Patient casebook: Lose the leak
I’m the Joe Wicks of the pelvic floor!
Reading the online health feature, my jaw dropped. It was on the perimenopause – the transitional years prior to menopause when ovaries begin to make less oestrogen.
It said women were 50% more likely to suffer a prolapse during this time.
That’s where the pelvic organs sag, causing pressure, vaginal bulging or incontinence.
I don’t want that to happen to me! I panicked.
It was January 2018, and I was almost 40.
The likelihood of prolapse was higher for women who never strengthened their pelvic-floor muscles.
A chink of good news for me... As a teenager, I’d read about the importance of this – had done Kegel exercises (for the pelvic floor) since the age of14.
I was sure it was why I’d not experienced incontinence after having my two kids, now 11 and 8.
But I started asking mates, mums at the school gates...
‘How’s your pelvic floor?’
Once they’d got over their shock, I heard horror stories.
Mums who thought it was normal to leak.
Women who’d never heard of perimenopausal prolapse.
Who thought incontinence was inevitable, irreversible.
Some had given up sex, or running for fear of an embarrassing ‘accident’.
Ads on TV even suggested it was OK to have a weak bladder. So women didn’t bother, or were too shy to visit the doctor.
Incontinence pads seemed a quick fix. But some were even considering surgery.
‘It’s horrifying,’ I told my husband Garth, 42.
I became determined to make my pelvic floor even stronger. But there were no Kegel weight trainers matching what I wanted.
‘I’m going to design one myself,’ I told Garth.
I had zero experience. But graphic designers helped build my website, Secret Whispers. And I found manufacturers, designers and printers online.
When my first kits arrived six months later, I squealed with glee.
They were elegant – and effective.
Once my product hit the marketplace, sales exploded, and at my first exhibition at the National Running Show, I sold out in three hours.
Next, a radio presenter mentioned my kits, after her first ‘dry’ run in years.
Secret Whispers had opened up a previously taboo conversation.
Over the years, my products won loads of awards, including the Niche Business Award for Innovation in Business. I also won Women in Business Sole Trader of the Year.
And I was making waves for a reason – because it’s not ‘normal’ to wee when you sneeze, laugh or exercise.
And incontinence affects men, too – pelvic exercises can also help prevent erectile dysfunction.
In December 2019, I even collected an award at the House of Lords – as one of the top-100 trailblazing small UK businesses.
I had everyone practising their pelvic-floor exercises!
My mission is to get pelvic-floor education onto the curriculum for teenagers aged 14 up.
This is the only way we can prevent future women from suffering.
Secret Whispers Kegel weights are simply a dumb-bell for your pelvic floor. It’s a muscle like any other and needs exercising.
I want to get everyone practicing their Kegels – I do mine when brushing my teeth.
Leaking is nothing to be ashamed of. But it’s fixable – and it starts with you.
I opened up a previously taboo conversation