9 weeks pp

Just a few thoughts while you are waiting for someone who may have had something similar experiences replies.

The urge to urinate is not unusual during pregnancy; its most frequent cause being the weight of the baby etc pressing on the bladder.

The feeling of sitting on something is the way women often describe prolapse of the uterus and/or bladder.

It does sound like you have been conscientious at ensuring good medical care and they are having a hard time discovering what the problem might be. Whether this means it is something unusual is hard to know.

You might consider cystourethrocele, it is similar to a prolapse of the bladder but develops when the upper part of the urthrea (the bladder neck) also drops down. Either of these conditions can cause stress incontinence (coughing, laughing) or overflow incontinence when the bladder gets too full or a feeling of incomplete emptying and if there is nerve damage then urge incontinence can develop.

Suggesting this sounds like a real downer, but if it should prove to be prolapse then possible repercussions can be good motivators to get started on the Whole Woman posture sooner rather than later.

Christine’s book “Saving the Wholewoman” discusses cystocele in its different forms and helps you identify what you have.

You could try putting urethra in the search box at the top of this page and read through threads around this subject.

I’m sure you would have researched the probabilities of IC and would know how to recognise and treat it if it were that, as you have also gone on an anti yeast diet.

Yes, pelvic organ prolapse (POP) can make you feel like you need to go 24/7, I certainly, with a uterine prolapse, have experienced it. Following WW advice has certainly helped that. But I guess it is not the only thing that will cause that bearing an IC in mind, or intestinal inflammation being another, and delayed elimination of faeces another, all of which can be connected with prolapse, or can exist independently.

When you see the gyn about the cyst, check about the lumps, these may be rugae, they may be not.

Best wishes, Fab

I am amiss Msgaran, not to congratulate you on your new baby. I wish you both a fortunate life of pleasant companionship. I went straight to your problems and not your joy. I do apologise. Did you have a boy to charm you or a daughter to idolize you? I had only boys whom I loved, but a house full of boys made it hard to have balance. Now I have a beautiful granddaughter and I have my balance.

But back to your questions. Look, we may be getting way ahead of ourselves in assuming that you have a prolapse, but you need to go with your instincts pending knowing otherwise. All the advice that Christine gives is to try to make sure that all prolapses return to their true position. In the case of bladder and uterine prolapse this means the organ goes up and then forward over the pelvic bone.

The first thing she recommends is that you assume WWposture in all your activities, you can find descriptions of this if you use the search box at the top of the page and type in posture. It means holding your upper torso straight so that your natural lumbar curve and lower belly is relaxed.

The second thing we look at is making sure that we empty the bladder completely. When you sit on the toilet, you need to lift yourself slightly off the toilet seat so that your weight is on your feet. This should push your bladder forward and thus make it easier to empty.

Neither of these things is easy to accomplish straight off and one generally needs a bit of time to mentally assimilate the ideas and then physically practice them and time to make them feel natural, but they are the essential beginnings.

If you can buy Christine’s book, if you are diagnosed as having a prolapse, or just know that it is what it is, you will find it very informative and of great value in the self management journey of prolapse. At your young age, there should be no real need for surgery and if it is advised, you need a lot of information about what is proposed, and why, before you should sign up for it. And it won’t be advised until you have finished having children anyway.

Also at your young age, there will be a lot of natural healing taking place over the next two years, so you are not to worry unduly if it should prove to be prolapse. Given time for most people, these things go away. But you are right to investigate what can be done.

While you are lying down perhaps you could massage or rub just very gently just above your pelvic bone where the bladder would be sitting. If you can relax that area it will mean you will have to get up and void, but it will also hopefully mean that it will be a good void and you will be able to go off to sleep and forget your woes at least until morning even if baby wakes you during the night.

I am glad that you are enjoying your beautiful baby and that this constant need to void is your only, though agreed nuts driving affliction.

Just keep coming back with any questions you have, there will be more ladies back on board soon and they can give you their own views.

