When the pelvic flooring weakens or turns into uncoordinated, you might have hassle controlling your bladder or bowels, inflicting you to leak urine or stool whenever you’re not trying to go to the toilet (comparable to whenever you cough, sneeze, or snicker), says Milhouse. Sex might also be painful, holding you from orgasming from penetrative intercourse.
“I think too often our world has convinced us these symptoms are normal or are just a part of life, but sex being painful is not normal,” she says. “Sneezing and losing some urine after you’ve had a kid, that’s not normal.”
You may also experience pelvic organ prolapse, says Milhouse. When the pelvic floor muscles and tissue aren’t strong enough to support your pelvic organs, they may drop or press into the vagina, according to the National Institutes of Health. The uterus and cervix, for example, can lower into the vagina and potentially pop out of the vaginal opening.
“That can manifest as, ‘I feel like things are falling down through my vagina,’” says Milhouse. “You feel like a ball is just coming down—organs are actually descending, like a hernia, through the vaginal opening.” Rectal prolapse may happen, throughout which your rectum slips exterior of your anus, she provides.
In people with a penis, pelvic flooring weak spot might also manifest as weak ejaculatory drive, an indication that’s extra discrete, says Milhouse.