please give me some suggestions

Hi Smit

How much weight? It is not about how much. It is about how, and also about why. Your body will tell you if it is too much. If you cannot use your leg muscles to lift it, either your leg muscles are not strong enough and/or you are lifting too much. If you get the object close to you and bend your legs so you are in a half squat, your butt is out the back, your tummy is braced but not pulled in, you have a significant lumbar curve (ie it is evident when you feel the shape of your slightly concave lower back), your pelvic organs are resting on your lower front abdominal wall and your belly is between your knees *before* you lift, your pelvic organs will have to move up and out to get through the pelvic floor which will be vertical at the point of lift off. Gravity will help you. If it is too low to half squat, then kneel legs apart, lift it onto the left knee, stand on the foot of the right leg, lift the load onto the right knee, stand on the left foot, then rise to standing. If you feel pressure from something extra in your vulva, stop! Then ...

Ask yourself if there is a good reason for shifting this load.

Ask yourself if any sane woman would try and lift it by herself.

Ask yourself if you can break it up into smaller pieces.

Ask yourself if you can roll it, or put a rope around your hips and pull it (up a ramp if necessary), 'walk' it on its corners, or push it onto a bag trolley and wheel it.

Ask yourself if the sky will fall if it is not shifted immediately, and call or wait for help, or for a big, brawny bloke to do it for you.

My theory is that we take "lift with your back straight" too literally, or it is bad use of language. The vertebrae are designed so that the process of one rests on the process of the next vertebra down when the spine is diagonal. The processes even have special facets on the bottom that match exactly the facets on the top of the next one down. It is designed to work efficiently and safely when diagonal, as long as there is not too much twisting involved. I think by straight back they mean 'not with your butt tucked under, and not with the spine in a c shape'.
Walking is one of the best exercises ever. DH and I pounded the pavements of New York City for a week, about eight hours in twenty four, a couple of years ago. My feet were very stiff and tired at the end of each day, but my POPs were fine. I took a small lumbar cushion for the 24 hours of economy class flying from Oz to NYC and long train trips. I packed light and used a suitcase with wheels.

Salty seawater is just as good for POPs as not POPs. The only difference is that POPped pelvic organs float, so they go up by themselves!! I think it would be very difficult to aggravate POPs with any aquatic activity, except perhaps pulling a big fish into a boat. I dream ...

'Suck it and see' is my motto. Get to know the sensations. Read and understand the theory. Have a contingency plan for if you lose your nerve halfway through, and go for it! Enjoy your holiday, and enjoy your life.

You might find that there are things that you really enjoy that turn out to be unmanageable with POP. It then becomes a matter of managing a new reality. There will be something else that you can learn to enjoy the best because you *can* do it without worrying. No worry makes for a happier life. Worry leads to fear and fear is bondage.

I really cannot think of anything I can no longer do, except perhaps 100metre sprints after a cup of coffee. There is nothing I used to lift as a young woman that I cannot lift or shift by other means now. The upside of getting older is that you don't expect as much of yourself physically, and your children have grown stronger than you. And, you get wiser, and plan ahead so that you don't leave things where they will be difficult to move later. You give up tennis and road running and take up bellydancing or body surfing.

It is the whole glass half empty / glass half full thing!

Cheers

Louise

I think Louise is spot on about lifting. Though I have a grade 3 prolapse, I like to train with weights, and I notice at my gym that the male gorillas who love to do big lifts do NOT waste their strength putting weight plates away after they have finished with them. And rather than put heavy things down carefully, they just let them fall on the floor, and if they bounce and knock a hole in the wall, too bad! Louise has made me realise that instead of fuming over this bad behaviour I can learn from it. Every lift a wanted lift! If you don't fancy lifting something, DON'T. The people around you will soon get the idea. Don't be a martyr!

Helpful hint from "Men's Health" magazine: to move a large object eg a fridge or car, set your back against it and walk backwards with your legs doing all the work in a far stronger position than if you pushed forwards.

Have you have just discovered your POP? In my experience this is one of the most upsetting, panicky, desperate times one has to live through. "Sad" is the least of it. A year on, my life is almost back to normal, very active and lots of fun. I wonder if the cruise has to happen right now? Personally, newly diagnosed, I would prefer to stay close to base, sorting out issues like pessaries and appointments with physios, working on posture, experimenting with modifying diet etc. Newly discovered POP seems to me terribly stressful. I would not have wanted to add the benign stress of a dream vacation just then.

Do trawl through this site for a wealth of shared experience and guidance. There have been recent discussions about lifting, pessaries and everything else. Good luck!

Great lifting advice. I am more cautious than i perhaps need to be, but i do carry a 35lb child some of the time... i carry everything close to me, and if when i lift i feel a bulge, i stop. i don't lift plants or heavy groceries--lovely wheelie trolley for the latter. and i ask for help as i need.

re travel--i wouldn't worry about a cruise! walking is great for your POP, just get someone else ot carry to bags if you are out all day. take lots of time to relax, put your feet up--something i'm sure you would do on a cruise ship (not sure how old your kids are though...). but enjoy a vacation! salty seawater is great for your body as far as i know--never heard anything bad about it. enjoy swimming in the ocean, relax, and i'm sure you'll be fine. if you do a long walk build in some rests along the way, stay in posture, and be able to relax when you get back if you need.

btw, how long have you had your POP? sorry if i missed a post...

