Often, Colussi said, patients come in looking for an exercise to do for 10 minutes every day. “But the question is not what’s a good exercise,” she said. It’s more about how people move in every one of their daily activities, from getting out of bed to picking up mashed fruit off the floor to lifting babies out of their cribs. The proper way to pick up that mashed fruit or a baby in a car seat is to squat down, keeping your center of gravity over your hips and not tilting forward. Then exhale, engage your abs and straighten up using your leg muscles, not your back.
Don’t put up with painful sex.
It’s common to feel discomfort or pain the first few times you have penetrative sex after childbirth, but after that, don’t put up with it. The first step is of course to go slowly and be gentle with yourself. Often ob-gyns will advise using an over-the-counter lubrication product, because breastfeeding suppresses estrogen production, and estrogen produces lubrication, explained Dr. Alison Stuebe, associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology and chair of the taskforce that wrote the newest American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists guidelines for postpartum care. But lube is just a beginning, our experts all agreed.
In addition to dryness, pain during sex can be caused by pelvic floor dysfunction, other tight or stretched muscles or scar pain from a tear or episiotomy during a vaginal birth. Sex can hurt for patients who’ve had C-sections as well, because both C-sections and the process of pregnancy can stretch or tighten muscles. Ask your obstetric care provider for a referral to pelvic floor physical therapy.
Dr. Stuebe also directs patients to “The Parents’ Guide to Doing It,” an episode of “The Longest Shortest Time” podcast with sex advice columnist Dan Savage as a guest. Savage discusses types of sex other than penetration. Unfortunately, some women experience pain with any kind of sex, usually from increased nerve sensitivity, said Colussi.
Seek help if you feel pressure in your vagina.
Some women come to Colussi saying they feel pressure in their vagina, like something is obstructing their bowel movements, “or like a dry tampon is half falling out of me,” she said. Sensations like these could mean a pelvic organ prolapse, when an organ (uterus, bladder or urethra) shifts from its original position or presses against the vaginal wall. “Prolapse is probably the thing women are least prepared for,” said Colussi.
Severe prolapses can be fixed with surgery or alleviated with a pessary (a support in the vagina to prop up the prolapsing organ), but milder prolapses can be managed just by lying down more frequently and avoiding high levels of pressure in your abdomen, Colussi said. “Oftentimes for a woman it feels a lot worse than it actually is,” she said, but in other cases prolapse can be more severe than it feels, so it makes sense to see a health care provider. To better manage pressure levels in your abdomen, don’t bear down when pooping; and exhale instead of inhaling or holding your breath when you exert yourself. If you find yourself grunting and then holding your breath when you lift something heavy, try exhaling instead.