Pee Problems as We Age, You're Not Alone: How to Tighten your Tinkler

Hi, I'm Natalie Jill, fat loss expert turned lifestyle and high performance coach. Welcome to Listen up the podcast. On this podcast, I do what I do best. Taking complicated information that is relevant to us now and breaking it down simply with actionable steps you can implement to level up your life. I also regularly interview some of the most inspiring and courageous men and women on the planet who at their worst, learned how to achieve success greater than anything they ever, ever dreamed possible. Creating everything from nothing. If you are new here, I encourage you to go back and listen from episode one, when this podcast was previously called Leveling up for the Full transformative experience, over 52 million women deal with an embarrassing issue. What is it? PEA leaks. Yep, that's what I just said. PEA leaks when we sneeze, when we laugh, when we exercise, even when we have sex. And this is something that progresses with age. Sometimes it's set off by giving birth and then it just keeps progressing as we age. But there's no shame in it because it's absolutely common. It's more common than I could have imagined. But we aren't talking enough about the solution for this or the fix for it because you don't always need to turn to medications, surgery, or the dreaded kegel exercise. Today on Listen Up, I interview pelvic floor experts Jen and Christina from Titan your Tinkler on what causes this, how to prevent it, and how to even reverse it, and why they're anti kegel. So enjoy this episode today. I'm excited to have this chat with Jen and Christina. They're from Titan. You are Tinker. And yes, that's what you think it is. It's your Tinker. We are talking all things down there. All things pee when we sneeze, when we pee. Why does this happen after we have a baby? As we age? Why does it get worse? I swear this happens to me every time I sneeze. That's how we know that I'm almost 50. So I thought until I met them that Kegels was the only answer, which I'm guilty of never doing because I don't fully understand it or the connection there. They told me they they are anti kegel and they've got a lot of answers here. So I can't wait to dive in. Thank you so much for doing this interview with me today. Thanks for being here. Thank you. So let me. Let's start at sort of the beginning. How the heck did you get into a niche of tightening tinkers? How did that happen? Did you grow up saying, I'm going.

To tighten tinkers babies between the two of us.

That's the short version.

OK.

But truly it really for me was my third pregnancy. I was 36 years old having my third pregnancy and I had already had birth injuries from my previous pregnancies and essentially that third pregnancy pushed me into pelvic organ prolapse.

What does that mean?

Birth injuries?

And then also that. What does that, what do those mean?

Yeah. So the birth injuries for me were I had a fourth degree tear and I was essentially incontinent both ways after my first delivery. At 26 years old.

At 26, yes. Wow. Did you know that this was like, did you just think this was normal after having babies? Did you know there was a way to fix this or what happened when you.

I didn't know what the heck was going on. I was absolutely terrified and like many women felt shame, didn't know who to turn to. But when, when I was peeing and pooping on myself and unable to control those basic functions for a week or so, I did reach out to my ob GYN and ended up being able to go and see a women's health physical therapist.

Yeah. Because I had imagined that would be so scary and like embarrassing. You don't know what's going on. And that's our dignity.

Yes.

Yes, completely. Jen is a go getter and she's a fighter and was not going to be stopped in her life by this. And I have so much respect for the way that she then turned this into her life's work and her life's mission. And even after that third pregnancy, when it pushed her into that prolapse, which is basically just the compartments of the vagina, the urethra, which is the P tube, the bladder and the rectum kind of falling in on each other or falling down out of the body.

Now is that something that happens with most women as they age? I mean, I'm, I deal a lot with women as they age and I feel like this is that most of them have had babies and they might have had some issues, but there seems to be a big mark. Getting up into your later 40s and your 50s where we hear this and it's creating like painful sex. It's creating like this needs of feeling like you have to pee all the time. What is that? Why does that happen more as we age?

It's this slippery slope that's amplified. You hit the nail on the head, it starts maybe small, maybe like that second or third baby things kind of don't go quite back to normal. But you're like, I'm sure this will go away. And then you cross that threshold of hormonal changes where your tissue becomes more lax.

Estrogen.

Yes, yes.

And then that.

So as the estrogen thickens or as it gets. As we lose it.

