If you have been to a Pilates class, you have experienced the task of trying to coordinate your breath with your deep abdominal and pelvic muscles, while also trying to pull yourself with straps, in order to smoothly move your body through space on a reformer! If that sounds hard, it’s because it is! It is also a really fun and rewarding way to train these muscles. Why would we need to train these muscles?
All About the Pelvic Floor
The pelvic floor muscles are responsible for supporting your pelvic and abdominal organs, aid in the control of urine and stool, and are important for sexual function. Just like muscles anywhere else in your body, it is important that these muscles are able to both contract AND relax. One way to naturally control the length/tension relationship of the pelvic floor muscles is with your breath (or diaphragm). The pelvic floor and the diaphragm should move in synchrony with one another, much like a piston (or a push-pop as I like to say!). As you inhale, your diaphragm, which sits within your lower rib cage, lowers to allow your lungs to fill with air. At the same time, your pelvic floor should slightly lower within your pelvis. On exhale, they both recoil back up and in.
Your deep abdominal muscles also tend to naturally move in unison with your pelvic floor. During inhale, your pelvic floor and abdomen slightly bulge, and then on exhale, they both recoil back up and in. This delicate coordination is needed to maintain stability throughout the entire core. Many different things can throw this natural coordination off and sometimes it takes retraining to get things back in sync with one another!
How the Pelvic Floor Moves during Pilates
One thing I love about Pilates is that it is a form of exercise that capitalizes on this natural coordination. The movements during classes are timed and cued to coincide with your breath pattern. You breath down into belly, then exhale and engage your deep core. Once your trunk is stable, you perform a lift, push, or pull action. It’s hard to keep your limbs stable during movement if your trunk isn’t in control first! The toughest and most important part of all of this, however, is making sure that you are engaging your deep core properly and not compensating with other muscles! Our bodies are REALLY smart and know how to make adjustments so that we can more easily perform a task. It’s important to feel when those “cheater muscles” are kicking in and taking over the heavy lifting. Overutilization of the wrong muscles can lead to overuse and injury in those helper muscles, while also impairing your ability to continue to strengthen the muscles you are trying so hard to improve!
Pelvic Physical Therapy before Pilates
Pelvic health physical therapist are trained in assessing your deep core and pelvic floor muscles to make sure they are activating properly. We can utilize our palpation (feel) skills as well as modalities such as rehabilitative ultrasound and SEMG biofeedback to view the muscles and their activity to ensure the right connections are being made within your body! The pelvic floor is often an area people don’t pay much attention to, unless there is a problem, making it more difficult to make a brain to body connection for activation. If you are looking to level up your Pilates practice, you may need to start back at the basics and make sure those deep muscle connections are intact and activating properly! Once these connections are properly made, Pilates is a great way to put it all into practice and gain awareness throughout your entire body. As your control improves, you can complete more advanced skills with increased movement patterns and faster paces!