May is Pelvic Pain Awareness Month
Pelvic Pain is often caused by one or a multiple combination of systems of your body such as your digestive system, your musculoskeletal system and your reproductive system. Often when one system has been not working right, it can spread to other systems too and cause dysfunction or inflammation in surrounding systems. Chronic pelvic pain can lead to lots of lifestyle changes like not being able to work, play sport, enjoy sexual activity or enjoy other aspects of life the way a person did before. The sad fact is, that when people have chronic pain, they are less likely to seek professional help compared to if the pain was located somewhere else.
There is more and more awareness in the general public about issues such as endometriosus that can often lead to chronic pelvic pain. With 1 in 10 people affected by endometriosus, it justifies the need for more information filtering through to be able to empower women to know that periods are not meant to be excessively painful and it is okay to seek help.
A women’s health physiotherapist can help with pelvic pain when it is of a musculoskeletal component or if the pain is extenuated into their muscles even though the original problem may have been from an organ like their bladder or from their endometriosis. There is lots to learn from a physiotherapist of how to deal with pain especially when it becomes chronic.
If you or someone you love is suffering from pelvic pain which can be a very debilitating condition, encourage them to seek help from their GP, pelvic floor physiotherapist or specialist.
There are links here that can give some more information on pelvic pain:
https://jeanhailes.org.au/news/pelvic-pain-know-the-differences-and-when-to-seek-help
https://www.mayoclinic.org/symptoms/pelvic-pain/basics/causes/sym-20050898
https://www.racgp.org.au/afp/2015/july/management-of-persistent-pelvic-pain-in-girls-and-women/
https://pelvicguru.com/