As you lose it as a degradation factor on the actual tissue. And that's part of, you know, we talk a lot about in our program in terms of pain with intimacy, but particularly women in their 50s who have either are close to going through menopause or who have gone through menopause. That pain with intimacy could be just pain with insertion, which is usually due to the tissue changes that happen during that time, which we recommend something called oxy cell, which is a game changer. It's a natural lubricant. Many of the women in our program have used that and really noticed the difference. But there's also this pain and discomfort that can happen higher up in the abdominal during intimacy, where it feels like you're almost stomach discomfort. Or some women have discomfort post sex where they're having swelling and pressure and discomfort down there. This is all associated with pain with intimacy.

So I know a lot of women will say that they've got pain around ovulation. Does that tie in with this?

No, that's a little bit. That's a little bit separate. That's due to other things that are happening in the body around this time. The pain that we're discussing right now is really pain with intimacy, or a lot of women are dealing with pressure issues related to prolapse that falling down.

I guess that's why I asked that, because I'm just picturing like anatomy here. If you're ovulating and you're already having issues, I would imagine that would put extra pressure on that. So maybe that's what's creating that.

Yes. Now, I guess I was assuming you were talking about pain with cramping during.

No, I mean during sex.

So, yes, that could be. I mean, these are all complicated issues. Each individual is obviously different.

Um, what it's definitely is connected to though, is if you are having the other bladder dysfunction, the PEA leaks, the frequency, the urgency, and you're having some of these issues with disturbances in your sex life. That is definitely all connected and can be addressed non invasively and with no Kegels.

Okay, so how does somebody know that they have that versus an infection or something else? Like what is. What are the signs that you're like, okay, this is what this is likely, or does anyone that has the PEA Leaks and the frequency need to look at this.

Anyone that has the PEA leaks and the frequency needs to look at this because many of those same women are dealing with chronic UTIs, and that is due to that falling down. We have a great picture that illustrates it here, where when the organs died are falling down. Here's your urethra, the tube you pee out of, and you can see that.

It'S collapsed just as normal up here. So bladder's supposed to be way up here, and this is what's collapsed.

For those of you listening and not looking at the video, it's. It's a pretty different. It's a pretty aggressive diagram. You can see it. You can actually see it different. So is this something an OB GYN could literally see during an exam or no. Is it?

That is a tricky question. So many obgyns are trained to get you safely through pregnancy and childbirth, and they're actually. This is not really their specialty. You want to see a urogynecologist if you're looking for a diagnostic assessment of potential prolapse or a deeper dive on these sorts of issues.

Never even knew there was such a thing.

Well, and even there, we do have to say many of the women that we work with, even if you do go see a urogynecologist, oftentimes you are not being examined properly. The proper way to be examined for these actual conditions is actually standing up. What they need to be able to see.

Wait, you're blowing my whole world right now. Wait a minute, girl.

When I went in and I had to do this, nobody gave me the heads up.

Yeah, well, thanks for the heads up. You're standing up. Okay.

You're standing up because they need to be able to see gravity acting on your own.

This all recedes when you lay down. And very often. And this is no shot against physicians. Look, women are not validated properly based on. They come in complaining of a lot of issues, and then they're examined, kind of lying on their back, and everything's kind of fallen back up in there. And. And they're told like, well, it's not that bad. And the woman's going, my life is not right. You know? And, yeah, a lot of dissonance that happens.

My mind is blown right now. So hold on. Wait, hold the phone. So if we are a woman in our 40s and 50s and we're done having kids, should we not be going to an OB gyn? Should we be going to a different type of obgyn?

That's my first question for your Annual visit. But if you suspect that you're having these issues, it may be worthwhile for you to get a referral to a urogynecologist to further see if you like to get an actual diagnosis on some of these things.

But it makes sense. Like, duh, like, why have we all been going to our ob GYN for that? Like, that's like going to a podiatrist for your toothache. I'm imagining.

Exactly. What a great analogy. And it's not that the ob GYN doesn't have a purpose in your life because they're checking for cancer and they're checking breast exams and they're doing other things, but specifically, specifically for this, the urogynecologist is the right.

I would imagine a urogynecologist can probably do other. Check other things too. So, like the same things you're going to your obgyn, they probably can check that too, I would imagine. I don't know.

I have to say. No, they don't.

Okay.

I've seen a urogynecologist for. For my prolapse. And this is really. Think of this. They are specialists. So essentially going for a little.

