Sore

I am sorry to hear that you are in pain. It is impossible to say if you are doing anything wrong. It is a process to find a new life posture. chances are, you have made some good strides in starting on the road to this new you. If you are relaxing your tummy, lifting your chest, breathing into your belly and lifting slightly at the crown of the head....then you have begun. I have learned in these six or seven months, that especially without learning at the careful hands of a teacher, we are guiding ourselves as we go along. Discoveries will be made and we will all improve our posture, life and yes, prolapse. The soreness could well be from this massive change. You were used to slouching and now you are a queen.....big change! For me, the first two or so weeks were very very sore. My hips, back and whole body was aching, but after a few weeks, that soreness went away and although there are days when things may ache or not feel so good, the improvements are enormous. How long have you been working at it? On the road to recovery and healing, we often find that soreness, tenderness, even pain can be a sign of change. I cannot address the sharp pain you are feeling but maybe other women have some insight. Best wishes to you!

Hmmmmm…..teacher question, maybe. I agree with Ms. N. I didn’t have any kind of pain other than the good kind you get from waking up lazy, underused muscles and joints. If you were having trouble feeling good in posture, I’d say maybe cut back and slow things down a bit. But since the posture itself is a positive experience for you already, I’m not sure what to say about the aches and pains. I assume you’re sitting in posture too? Not slumping back into the chair and collapsing the spine? I don’t know. If it persists, with your history you might want to get it checked out, to rule out other issues. - Surviving

Hi Boohoo

I had a retroverted uterus all through my childbearing, and I used to tuck my butt and suck my tummy in too, right from being a teenager. I have no doubt at all that my posture contributed to my chronically retroverted uterus. Have a look at The Whole Woman Inc. on Facebook. There is an image from Gray's Anatomy that I edited with Photoshop to illustrate what I think happens when we change our posture.

There is a sheet of peritoneum that spans the pelvic inlet (the big roundish hole in the centre of the pelvis). There is a closed fold / doubled flap of peritoneum running from side to side right across this round membrane. It enfolds the uterus, fallopian tubes and ovaries. The fold of peritoneum extends out into the abdominal cavity and is free to move in the abdominal cavity.

You will see how easy it is for a uterus to tip backwards, and even get jammed back and upside down when the butt is really tucked under. It actually folds back and can go down into the Pouch of Douglas, between the rectum and the vagina, and may damage the fascia connecting the rectum and the vagina, resulting in rectocele, if it is pushed down hard enough by the weight of the intestines on the top, and perhaps chronic coughing (as in my case). The round ligaments (the only real uterine ligaments) would have been stretched taut while my uterus was retroverted. The round ligaments come off the top corners of the uterus just below the fallopian tubes. Their role is to keep the uterus anteverted. I think the uterus will fold backwards if it is pushed backwards by butt-tucked posture, and there is insufficient length in the round ligaments for it to stand upright. So there is a lot of pushing and pulling of the uterus, and it is jammed up against the sacrum. Perhaps that is the back pain you feel? Perhaps round ligament tension is the front pain you feel?

The only possibility I can see was that a drastic change in posture (to WW posture) eventually rotated all my pelvic organs with my uterus and bladder moving forwards and downwards onto my lower abdominal wall, and supported on my pubic bones, my vagina stretching out lengthwise by being pulled up and forward, and my intestines falling forwards onto my abdominal wall instead of being squashed down at the back. My rectum would also have stretched out by being pulled up and forward at the top. At the time I was perimenopausal, so my uterus was smaller, and possibly more mobile.

I think you could try and move your uterus forward to normal position by spending a lot of time as a quadruped, with a relaxed belly, and just encourage it slowly to come forward into your belly aided by gravity. When you are up and about, teach yourself to bend over from the hips, rather than from the waist. This will maintain your lumbar curve and allow you to keep your pelvis tilted further forward, which in turn will get this rotation of organs happening. When you are upright try and maintain a lifted chest. Do firebreathing, both on all fours and in the 'hands on bent knees with feet apart' position. You can also learn nauli, a yoga exercise for rotating the abdominal contents around the abdominal cavity. This will help to loosen any sticking bits. Bowen therapy might also help to unstick your connective tissue in your abdomen and pelvis. I don't know how long it will take, but this seems to be the only logical way to get your uterus to move forwards and alleviate your pain, if this is the cause of your pain.

