This article was written for Annabel & Grace, which is now part of Rest Less.
It wasn’t what you might call a serious problem, and certainly not one that I wanted to share with anyone, not even my doctor. But sometimes (to be fair often after one too many glasses of wine on a riotous night out with friends) I would find myself so overcome with laughter that I was suddenly gripped by the unbearable urge to, well, wee.
Then again once in a while in one of my more vigorous gym classes I would have the same kind of difficulty doing certain moves (particularly star jumps). Or, from time to time, out walking with the dog, a sudden strong sneeze could cause a moment of anxiety.
This problem, which one in three women experience from time to time, couldn’t really be termed clinical incontinence, but it was embarrassing and occasionally I would find myself buying a box of one of the many different brands of ‘discreet’ pads for ‘light leakage’ that they sell in supermarkets and chemists.
I vaguely remember – in the foggy days after the birth of my first child – being given instructions about exercising my pelvic floor muscles but exercising anything with a new-born (my brain in particular) was impossible. Two more babies and three decades later (they are all grown up now) it occurred to me that it was time to do something to stop my ‘light leakage’ becoming an uncontrollable torrent.
I chose Pelviva, a system that uses ground breaking reactive pulse technology to retrain your pelvic floor muscles. The first time I used one (each one comes with a sachet of lubricant and you insert it as you would a tampon and leave it in for half an hour before disposing of it) I found the effect of the electric pulse mildly alarming (but not painful). Although it is perfectly possible to walk around and carry on as normal when you are using it, I chose to take half an hour out (I work from home) to rest.
Every other day for twelve weeks I used the pelvic muscle re-trainer and the effect was noticeable within a fortnight. It has made a huge difference to my social confidence because I can star-jump, sneeze and laugh till I cry without fear of leakage. In fact I like to think that I am now absolutely water-tight.
Pelviva is the first of its kind – an award-winning pelvic floor muscle trainer that trains your pelvic floor muscles for you. Pelviva has been clinically proven to improve bladder control in 84% of women in just 12 weeks.
Buy Pelviva on-line at www.pelviva.com from as little as £42.95
And thank you to Jane Gordon for sharing her review with all of our readers. Here’s hoping her honesty will help others to train their pelvic floor so they need never worry that it will let them down again.
To listen to our podcast when we chat with Jane Gordon about moving to the country click HERE.
If you haven’t yet read our article on mammograms, CLICK HERE