So, number one, if somebody is experiencing this and they've been embarrassed by it, you might want to look into a urogynecologist. But also, we're not going to do Kegels. Can you speak into why? Because. Why does everyone love Kegels?

Because they don't know there's a better way.

Okay, so talk to us about what Kegels are and why you're anti Kegel.

Yep. So Kegels were invented by a man, God bless him. It was the best thing that we had at the time.

Right.

But if we think of, you know, we always talk a lot about your pelvic floor is not a magical unicorn muscle group. And what we mean by that is it's skeletal muscle tissue. The way. The same way that your biceps and your thigh muscles and all of the other muscles in the body that move you work. And so these muscles also need to be trained functionally in all planes of.

Motion, with movement in the way that.

They were designed to be used. These muscles coordinate with other muscle groups and they are not designed to just clench and hold isometrically, which is what a Kegel is.

I love. Jen always explains it where, like, if you were trying to get your arm stronger and you went to your personal trainer and they were like, okay, hold your arm at this 90 degree angle and just squeeze and relax, squeeze and relax, would that bring you strength lifting a box from the floor to a high shelf.

Wow.

Absolutely not. And that's like, what Kegeling is. It strengthens you maybe a little bit. Like, in this one tiny. Like, if you do them sitting up or you do them lying down, you may be getting a little strength just in that one position. But we need our pelvic floor to work for us, really, when we're, like, squatting down to pick something up and we happen to sneeze right there, or we want to lunge and move our hips and wide ranges of motion, we need pelvic floor really working for us through all that.

So I've always believed that pelvic floor therapists just talk Kegels. Is that. Are.

They still do. And that is unfortunate. And it's just because we haven't been able to shout this from the rooftops loud enough yet that they know there's.

Okay.

Also part of the reason why we did the research. Natalie. And actually, it was pretty shocking to us to actually get pushback on that research of coming out and saying that we don't want women to do Kegels. We don't think they're effective, and it.

Often ends up over tightening the pelvis.

Yeah.

A lot of women coming to us who say, I went to Women's Health and it actually made it worse.

No, I'm hearing you. It's kind of. I mean, there's so many analogies I'm thinking of for this. Like, when we think of one thing that treats like. Like, I'm just looking at what happened over the last year. Like, everyone was so. Mask, mask, mask, mask, mask. But, like, mask was one small drop of, like, everything else. Also wash your hands. Also get your immune system where I can also make sure you're not overweight. Like, right. There's, like, all these things, and I'm hearing the same. Like, it's like, the same thing. It's not that it's going to hurt. It's just only touching on one very small part of it versus, like, the whole situation completely. Yeah.

That you're not getting to the root cause, which is essentially what we talk about. There's a way to get to the root cause of all of these issues, and Kegels aren't going to fix that.

Got it. Okay. So you're not anti. Well, you kind of are anti Kegel, but you're not. Like, if you want to include Kegel for something, fine. But, like, it's a whole picture, but you're saying you don't need it.

Yet to that, Natalie, there is a place for Kegels. Like when I was completely incontinent Both ways at 26 post birth, you better believe I was trying to Kegel my heart out. Because you get a flicker of any muscle contraction down there, right?

And wearing depends.

But yeah, there is a place for.

It, but it's a very short term fix to then once they get that base level strength, then you need to progress it into more functional training.

Got it. Okay. Totally clear on that. Okay, so what do you tell somebody to do? So, so far, don't just do the Kegels. See a specialist. That's the urogynecologist. But it sounds like whether you go to the urogynecologist or not, it's not going to hurt to do some of these treatments. Is that correct? Like if you don't. So. So if you think you have a problem, you could still do treat things that we're going to talk about.

Absolutely. And that is something that we talk so much to our girls, our ladies, the women. Who is that? Some of them have a diagnosis, and that was very important to them. They needed that for peace of mind. Some of them are terrified. They're like, okay, great, I'm leaking. P. Can you just fix it? I don't want to know. I'm not going that route. I don't prolapse.

What?

That's a scary word. No, thank you. Yes way. That woman is very appropriate to work with us and gets great results.

Okay. So by the way, if you're like listening, you're like, holy cow. I didn't even know. I was not the only one with this issue. They told me before we started recording that 52 million people have an issue with this. This is. That's a crazy number. Like, we need to talk about this more number.