A couple of us have managed to antevert the uterus. There may be more.

I suffered back problems for years as a young women and have scans of numerous ragged lumbar discs which resisted all physiotherapy, exercises and healing attempts until I took on WW posture, and let my lumbar curve have its way. It took about four years, but my uterus eventually turned itself over to normal presentation and I no longer have the back pain I used to have.

Louise

EDIT: I have just done a spot of reading on myasthenia gravis. This might make it more difficult for you to strengthen your upper body. Yes? Do you take cortisone or other drugs for it? I am sorry I glossed over this when I was first reading your post.

Louise,
You have really described very well what my uterus has been doing all these years. Before doing the posture and exercises, it was hanging on the rectal side, and I was having all the squishing and burning, and back pain also. Now over a month into this, she is nestled more on the pubic side, still low, but not sticking out anymore, thank goodness! I don't have the pain and burning, unless I overdo, and then it is only in the lower vagina, not high up as it used to be. I am so grateful for this program to get this far all ready.
I was just wondering,"what does it feel like to have an anteverted uterus?" I don't think I even remember, since it had to have started retroverting as a teenager also. Must have been those full on 100 sit ups a night to get those tight abs. Lol!
I don't have unrealistic expectations of having results like yours, because I feel pretty darn good right now! Just curious.

Funny that you should mention the 100 situps thing.

Before I had babies I went through a phase of doing 10BX or 5BX or some other similarly named program. It was a fitness program from the Canadian armed forces or something similar. There were two programs, one for men and one for women. I sure felt buff when I could do all those situps, but I now know that this could have been yet another factor that tipped me towards POP, along with childhood constipation, post viral coughing all my life, being superwoman in my younger days and a DH who doesn't do physical chores without a machine and a kick in the bum; forceps and episiotomy for my first baby's birth; cortisone (weakens connective tissue) puffers for asthma for several years; lifting heavy loads from a full squat, with straight spine, as instructed, rather than a half-squat, and spine extended into a big lumbar curve; zip and tuck posture, and decades of obsession with making my chubby belly flat. It was a perfect storm, really.

Mind you, I have done some good things over the years too. I shudder to think what might have happened POP-wise if my childhood family's food culture had not been veges and fruit, and more veges and fruit. I also had two further good quality hospital vaginal births that were near to perfect, and active, with little intervention. I have always gone without shoes whenever possible and stuck to flats where I could. I have been a whole foods freak since I left home. The old-fashioned ways have proved their worth.

Life ain't perfect, but it is pretty darned good!

BTW, I used to have vaginal and vulval irritation and burning during perimenopause, which was aggravated by too much penetrative sex (semen pH?). I don't have a lot of sex at the moment and my vulva and vagina are very happy. Actually, they were reasonably happy after menopause when I was having more sex too, esp with Christine's Bliss Balm.

L

I too am very sore and I was very active before. I did at least 500 sit ups a week sometimes more. Lifting always....ext. I am going slowly now think I went into to fast in the begining. I love the posture it makes me feel good about myself..... it seems so natural.....I am very new to this.

Hmmm.... Will have to look into this bliss balm. I have been using honey on the real sore days with great results, but hadn't thought of the sex thing. Thank you!!

Mika, I know how it feels to have to start slow when all you want is be normal again right now! I have been doing the exercises on the first aid to prolapse DVD and the first wheel yoga DVD every day for about a month now. I alternate between them every other day. Also jiggling and fire breathing in between. I have been going at my own pace, not trying to keep up with all of it. That will come in time I am sure, but those exercises are really reinforcing my posture so well! Christine says in the video that how much you do is subjective, so other people would probably do more or less than what I am, but all I know is that it is working.
I am going to buy the rest of them after Christmas for a belated Christmas present for myself! I think it is really worth it!!!

There used to be a video of Christine making balm somewhere on the site. I wonder if it is still there? There are instructions on the Internet, try Youtube. You can control the consistency of it by adjusting the ratio of wax to oil and add the essential oils that you like.

Louise

Look on the Resources tab and find Christine's Living Arts. The video is there.