Best wishes, Fab

We suggest you walk and sit and stand as much as possible in WWposture. This means that when you bend over to empty dishwashers, place the cat’s food bowl etc that you bend from the hips rather than the waist. This allows you to maintain your lumbar curve. I myself prefer to get down on my knees for a lot of things like weeding in the garden, picking toys up off the floor, and giving little ones hugs

Aches and pains in the lower abdomen/pelvic area are common to prolapse, but they are also common to pelvic area infections, so it is good that you are going to the doc to check things out.

Why does pelvic organ prolapse get worse the further away from the birth? I think that has been the 6 million dollar question asked a lot on this forum. It could be that the trauma has weakened things, at first you are careful and only do light duties and then when you are comfortable and relaxed, you tend to think you are back to normal and overdo things. Then you have learnt your lesson and know better not what to do so by 6 months you feel a lot better. Plus, of course healing has had time to take affect. That is but one theory. But then we can ask why do cysts happen and we can find exceptions and objections to make any broad explanation dubious.

It is a matter really of looking at what you yourself did, which may give you some sort of feasible explanation which you can then test out with other people of similar symptoms as on this forum or with your doc who sees a lot of people with similar symptoms. That should keep you own explanations within the boundaries of probability.

Cheers, Fab

Hi MrsGaran

Fab has given you all the info that I think is relevant. It is horrible when you have sensations that you don't understand, and when no professional can pinpoint its cause.

Yes, I would say you have some sort of prolapse, maybe to do with your urethra, but as the doctor said, you look just like any other women who has had a baby. That may seem to be a glib answer, but we just have to get used to the fact that a baby has grown in your womb and has come out recently through that tiny hole, as it was meant to, and it simply takes a lot of time for the body to reconfigure itself back to pre-pregnancy.

I never really looked at my vulva before having babies, and it was pretty scary afterwards, when I saw what I saw. Nevertheless, it does all go back to normalish, but it may be taking longer than you expected.

When you feel any part of your body with your fingers, that you don't normally see, like your back, any moles or lumps can feel enormous and distorted. Feeling a chipped tooth with your tongue it seems like a canyon in the tooth. I am not saying it is in your imagination, simply that this is a new way of being for your body, and it is unfamiliar and a bit unpredictable and scary.

I also think that as new mothers, our brain goes into here/now mode. We are concentrating on the baby and on ourselves, almost as one person at times. Our horizons can be very narrow. Babies take a long time to develop any independence at all! So, I think we are hard-wired to be ultra-sensitive to the relationship and everything that surrounds it. This means that is very difficult to imagine the baby as a grown up man, or even their first day of school in a few years time, or even learning to walk. We just want it to happen, but there is nothing that can hurry it up. Everything slows down on a day to day basis and we take in every little thing.

Likewise we want our old body back, or at least a body that is not still suffering the after effects of the birth. I can remember wanting to get back into pre-pregnant clothes, to be my old self, but with a baby as well. It did eventually happen, but my body was a different shape by then, and those clothes went out of fashion anyway. I breastfed babies or got pregnant again, so my boobs never knew what size they were! My ambitions of being the most stylish woman on the block went right out of the window for a looooong time. That was one set of expectations that I gladly let go of. I was deliriously delighted with my three babies, even if I took a bit of an emotional battering. ;-) But I came through it. Welcome to the world of being a reproductive woman! I even got used to the unpredictability of it, and had a wardrobe of tops and bottoms that covered about size 14 to 22. I had my babies in the 1980's, the era of giant shoulders and no hips. But I had a belly and hips! Fortunately I also had lots of big T-shirt tops. They save me a lot of grief over not being able to get into anything! There was very little that couldn't look respectable with some necklaces, scarves and smart shoes and belts.

I hope this little story of mine will convince you that time will pass, and your body will revert on the inside. Give it two years, and keep up the posture. Give yourself a treat every now and then to remind yourself that you really are worthy of it, for all the hard work you are putting in.

Re the lumps on the inside of your vagina, did you have a tear or episiotomy? I still have a lump of proud flesh in my vagina as a result of a dodgy suturing job from the forceps birth of my firstborn. When I feel it with a finger it seems to be about 20mm long, but I am sure it is much smaller. This baby is now 31 years old so my lump has become normal.