I'll have you know that's really underreported. We're talking about one in every three women dealing with some type of pelvic floor dysfunction.

Wow. So, ladies, this is serious. Okay? We gotta fix this. So. Okay, so if you. You're gonna give us some ideas. But like, my next thought was, do you have to have surgery to fix this? Do you have to have that net placed in you or whatever that thing is? Do we have to do that? And why do doctors go to that?

So I guess I'll lean on my story a little bit more for this because at 36 years old when I did go into that urogynecologist office, but before putting this protocol into place and creating it I was referred for surgery. He basically diagnosed me with stage two pelvic organ prolapse of all three compartments. And his offer to me was that I was going to need surgery. That it wasn't a matter of if it was really when. He also put the caveat in there that he hates to do this surgery on 36 year old women because it doesn't last that long. So I would have to go back in, in 15 to 20 years and have it redone.

And what is the surgery? What do they do during that surgery?

Well, essentially, there's different ways. Because of mine, it would be a sling from mesh, from one, from the front of the pelvic bowl, secured from the front of the pelvic bowl to my tailbone.

Sounds horrible. Yeah, awful. Yes, awful. Okay, so it's literally like mesh that they're going to put up in there during surgery. Okay. That you have to replace in 15 years or so.

And that has an under. A really depressing failure rate to boot on top of that.

Plus you're putting something in your body that's like another whole nother thing. So. Okay, so that. But that's an option. It's an option.

And what we tell women is honestly for stage three and four, you know, there can be. For stage three and four prolapse, there can be some progress made, but that may be something that you may need down the road in the future.

Got it.

When you're at that point, what do you have to lose?

No, exactly.

That was the attitude that I took walking out of that office is I have nothing to lose and everything to gain. I'm going to try absolutely every holistic approach possible.

Okay, so somebody's considering this. You're not saying it's don't do it. You're just saying there's some other things you can try first.

Especially if you are stage one or stage two prolapse, or you just have some of these issues going on, you don't have a diagnosis, or like you, God, I'd really like to get rid of this stuff in my life. It can be surprisingly easy to fix.

Okay, so what are some things that we do then?

Number one, stop pushing your pee out. That might sound hilarious.

Wait, what do you. No, wait, I push my pee out. Tell me what that means. I know I do that. Okay.

You're a mom and a busy woman, so that's not surprising.

Yep. Most women look at us like, how did you know?

Yeah, how did you know Feel busted.

That is the number one quickest, easiest thing you can Stop doing today to make a meaningful change.

Your bladder has a nerve reflex. Christina can talk more about that. But essentially you aren't able to completely empty your bladder. When you push your pee out, you retain some urine in your bladder. And so if you're one of those women where you're pushing your pee out and then 10 minutes later you're like.

Why do I have to go again?

Yeah, that's me. Okay, got it.

Okay, it come out.

Stop.

Number one, it's all about letting it come out.

By relaxing the muscles, you're worth the extra 10 seconds.

Okay, got it.

And that allows you not to retain urine in the bladder, which decreases risk of UTI and also helps you not have to go as much. That's a quick.

Okay, got it. We can do that. So stop pushing it out. What else do we have to do?

Well, and so if you're a woman who's dealing with the pressure issues, like myself. So on that front end of the bowl with the pee problem. So the specifics around the pee problems are we talk about if you're peeing more than 10 times a day. That is not normal. That is too many times. Regardless. And we hear all the excuses. Regardless of how much water you're drinking, you should not be peeing more than 10 times a day.

What is the average?

You should be going 10 or less.

10 or less.

So we have a bladder diary in our program, and that's a simple way you can just begin documenting how many.

Times you're peeing a day.

But I would imagine if, like, you're just starting to drink a lot more water. Like when someone comes into my programs, we have them drinking a lot more water. It's normal the first few days that you're going to have that.

While you're readjusting on the regular, your body's going to acclimate to that pretty quickly. And most women are dehydrated.

Okay.

So they're not going to be having as much output because their body should be better utilizing that.

Right.

One of the things that we recommend to women is who are having, we want them to drink more water, but something simple as using electrolyte drops so that they're not having to pee more, but they're making the water that they're putting into their body actually more usable. Yeah.

We recommend high light electrolyte drops. And that actually helps your body to use the water that you're putting in better.

Yeah. All of these are. That's also on our resource page.

