How To Do Kegel Exercises.

What are Kegels?.

Kegel exercises are exercises that strengthen certain muscles in your pelvis. These muscles hold your internal organs like your bladder, uterus, and intestines, high up inside your pelvis. These muscles also can stop your urine flow if you tighten them. Kegel exercises make these muscles stronger so you won't leak urine by accident when you cough or sneeze. Kegels also help you to become aware of feelings of tension and relaxation in these muscles so you can better help your baby to be born.

How do I do Kegels?.

The easiest way many women find to learn is to try to stop their flow while they urinate. The same loop of muscles that surround your urinary opening also surround your vagina.

Try to not squeeze your buttocks or your legs together, think about feeling the muscles towards the front, behind your pubic hair.
Tighten the muscles and try to stop your urine flow for a count of five, then release.
If you find you're squeezing your buttocks, try to think more forward.
If you can't stop the flow completely, that's okay. You'll get stronger.
Then try to push the muscles out a little, like trying to speed up your urine flow.
Repeat for a total of ten sets, tightening and releasing, and finish with tightening the muscles.
Once you've tried two or three times, you can try tightening the muscles in the same way while sitting in a chair, or at any other time.

If you can't do ten sets at first, that's okay, just do as many as you can. Your muscles will get stronger and you will be able to do ten sets. Try and do ten sets five or more times every day. After you first learned how to tighten the muscles don't keep practicing on the toilet except to check your progress every once in a while. Stopping your urine flow in this way too often may make it hard to completely empty your bladder, which might lead to a bladder infection.

How will Kegels help me during labor and birth?.

By doing the exercises you will know what these muscles feel like when they are tight and when they are loose. Tight pelvic muscles during birth can actually make it take longer for the baby to be born. If these muscles are tight as the baby is about to be born, it might make your doctor want to do an episiotomy (ee-pee-see-ah-ta-me), a surgical cut in the opening of your vagina (birth canal). The episiotomy cut and the stitches used to repair it can cause a great deal of discomfort after the birth. Tight muscles might also be stretched too much during birth, and allow the uterus to slide down into the vagina. While you are pushing your baby out, you can think about the part of the exercise where you push the muscles out. This will make sure that the muscles are loose and relaxed.

What else I can do to prepare this part of my body for birth?.

You can try perineal massage to help stretch these muscles and let you feel what it feels like when the baby stretches your skin and muscles as it is born. Many women have used this method to avoid having an episiotomy.

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