Nicky Herringshaw
I'm a Physiotherapist, specialised in treating the pelvis and all that entails. With over 20 years experience working with clients to help them explore what’s going on with their bodies and help resolve their problems, I am well placed to help you today. Along with being a Physio, I am a Mindset Coach, Pilates Instructor, Cranio-Sacral Therapist and most importantly, a mum of two gorgeous little girls. Believe me when I say, my pelvic floor has had a “challenging” time since becoming a mum, so I know first-hand what it feels like to have a pelvic floor problem and what it takes, both as a physio, and a mum, to fix it.
It all started when...
In 2015 I fell pregnant with my first daughter and this marked the beginning of my journey into Women’s Health. I’d always been fairly fit and healthy, but in the months leading up to me becoming pregnant I had got a bit lax on the exercise and diet front, so definitely didn’t go into pregnancy in my best shape. As with most first time mums, I was blissfully ignorant to the realities that lay ahead of me. I ignored all the “horror stories” of other mums labour experiences and motherhood in general, as surely they couldn’t be true?
Fortunately, my pregnancy was fairly unremarkable but my labour was a bit more spicy! After 22 hours of huffing, puffing and getting into all manner of positions and 6 long hours of pushing later, my daughter was finally born! Although I wasn’t unwell after having her, the physical shock of what I had been through, let alone the emotional shock, was huge!
I was left shattered, bruised and bleeding. I had a squidgy belly that felt like jelly; lady bits that were 15x the size they used to be… and oh yeah, I randomly wet myself and started pooing before I'd even sat down on the loo! What on earth was this?!!! No one told me this would happen. Surely all of this was wrong? This couldn't possibly be "normal" could it?
And there it was, my rapid, hard-hitting, smack you in the face reality check.
This was motherhood! The only part I hadn’t quite realised at that particular moment was that I'd had it easy compared to most. I had my daughter at home, no emergency episiotomies, forceps, ventouse or c-sections… nope, the thing that shocked me to my core was that my experience was, by comparison to many, pretty easy!!
Oh how society has screwed us over on this one ladies….there’s no part of GROWING A HUMAN FROM SCRATCH, getting them out of your body alive and you still being alive at the end of it that’s easy! It’s a frickin' momentous undertaking of the most epic proportions….and it’s been made completely normal and everyday. Madness! I thought people should be bowing at my feet and bringing me grapes on silk pillows after what I had just done, not sitting in massive incontinence pants, with blood still coming out of me and my now massive udders constantly out and in use.
After a few months, life got fractionally easier and yet there was one thing that had got much worse. Pooing! Every single time I went for a poo I thought I was passing razor blades and it left me in floods of tears. Along with that, if I suddenly had the urge to poo, I had to go immediately! If I had waited longer than about 30 seconds, I literally would have soiled myself. Ironically, even at this point, I hadn’t put two and two together and worked out I had a pelvic floor problem. I guess I had always associated that with wetting yourself and I wasn’t doing that unless I had a really full bladder. You see back then, I was just a regular musculoskeletal physio… you know, the ones who sort out your back, neck shoulders etc. And an upsettingly small proportion of musculoskeletal physios are trained in the pelvic floor. So it wasn’t until a colleague of mine, who was a Women’s Health Physio, suggested I had a pelvic floor problem, that it all start falling into place.
I plucked up the courage to go and see this colleague for an assessment and I can assure you, it wasn’t a thought I relished. I mean who wants someone staring at their bits like that?! Well, I cannot tell you how grateful and relieved I was when I finally went. She was able to assess my pelvic floor (by placing 1 finger into my vagina) and she could tell straight away that my pelvic floor muscles were super tight. When she pressed on the muscles, she could reproduce all the pain and urgency I felt on a daily basis. She set about releasing my pelvic floor and teaching me how to feel it again and before long, all of my symptoms went away. It really was that simple!
But more than that, she could make sense of all my symptoms and put them into context of what was going on in my life. Yes, I had some pelvic floor issues, but now I knew with certainty what they were and how to fix them. She empowered me and showed me the big picture and that's what I want to do for you.
It's a mindset game...
I hear so many women say "Oh well, I've had a baby now so it's to be expected that I leak a bit" or "I'd never dream of going on a trampoline now". 1 in 3 have a pelvic floor problem, making that a very well populated boat to be in but the thing is, just because it's common, doesn't mean it's normal. For the vast majority of people, it's not that there's any damage to the muscles, they're simply not functioning properly and that can be corrected fairly easily.
For example, before I met my colleague, I had accepted the idea that nothing could be done about the pain I was in (even though I knew it wasn’t right) and that somehow, because I had had a baby, it was to be expected. It honestly sounds ridiculous now but in that sleep deprived, utterly exhausted and overwhelmed phase I just couldn’t see it any other way. I had a thought process, it went unchallenged and therefore I believed it to be fact. And that lack of challenge of our thought processes is how we get ourselves into all sorts of trouble and living a less than optimal life!
Treatment challenged that mindset and suddenly I thought "maybe this pain could go", "maybe I don’t have to suddenly run to the loo", "maybe I could be 'normal again'...and if that’s true, maybe I could get fit again and feel like the 'old me' again". As time went on, I found that my mood changed. I was less depressed, I was less overwhelmed and just like that, the dark hole I had unexpectedly found myself in, started to melt away.
There is hope.
This programme which both educates you and challenges you, supports you and gently pushes you. Either way, this post natal programme will be a great first step to get you out of being overwhelmed and towards a steady state of being consistently and genuinely OK. We're not after perfection here, remember, just feeling in-control and more balanced. Take the pressure away, the unrealistic expectations and let's start talking "real life woman" language, with huge amounts of respect, compassion and honesty. We've got you.....