Rectocele / cystocele / teenagers

Hi All

I think I just had another lightbulb moment. We seem to have a lot of Members who are diagnosed with cystocele, then rectocele follows some time after. Or else they are diagnosed with cystocele and rectocele, but rectocele was assymptomatic.

When you start doing Wholewoman posture the bladder is no longer resting back against the rectum and supporting the rectovaginal septum. So any weakness in this fascia between the posterior vaginal wall and the rectum can worsen more easily, or an existing assymptomatic rectocele manifest itself as a bulge in the vagina.
In addition, I am wondering if the presence of a cystocele pressing against the bottom part of the rectum (assisted by everyday intraabdominal forces) is what kind of kinks the rectum above it and makes it push up against the rectovaginal septum and eventually damage it and push through it. IMHO, the bowel knows how much the rectum can hold and sends down just the right amount but if some of that space reserved for the rectum is used up by an out-of-position bladder, the rectum has to push out somewhere else every time it fills. Voila! Rectocele! So the only way to prevent rectocele is to keep the bladder forward, from puberty. (That's as well as the dietary tools that keep the bowel light.)

This may explain cystocele and rectocele in young women and women who have not given birth. It could be caused by self-conscious adolescents who are not comfortable in their changing bodies slouching to hide their newly formed breasts, and tucking their butts in an attempt to hide their newly grown childbearing hips. This translates later to the waif slouch we have seen for so many years on fashion catwalks, magazine covers and billboards.

Maybe adolescent development of POP and is the hidden and indirect result of the confusion girls experience when their bodies start changing in a world where media are pushing sexuality, their hormones are raging, and their Mums and Dads go to jelly with fear about teenage pregnancy and push the 'sex is bad' story down their adolescent daughters throats. No wonder these girls are confused and slouching!

Maybe this is yet another pressing reason to celebrate menarche as a joyful rite of passage, instead of a tumbling into the abyss of messy periods, pimples and pregnancy risk. If there was a little more celebration and a lot less hand wringing these young women could hold their heads proud and high, and keep their precious pelvic organs well forward from the start.

This model of cystocele causing rectocele probably explains why Wholewoman posture seems to make rectocele worse. Actually it doesn't - it is the damage done before Wholewoman posture is implemented that causes the rectocele. Wholewoman posture just unmasks it.

To blame Wholewoman posture on rectocele is like blaming the tradesman who re-stumps your house for all the cracks that suddenly appear in your wallpaper. He has done a good job of bringing the house back to level but unmasked how bad the levels were before.

Christine, what do you think of this theory?

Cheers

Louise