My kids would ask me, "mom, jump on the trampoline with us?"
Hold up! I need a change of undies.
You want to browse every aisle at the store?
Hold, please… you can’t be too far from the bathroom.
You want some sexy time with your partner?
Hold, please… sex hurts too much these days.
You want to exercise?
Hold, please… better change into darker leggings first.
I know what's it like to have to worry about your body betraying you every time you laugh, sneeze or cough.
I am postpartum, after 2 vaginal births, and I had trouble with urinary leakage.
I have lots of tools and exercises so you can gain the confidence to leave your house with head held high and no cares in the world...at least where your pelvic floor muscles are involved.🤣
I love talking about anything that's taboo, like the pelvic bowl, the pelvic floor, which really encompasses our genitals. So, we don't really talk about it much and the problems that we can have!
The pelvic floor muscles actually control so much and we often don't know or pay attention much to them until there's a problem.
I'm going to speak to both men and women.
For women, a lot of problems show up:
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Postpartum.
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Urinary incontinence.
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Urinary leakage with sneezing, jumping, laughing, etc.
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Painful sex.
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Pelvic pain.
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Prolapse.
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Also, you don’t have to be postpartum to experience problems. It can be from aging and other factors.
For men, similarly, while they don't go through childbirth, their pelvic floor muscles also wrap around the openings for the urethra and bowels.
For men, pelvic floor controls:
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Urine function.
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Bowel function.
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Sexual function and ejaculation.
While men are not going through childbirth, other causes can be:
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Constipation.
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Aging.
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High impact exercise, essentially going “too hard.”
With yoga, and when we're speaking more energetically and spiritually, this is the second chakra which is the sex chakra (sacral chakra is another way of saying it), and it's also womb power.
Womb power is not just specific to women. Men also have an energetic space for womb power.
This is what I get most excited about because womb power is really optimized with sensuality and the sensual erotic dance that I practice and teach.
Sensual movement really taps into that womb power which is creativity, passion, alignment. When you can actually get aligned with that power, you naturally will feel more flow, more ease in your life, and feel confident to really step into your power.
The sacral chakra is creation, and it's not just creation physically; it's also creation through your words, your vibration, and being aligned with that.
Think about the organs in there we've talked about and how the pelvic floor muscles encompass your genitals, but it also supports your bladder, bowels, reproductive organs.
So bringing awareness to this area if you're healthy is great, but also if you're having dysfunction, it can be super helpful. All of the following exercises are excellent for pregnant women.
Womb Breathing (Deep belly breathing)
Sitting up straight on the floor or on a chair, place your hands on your pelvic bowl area, feeling your hands there and you can close your eyes and start with deep womb breathing.
For my men here or women who no longer have their uterus, I don't want you to get too caught up in the wording. Like I said, there's energetic womb space there and you're breathing deeply and envisioning this whole area.
Fill it up entirely all the way up to your collarbone and you’re exhaling, noticing all the sounds and distractions around you, and then bringing your focus back to your breath, to the space you’re in, breathing.
So you're really lengthening and deepening and visualizing the breath feeling this space on the inhale and exhale.
Bringing your breath and focus to this area is already breathing life and energy into it.
You can chill out with womb breathing for however long you want and there's other ways of doing it.
An alternative to sitting is lying down. Lying down is my favorite way to do it.
So coming down to your back and your knees can be bent, feet flat on the ground. That can help support your lower back, and again, having your hands on your pelvic bowl.
Now you can see your hands rising a bit on the inhale and they lower on the exhale, and you're just relaxing here and continuing to fill up your womb space with your breath and exhale completely.
Pelvic Tilts
Now from here lying on the floor, you can practice by bringing your hand back to your pelvic area and you're going to tilt your pelvis forward and your lower back comes to the ground (articulating to the ground), filling in that space behind your lower back and the floor.
This is a pelvic tilt and then exhaling and you're tilting your pelvis back and then that space is there again.
So inhaling, tilting forward, exhaling, tilting back.
This is a simple pelvic tilt starting to bring awareness to the space and keep going with this.
In the video I go briefly through these exercises, and I encourage you to take more time with them.
Something that you can add to this pelvic tilt is a pelvic floor muscle contraction. In yoga, we call it root lock, mulbandh, or it’s commonly known as kegels.
You are contracting the pelvic floor muscles. Basically think about it the same way when you stop the flow of urine or you're holding in a bowel movement. It's those same muscles.
So as your pelvic tilting forward, contract those muscles for a few seconds. As you exhale, release the contraction.
Note: Do you best not to clench your butt cheeks together. It's not that same contraction. You really want to isolate those very internal muscles.
Allow yourself to explore with that and experiment.
Is it normal that you might feel aroused?
YES! That's normal because the muscles are also surrounding your sex organs and gentials so it’s stimulating. The more you practice, the more you can get used to it and find a flow with it.
Bridge Pose with Hip Articulations
Here is one more variation if you want to take it up another notch.
Similar with the pelvic tilts, as you are tilting forward, you are raising your hips off the ground towards the sky into a bridge pose. You can hold here but you can also start to explore this with a little bit of hip articulations where we start to bring some sensual dance into the movement.
You're moving your hips in a circle in the air, exploring space, almost like a paint brush is on your tailbone and you are painting circles. 
You can start to gently explore that.
You can play with contraction of the pelvic floor muscles as you're doing this and releasing and then going the other way with your circles.
You can go into figure eights and then you can really start exploring and playing with this and that's where it starts to get fun!
Kegels/Root Lock
Kegels or root lock can be done in a sitting position or sitting at your desk, whatever you're doing at any time. No one really needs to know.
I would suggest with the root lock, what you can do is hold it for 5 to 8 seconds and release and then take a break in between and work up to 10 contractions/twice a day.
The sensual dance really brings activation to the pelvic bowl and sacral chakra, the whole encompassing area of the hips and the pelvis, and it's really so beautiful.
It's our fluidity, it's our emotions, self gratification.
With the sacral chakra, we can have issues that often come up as trouble with boundaries, or feeling overly emotional, fearful, or unhealthy attachments.
Something you can take with you into your practice are these affirmations:
My sexuality is sacred.
I deserve pleasure in my life.
It's all related. The more we can bring awareness to this sacred space, and not just the problems or dysfunction, the more we can experience it as the seat of our pleasure and self gratification.
Ways to dive deeper
You can always book a 1:1 virtual session with me here for individualized attention and tailored exercises.
I'm here for any of your questions. Let me know how your experience was.
Who am I?
I'm Heather!
I'm a multi-dimensional human being whose mission is to live 'outside of the box', show others it’s possible, and raise awareness of the taboos and shame that exists in our society.
My background is that of a nurse, holistic coach, yogi, dancer ,mother, plant medicine explorer, and new author.
I'm passionate about giving permission to men and women to release shame, bypass anxiety, be moved to make waves, come home to stillness, and BE RADIANT.