Got it. Okay, cool. So electrolyte drops. Stop pushing it out. What else do we need to do?

Get thyself a squatty potty.

Yeah. Okay. We have those.

If you don't have one yet. They do make them in, like, pretty woods and teaks and stuff. If you're like, I can't stand that flower.

Yeah, they're kind of ugly. We have the plastic ugly one. I didn't know they make nice ones now.

They have prettier ones.

The teak one is beautiful.

Do they have a pink one yet?

Oh, I don't think so. That's an unfortunate error.

Spray paint yours.

I did see somebody had bedazzled theirs one time on social media. I thought that was pretty cut.

Yeah. Right now it looks like a bedpan. It's like, not a. It's not pretty.

Yeah. They make them in teak and bamboo so that you can get them prettier. But it's important, actually. Squatty Potty is missing this giant slice of the market. It's important not just for bowel movements. It actually helps you better, more effectively empty your bladder to use the squatty potty, too.

Wow.

That's an important component in your wellness.

Okay. For those of you who don't know what we're talking about here, it's this little step stool that, like, lifts your feet up and. And it puts you in the position of what humans were supposed to be. Really going to the bathroom. Like, you would squat down, like, when you see. That's why we don't. That's a whole other story about ankle mobility and all those things. But to be able to do a third world squat. It's called third World squat.

Yes.

And this doesn't put you in that deep of a squat. Probably because most Americans can't even do it.

Sure.

But it helps anatomical biomechanical advantages to it. It really does release the. The muscle on the rectum for a bowel movement. And then for the bladder, it's really about lifting and leaning forward to be able to help completely empty your bladder as well.

Okay, so if we do what else? Well, we'll go through the list first. Then I'm going to ask how long it takes for these things. What else can we do?

Well, our methodology is a little bit unique and different in that we have three pillars that we walk women through.

Okay.

And that's decompressing first, which we feel is the big missing piece that many other programs skip over. Most of the women that come to us who are in pain dealing with these issues, either their pelvis has been Rotated for a long time due to their pregnancies where they've had all that relaxing, their hips have spread. And so it's, you know, my term for that is they're a little bit wonky. They have one hip higher than the other, their tailbone is stuck out of.

Alignment, or their hip flexors have been doing the work of their abs for so long that the muscles need some tweaking and relaxing. We have to decompress first, which is a slowing down. It's a slowing down speed up. And we give you absolutely meaningful, dosed, appropriate steps to decompress both the bony structures and the muscles to get them ready to receive the input of the activation exercises. And that is the piece that is often skipped because if you don't get the decompression, your muscles aren't in the proper length and alignment to be ready to receive that input of the activation exercises, which, as you know, ours are whole body movements, functional movements. They are not Kegels. They're not isolated contractions. And that gets everything firing synchronously again between the core, the glutes, the back, and the pelvic floor.

Yeah. And that's the step that many women want to rush through because they want to just get to the strength piece of. I know that for you, I've heard you talk previously about the dormant glutes. And many of the women in the end stages of pregnancy, it's actually quite common for the glutes to kick off due to how large the belly is. It's just an anatomical thing that happens. But many women aren't able to get their glutes back on board. And so they're trying to overcompensate with strength training, adding lube, when really they need that gentle activation, that gentle nudge to get the lights back, back on in those muscles.

Then you can load them safely. Yeah.

So, okay, so you slow down first to then start speeding up. When you say speeding up, what do you have different components of that? I'm assuming some of it is actual exercise. Some of it is actually, like, do you go through, like, is there certain supplements people should be taking? Is there a certain amount of high. Like, what are some other little things that people. I want them to know, and I'm going to encourage people to check out your program, of course, too. But, like, just for some quick. Like, I want to start seeing somewhat of a difference or I want to do something I control right now. What else would you say?

Yeah, so aside from the real. The real supplements, I mean, obviously we get more nitty gritty on a one on one basis. But really the thing, the first two things that we recommend are those electrolyte drops stopped at the difference. Because a lot of women who might be dealing with bowel issues or pelvic floor issues are dealing with chronic chronic constipation, which is from dehydration. So that's a big bang for your buck there. And then fiber for that as well. Fiber makes a big difference in getting excessive estrogen out of the body. It makes a big difference for balancing blood sugar. And obviously it makes a tremendous difference on your bowel movements.

