A set back..

Body: 

Hello again... i am now 10 wks pp and I have had a wonderful four wks with not much feelings as far as the prolapse go and I am back to taking walks and even doing the stairstepper at the gym. Yea! But now I fear this wknd set me back. I did some hiking with my husband and kiddos and when we returned from our vacation I new that I had a setback, and sure enough when I looked, it was peeking out. I am feeling really bummed out but still going to continue the ww posture and my favorite excersize that seems to help the best is cat and cow.
Now my question is, why when I have finished cat/cow the prolapse has moved out of view but then after a short while, its back to peeking out? Does that mean that I am not in posture correctly? Also, does the posture help to strenghten the pelvic wall or just help the symptoms? I am going to reread the book and thought I should get the video to do the excersizes.... do the excersizes also help for strengthening the pelvic wall or just to help the symptoms?
This forum has been so great to come to have in my life! Thank you all!

Hi busymama - I'm not the post-partum guru, but you sound like you've been pushing the limits at only 10 weeks. Are the gym visits really necessary, with all that you have going on just caring for your brood and cultivating WW ways? Are you doing that stairstepper in perfect WW posture, I hope? Setbacks are normal and you can't allow them to discourage you. This one might be trying to tell you to slow down. Work on the basics. If you are going to exercise right now, then yes, WW routines will gently work the right stuff. Take it easy! Keep that belly relaxed and chest pulled up in ALL that you do. Walking is great, done correctly.

Hi Busymama

The exercise are to strengthen your whole body.This makes it easier to stay in WW posture and extends the range of movement of all your muscles. Your pelvic floor (wall) muscles will become stronger by themselves if you keep to using your body in WW posture.

The gym work may be making you stronger, but remember that your body took 9 months to grow to accommodate your baby, so it is going to take at least that to shrink back on the inside, no matter what your body looks like on the outside. Going at the exercise really hard is not going to make your body revert any quicker.

Ten weeks pp is around the time many Moms start to feel really prolapsey, so you may have to wait until at least six months until you start to experience real improvement. That's just the way it happens. We don't know why. You just have to be patient and trust your body. After that, the improvements will continue until about 2 years pp.

Louise

Okay.. you ladies are right. I might as well slow down and just slowly ease back into things! I am anxious to recieve the dvd. When I have been doing the ww posture I have noticed hip pain so i looked in the search forum and noticed others do to. I have always had my feet turn out when I walk and now that i am trying to correct it, it must be making the hips a little sore.

Busymama, I simply cannot describe the joy I felt, sometime in this, my second year of WW work, when I realized that the posture had truly become second nature and that my torso actually felt like it was "seated" properly over my hip joints for the first time in my life. Protecting the hip joints is a really huge part of what this work is all about. I'm not surprised about the hip soreness some people get at the beginning, but it's just like anything that's new and working unfamiliar muscles. You are young and newly PP, which I can't relate to directly, but I can imagine that aspect adds some extra challenges. Take it easy, this is going to make a huge difference down the road even if you aren't quite feelin' it yet!