I would suggest spending as much time as you can on hands and knees (not scrubbing!) or knees and elbows, with relaxed belly, to help your pelvic organs to come deep into your body, and stretch out your urethra and vagina. Firebreathing and nauli, both on the DVD First Aid for Prolapse, are very good exercises for helping with this. Just do a couple when you can, a few times a day. No need for special equipment, and no need to do the full workout.

Re the cyst, I wonder if your weaning, then recommencing breastfeeding messed up your hormones a bit, and it is a left over from an attempt at ovulation, or something. I am also wondering if the discomfort you are feeling is related to premenstrual discomfort, like some women get during perimenopause, when their body is trying to carry on with cycling, but parts of the hormone system are not cooperating. That can seem like being stuck in time. I am sure that time and a few more cycles will get that straightened out,if that is the case. Endo will probably exaggerate some of these menstrual sensations. Make the most of your postpartum ammenorrhea,eh?

I would suggest not worrying about it for now (really???), and just get on with nursing your baby, and working out how you can do your everyday chores without annoying your body. There is really little that a doctor can do anyway until it has all settled down. Hopefully, in a year or so, having surgery will be becoming a more remote possibility.

When a doctor says "You should be fine by now", she is denying the reality that you are not 'fine'. And what does 'fine' mean anyway? It is a meaningless comment, so I would ignore it. She has either not *heard* you, or thinks you are imagining it, or doesn't know, and doesn't have the humility to admit it, and to do the research to find out, or take some other action. I would put my money on 'doesn't know, and won't admit it'.

Your body won't have reverted as far as it is going to for about two years pp. Even after that I think it tightened and became less floppy inside for several years after that, ie maybe five years after my final baby. It is impossible for a woman's body to have fully reverted post-pregnancy and birth by the six week checkup. That checkup is about the doctor signing off on the birth process and ensuring that the baby is healthy and being fed, and that the mother is OK and has stopped her lochia and is using contraception. It has taken 9 months for your body to grow to prize pumpkin proportions. It is not going to go back in a few weeks.

(Or perhaps she was referring to your vagina, when she said it "should be fine by now"? I don't get that either. A woman who is exclusively and frequently breastfeeding, particularly if at night as well, will still be firmly in low oestrogen country at 9 weeks pp, as I understand it, but I may be wrong. )

If you have vaginal discomfort and dryness, it might also apply to your urethra (which is also oestrogen sensitive).

Have you considered trying red clover tea? I don't know if it has an effect on the urethra or not. Red clover has a very weak phytoestrogens, but they work by occupying the beta oestrogen receptors that otherwise become occupied by inflammatory oestrogen metabolites from the breakdown of your own oestrogen. This means that these inflammatory metabolites stay in the blood stream and get filtered out and excreted by the kidneys as urine, instead of getting into your tissues and causing inflammation.

All this is in Christine Kent's new DVD on Vaginal and Vulval Health. There is also a heap of other stuff about fighting inflammation in the body with anti-inflammatory foods and herbs.

If I were you I would be emptying my bladder fully at least once every day, using all the posture based techniques possible, to keep your urine pale, and flush out any germs that have grown in residual urine.

Louise

Hi,
Louise I notice you mention to get on hands and knees, but no scrubbing. I thought this was one prolapse
friendly chore I could actually do. Is this not the case. I do spend lots of time on hands and knees relaxing, but sometimes also scrubbing. How is this bad?

Hi sea turtle. I don't think there's much (if any) harm you can do to your prolapse while on hands and knees. It's the perfect position! I think that what Louise meant was to do it for YOU, not just when you happen to have a floor that needs scrubbing. But I don't want to answer for her. Louise? - Surviving

Well read, Surviving! I was joking. No Cinderellas on these Forums! It is important to do it for you.

On the other hand, if you can do a chore in a way that is WW friendly, you have found the holy grail. Well done.

I too prefer scrubbing on hands and knees, with a good knee pad, to carrying a heavy squeezy bucket of water in one hand and a mop in the other, and having to get into artificial posture to keep one foot on the tab at the bottom of the bucket and the other on the pedal that squashes the rollers together, while lifting the mop upwards with some force. I also find that I can get the floor much drier with a well-wrung cloth than with a mop. However, for big jobs there is nothing like slopping some real hot water around with a mop and letting the grunge soak. Saves a lot of scrubbing.

Louise