Okay, got it. Okay. So it's still important to what I'm hearing you say also is something that I feel with a lot of chronic conditions that you still have to clean up your diet and make sure you are doing those things, because if you're not, you're just contributing to constipation and other not moving through you and also throwing off hormones. Like, if you're estrogen dominant or not enough, all those things could be affected by how you're eating as well, too. So I'm still saying that, too. Like, do these things and you still have to do things like make sure you're getting fiber, make sure you're staying hydrated. All of those things.

Yes. And it's something that many women may not immediately connect with. My pelvic floor.

Yeah.

It's incredibly important for that, as well as so many other components of health. Exactly. As you just mentioned, for sure.

Yes. How long does it take when someone starts, like, doing all of these things, going in the right direction, they do the decompressing first. Like, how long does it take to notice the difference?

Usually the first session. It's absolutely incredible. The feedback we get all the time is, oh, my gosh, I didn't know it was going to feel so easy. And I can't believe I'm feeling it as much as I am after just the first session of doing these new exercises. Because it doesn't feel hard. That's the difference with the activation piece is where we start. It doesn't feel hard. It doesn't feel like a muscle burn. It doesn't feel like.

Yeah. Can you share an example of an exercise that you would have someone do?

Yeah. So, I mean, we're teaching women how to do standing triplanar movements with their hips moving, getting their hips to move in all ranges of motion that they're supposed to be able to without pain. And many women are locked through there. So that takes some Time. And then we're teaching women how to do planks and bridges our way, which a lot of our women have done that before, but they've never done them tri planar.

What does that mean? Because I teach planks all the time, so I'm curious what you would there.

So we don't teach static planks at all because many of the women have been using hip flexors as an example to dominate this. So it's the gentle finding the range of motion that's appropriate for them.

Yeah. Gets the abs just to kind of catch you is how we teach you find a range of motion where you feel your abs just catch you. But before your hip flexors start to take over, for many of them, we back out the angle. We don't go straight to the floor because that's the position that's been troublemaking in the past.

So I'm trying. I'm trying to picture this just so I'm like, especially a plank, because I know so many listening have done my programs where I teach planks. Let's just imagine you're in a plank right now. Like a standard plank. We've learned, like, not to cave our lower back down. We've learned to, like, not roll on our shoulders. Like, it's really a stiff plank. So it takes pressure off your lower back, squeezing your glutes, all the things. If you're making that active, you mean you're swaying? Are you dipping side to side or what's happening?

All of the things. So forward, back, side to side. And then we make them do circles, but in a neutral spine so there's no breaking, there's no tucking, there's. We want to teach those muscles how to re engage subconsciously in a way where they're just going to turn on and protect and support you. We don't want to have to have that conscious effort of, oh, I'm getting ready to do this. Let me brace, let me tuck my tail. That is not what we want.

Could you do a plank? Like, if you did it on a bosu or a stability ball, would that create that same thing you're talking about? So you're making an unstable surface.

That would be way too much for our ladies to start.

Got it.

Great question. I'll say. That would be something they could progress to.

Okay.

In order to get that reset and volley the control away from the hip flexors and the muscles that have been cheating for all those years, we have to pull back and get the activation of deep abdominals, glutes, and keeping in.

Mind from a bigger picture, Natalie, which I know you understand, is these women lack stability. And so if they're lacking stability through their hips, they certainly are lacking stability through their shoulders, which would be required to be able to handle that surface for those moves.

But the goal is certainly that they can progress to that place, then that's.

But we're thinking the same thing is what I'm hearing. So it's whether you're beginner or advanced, it's that same. Still creating that little instability. So you're really activating all those little muscles, Is that correct?

Yeah. So we. It's mobility, stability, and then strength that we tend to walk them through. So really with that tug of war, if you want to think of it in that way, where a lot of the women are coming with the tight hip flexors or the back tightness and the weak pelvic floor, we're trying to balance the strength of those muscles to restore mobility in all planes of motions and then increase the stability that security that up and in support that. We like to talk about that. Then once they have that, then they can move to the strength and the greater challenges with instability, of adding more instability under the feet, under the upper body and all of those things.

