided concept, not to mention an aggravation of prolapse. Bring the muscles together horizontally with posture. Christine explains this better. - Surviving

I guess my question is what us making your back so hunched? The way you describe it, it sounds rather severe. Have you ever had that checked out?

Thanks for clarifying surviving 60 - they seem so tempting! But will work on posture instead.

Hi Ladies,

These belly bands are bad. That is what I meant. They were a stretchy band of fabric that you put over your belly to support it. Terrible as you would not be able to relax your belly. It seems like the dark ages given what I know now but of course this is what many people do and what we hear celebrities doing for red carpet events etc.

Thankfully I never used one or put anything constricting on when pregnant. I just used my muscles and posture to pull myself in!! I never even looked pregnant until over 20 weeks. Terrible when I look back. I did try to fit my jeans and it was very uncomfortable when I was sitting down (I now know it's because my organs were being shoved into my vagina). I don't wear jeans anymore.

I will reread that pregnancy chapter for the chest info in Saving the Whole Women.

Sorry Lifegoeson04, I cannot be much help except to say hope you can get some clarity soon and move things forward.

Oh almost forgot. The finger thing was done by pelvic floor physio 'experts' hence I don't suggest trying it. We lay on the floor on our backs. 2 days after giving birth and did a little ab crunch (knees bent) and popped the tips of our fingers in the gap to see how many we could fit. They did say only to do the crunch for the purpose of checking the gap and not to do ab work again. That was one good thing. I think you could just feel things with breathing deeply while standing in WW posture though and of course expect it to take 2 years to recover from the birth as mentioned on this forum regularly. Or just not worry about this at all and get on with doing WW work and the muscles will do what is natural in time. Sorry easy for me to say as I have no belly issues so am lucky in that regard (well if I don't eat till full or I get bloated easily which makes POP worse and then I feel I look pregnant).

Thanks A&L for explaining that finger test. I never quite knew what it was about. And it all sounds a bit circular and self-fulfilling to me. You place yourself in the worst possible position, just to see how far you can get the muscles to separate, and then you say "oh no, look at this separation, I need to push these muscles back together!" I guess if you look for trouble, you will be sure to find it, huh? Better to stay in WW posture and let the muscles comes together the healthy and natural way. - Surviving

I agree they just need to start teaching WW to pelvic physios!!!