You don't know squat!

The title is shamelessly stolen from the blog my an amazing lady called Katy. It's a bit crazy, but I'm actually really really excited about her work! Its' never really sat well with me the whole importance put on pelvic floor exercises. Firstly I could never really find the 'trigger-action' to get me started... when going through a door, when driving, when feeding baby, when boiling the kettle. And then doing the whole elevator trip... first floor... squeeze.... second floor....squeeze.... third floor... squeeze and hold....hold.... I can think of so many nicer things to do. Squatting on the other hand, now at least that is tangible, measurably, and it can be done while doing other things, picking up the toys....again... from the floor, sorting the kitchen bottom cupboards, wiping up my sons poor-aim disaster, OK, so maybe the imaginary elevator trip would be better than that. The point is that someone has finally given a reasonable and proven reason why those pelvic floor exercises are not only quite useless, but can be detrimental for your pelvic floor health unless done in conjunction with other exercises that also LENGTHENS those muscles, and there is the punch line: queezing those muscles will only serve to shorten them, not make them stronger. In order to get stronger muscles they need to be stretched as well, hence the squatting. And to do it really well, relax those muscles when squatting, i.e. have a wee in the shower... I just love the fact that she gives us all permission to 'have a squat' while rinsing off... :) Her blog is well worth a read: http://www.katysays.com/2010/06/02/you-dont-know-squat/