Are You Doing Those Kegels Correctly?

Common Kegel Mistakes

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If you’re still noticing symptoms, there are a handful of reasons your Kegels might not be working.

First, you could just be doing them incorrectly. Many women unknowingly push the muscles out rather than suck them in. One sign you could be doing this is if you hold your breath during Kegels. If you’re worried you are doing this, consider actually inserting a light tampon into your vagina during Kegels and make sure you see it moving inward – rather than outward – when you do the exercises.

You might also be accidentally engaging other muscles, like the abs, glutes or upper thighs. The pelvic floor muscles are the only muscles you should be engaging during Kegels. If you are engaging the other muscles, there’s a good chance you are not engaging the pelvic floor muscles enough.

It’s possible that you are not relaxing your pelvic floor muscles throughout the day, too. In order for these contractions to be useful, it’s important that your pelvic floor has a chance to relax between sessions. If you are under a lot of stress and feeling tense, you might be contracting these all day without realizing it. But, these muscles need to exist mainly in a state of relaxation for the exercises to work.

If you’re still struggling to see results, you might consider working with a pelvic floor physical therapist (yup, that’s a thing). When Kegels or physical therapy do not work, surgery might be necessary. The good news is that most of the symptoms associated with a weak pelvic floor can be treated through Kegels or physical therapy.