Got it. Okay, got it. Now, what about when doctors prescribe medication prescriptions to stop the leakage? Can you give us your feelings on that? And again, well, none of us are giving medical advice. I just want to be really clear. I'm just asking the questions to make sure we're understanding in my. And I don't know what your answer is going to be yet, but in my experience, sometimes medications are necessary. So I'm not. I don't. But I also think sometimes we spend so much time treating the symptom that we're avoiding treating the cause and the problem. And that's why I'm asking this question. So if your doctor advised you to be on medicine, awesome. But I wanted to hear your side of this.

You totally hit the nail on the head. I. We equate it to kind of like a back brace. You don't want that to be your forever solution. Well, I wouldn't want the medication to be my forever solution because it always comes with side effects. There is a time and place exactly like you said.

Well, I was going to say I actually took the bladder medication for quite a little while while I was in that in between stage because I was peeing 20 times a day.

Yeah, it's a lot.

That's peeing 20 times a day. It's miserable.

Totally.

It's a nice crutch to have in between. But those medications have a lot of side effects that women don't like. I mean, when we've worked with women who have ended up with gashes and sores inside of their mouth because they're very dry, and it also further perpetuates the vaginal dryness. And so, you know, like all other medications, there are side effects. And if you can get to the root cause, then why not do that, Use the medication for a little bit and then ditch it once you strength.

Gosh. Okay. This was so helpful today. So. Okay, so I just want to kind of recap just so I'm clear on. We didn't miss anything. So. So what they're saying is, first of all, this is a very common problem. One out of every three women experiences. If you don't experience it a lot now, you may as you age. It's very common. But also the good news is if you catch this earlier, you can reverse, prevent. You can really slow down the progression of this. Kegels are not the only answer. If you want an official diagnosis from a doctor, they are recommending that you work with a doctor that's a urogynecologist, not just your regular obgyn. Some quick tips to start keeping in mind. Stop pushing our pee out. I'm guilty of that too. Know that 10 times or less a day is the goal. So if you've got more, we've got to start working on this. Make sure you are staying hydrated. That's drinking water. But also making sure. There's lots of ways you can make sure that that's happening. For me, I add a little bit of salt to my water, Himalayan rock salt, but also adding electrolyte drops. That's. That's. And there's lots of brands that do that. Do that for sure. Get yourself a squatty potty. I totally. I have one. I think that's great. And then I loved your idea of slowing down to speed up. So starting to be mindful of when you're doing your exercises too, like starting from where you are and these little movements to shape everything internally there. So for instance, I'm hearing planks being more mobile with those and that. Am I missing anything other than also, of course you can check out your program, which I'm going to put information below as well too, because that is an option if you're like, I want to dive head in and like really conquer this and go deep with experts on this.

Yeah, I mean, we should mention the bridges and all the exercises that we teach. We use a tool that is shipped to them when they purchase.

Oh, that's cool.

It's called a pelvic core. It is not anything internal. There's no internal work.

We're not sticking anything up in there.

Nothing.

Okay. Because we've seen lots of gadgets that.

Is just the same as Kegels.

Yeah. No.

Get rid of them.

Not sticking marbles up in there.

No, no, no, no. But it's the magic of the pressing and the squeezing using this tool that really does make the difference with those movement.

Absolutely. And parting words. Probably don't accept this. This does not have to be your new normal. This doesn't have to be just the way it is. It is shockingly easy to fix this and move that needle in the direction of life changing movement where you are not by this forever anymore. And it happens so quickly in 10 minutes a day.

Yep. I love this. I'm going to put a link below on where you can find their program if you want to go deeper. I'm also going to link up their Instagram, their Titan, your Tinker. Titan, your Tinker.

Instagram is at Titan, your Tinkler.

And I keep saying Tinker, Tinkler, Tinkler. Got it.

And one of our clients helped us name it.

That's so cute. Thank you so much for doing this today. Thank you. Thank you for taking the time out of your day to listen in as my guest today. If you found this episode valuable, please share it with friends and on social media. I don't advertise this show so I rely on word of mouth and reviews to get it out in the world. The biggest thank you that you can give me is leaving me a review. And a nice one, I hope. By the way, this is how others find these episodes. If you do leave me a review, be sure to message me@supportnataliejill fitness.com with a screenshot of your review because I would love to send you a free digital download of my DSR journal as a thank you. And please don't forget to connect with me on social media at Natalie Jill Fit on Instagram and Facebook.