Kiki, I am very impressed that you can carry such a heavy child. In my experience, children are MUCH harder to lift and carry than objects, because they are an unstable, irregular shape and they WRIGGLE. Also, they are alive so one can't just grab hold of them and sling them around in the way that is most convenient for the lifter, still less let them fall if they seem too heavy! I just read an article advocating using bags full of sand for training instead of dumbells because they are harder to hold on to and so give a better workout. I think the gym gorillas would get an even better workout if they just carried toddlers around!

I have just remembered an early book by Arnold Schwarzenegger on weight training for women in which he encourages women to believe in their own strength. He describes how his sister in law insisted he hold her new baby, how nervous he felt and therefore how terribly awkward and heavy the baby seemed. He was quick to hand the child back to its mother, who proceeded to carry it around all day without any sign of fatigue.

very good advice, louise
I am very *bad* about lifting. I don't think much about it, just do it. sometimes I start to feel some pressure so I put whatever it is I'm lifting down. even if its a child. especially if its a child. alix is right, kids can be so hard to lift safely! but hey, as long as I'm pretty much in posture, I figure I can lift anything I used to lift. haven't hurt myself since.

I hope that if you choose to go on the cruise you are able to push these worries aside and enjoy yourself

Hi Smit

Another thing to remember is that I have found setbacks are usually due to repetitive bad manual handling, whther I was in a hurry at the time, or there wasn't an immediately workable alternative (see previous comment, usually impatient!), eg drilling holes in timber ceiling beams, on a ladder, above shoulder height, using an electric drill with a dull drill bit (see, I told you I get impatient and lazy!) where maintaining WW posture is difficult. No, DH doesn't do that sort of job. He would just ask every few weeks "What's the speaker cable hanging down for?" Life is too short for ...

Setbacks usually are not due to a one off incident, so forgive yourself if you do something in a stupid way once. It probably won't make any difference unless it is a sustained or repeated effort in the wrong direction.

Even if your uterus or bladder or rectum comes down for a couple of days, it will go up again as long as you are diligent about diet, clothing, posture and how you do other tasks for the next few days. I used to find that the last and first weeks of my menstrual cycle were strongly associated with setbacks. Now I don't have obvious luteal phases or periods I no longer seem to get setbacks. :-) I think many of my irritable times were a manifestation of premenstrual syndrome / perimenopause. I am much less moody now, much more at peace. since stopping menstruation I have realised what an old witch I had been intermittently for the previous few years! Sorry, DH!

Cheers

Louise

I moved my 7 y.o. last week from my bed to hers, and I shouldn't have. She was sound asleep and felt like a 40 pound sack of wet sand. My prolapse got significantly worse suddenly.

Louise, you sound like me. A few weeks ago I built a stone wall and was moving rocks I had no business moving. They were big and heavy and it was great fun and it felt so good to be outside working! But I shouldn't have done it. On the other hand, I can't wait around for DH to do my projects for me. Blah.

Smit, I believe mine's about a 3rd degree as well. It's hard to know what to do when.

Is it okay to tie something around my waist and pull it that way? Like if I put all those big rocks in a cart or wagon, tied it around my waist and pulled it to its destination? Oh, well, I'm still lifting them into the wagon though. Hm.

Ribbit, I would be pushing each rock onto a flat bottomed bag trolley, and wheeling them, then positioning them by digging out behind them to make a hole, and rolling the rocks into the hole, kind of like sinking a well liner. If building a wall, wheel them on the trolley around to the top end and roll them down, instead of lifting them up. Vertically lifting rocks by hand on a freestanding wall? No way!

You could also tie a rope around your rock and around your *hips* (not waist) and pull it *backwards*, reinforcing your lumbar spine, rather than going forwards and working against it. Easier if you make a little sled out of a piece of sheetmetal though, less friction. I still reckon the bag trolley is the go.

But yeah, working with rocks is so much more satisfying than washing up and dusting. No b***** comes along and rearranges all your good work. Yes!!!

Bag trolleys aren't very useful for shifting sleeping children, though. Nor is tying a rope around them and dragging them. ;-)

Ya gotta stop lifting her, or else you are teaching your kids that it is OK for Moms to do this sort of stupid stuff. Not good role modelling.

Have fun with your rocks!

L

My idea of living well with prolapse includes doing things I shouldn't do. I LIKE building things. I LIKE moving things. DH travels a good bit, so it's me and the children and the creek, cats, oak trees, rocks, and a garden plot begging for beans to be planted. Thanks for the suggestions about moving heavy things. I will keep it in mind for when the chicken coops have to be dragged around.

Hi Ribbit

That's me you are talking about, except it is gum trees instead of oaks, and dogs instead of cats!!! I am sure that you will be able to do it, but I remember feeling a little vulnerable still when my kids were little. In a few years you will be a new woman, as long as you respect your body now, and that might mean accepting a few short term limitations and working out how you can use mechanical aids. You are in a new reality and you will need to think your way around a few things. That's why the Creator gave us such a clever brain!

Cheers

Louise

:-)

Smit, when we swim in the ocean, the salt water goes up the vagina anyway. I don't see that it would make much difference if our vaginas are bulging or not. It might be really nice to go on a vacation where you don't have to do all that much. Relax (upright, with a pillow behind your low back) and enjoy it!