From Heart Surgery to Happy Pelvis: Post-op Zen for Your Pelvis

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In this episode, we are going to learn from Dr. Kelly

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how to relax our pelvic floor via the

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pelvic floor connector and relaxation exercise.

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You'll need a towel and you'll need a quiet place to sit.

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So if you're driving right now or unable to do this, be sure to

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bookmark this episode and save it for a time where you're able

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to practice it. Let's get right to it.

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Today is the last installment of our

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series. I'm gonna miss you, Boots

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and Randy the Rectum. You guys are gonna have to send him postcards. He's gonna

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be so lonely. I know. And Patty Pelvis And

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Philip Pelvis. Philip the pelvis or Peter the

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pelvis? You know, he's two personalities. Okay.

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Yeah. So if you're just finding us,

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please be sure to go back and listen to the other episodes

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in this series for Heart Month because gives you a lot of the background of

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what we're about to do, which Kelly's been talking about

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relaxing our pelvic floor, and she's already given us a couple of really

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great tutorials. But now we're actually just going to do

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a legit 10 minute exercise.

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10 minute pelvic floor relaxer. This is perfect. So, yes, I second what Boots

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said. Get your cute butts back and watch the other episodes in their entirety.

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But this is for you when you're like, yes, I saw myself in

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those episodes. I want to connect and relax to my pelvic floor. This is

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for you. So Boots and I, if you can see us, we have just like

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standard hand towels that are. Would you call this a hand towel?

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I never knew a nomenclature. Okay, perfect. I call them hand towels.

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Perfect. So we'll fold it in half once lengthwise and

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then again in a half. So it's this little rectangle and we are going

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to roll it about into a circle that's,

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I don't know, like about as big as my fist,

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right? Huh? Yep. And I'll probably make

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a little, like, handout for you for, like, relative size of this. And we are

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going to put this hand towel under our perineum, under

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our pelvic floor muscles. So we're going to be sitting down and we're going to

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set it so there is some pressure on the

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rectum, some pressure on the vag,

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and if you don't have a vag, like pressure right behind the scrotum and

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pressure on the rectum. So this towel is meant to fit right between

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your sit bones and kind of like a bike seat, except a little

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skinnier so that it only compresses those

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muscles. When we sit on this towel, friends,

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you should be aware that you're sitting on it like, hello, but

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it should not hurt. So if it hurts, you might need to go

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to a smaller towel or if it feels like it's actually

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touching your sit bones, your towel roll might be too

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big, so you might have to unwind it a little bit. But the key is

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that if we are wanting to truly connect to

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our pelvic floor and relax the pelvic

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floor, we are not sitting on this towel because we think we're going to

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pee our pants. We're sitting on this towel because it is

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giving a very gentle touch sensation to where

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all of these amazing pelvic floor muscles are to

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help the brain find them. And that is

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so powerful. So even if this is 2

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days post op and we've just got to the chair

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next to our bed the first time, and we're working with respiratory

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therapy and they leave, oh my gosh, guess what? We could put this

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rolled towel under here and tune into our pelvic floors

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and it would help so much with all the things.

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So hopefully we're all sitting down now on the towel

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and I want you to tune in. Hopefully you're not driving

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or walking. We can sit on the towel. We are going to close our eyes.

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We're going to have one hand on our lower chest and one hand on

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our lowest belly, kind of right where our belt line would

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be. And you're going to take a couple relaxed

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breaths, friends. You're going to breathe into your lower belly

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and back out. And your first

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check is if this top hand that's on your chest, this bottom

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hands on your belly when you breathe in. If we're breathing a ton into

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our chest, notice that. Don't be mad, but just say, oh, that's

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interesting. And try to will yourself to keep the top hand

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quiet and take all the breath into that bottom

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hand. That's true diaphragmatic breathing

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against a relaxed stomach. And that's step one.

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And honestly, if this is hard, this is where you stay for three minutes just

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doing the soft belly breathing. You sitting on this towel roll

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is helping your brain recognize that your pelvic floor exists. And that's

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enough for right now. But once it starts to get

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easier to feel this belly moving forward,

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inhale, let the belly move forward. And now tune your

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mind into the parts that are touching this towel. And if

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they're truly relaxed, as you inhale and your belly gets bigger,

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these pelvic floor muscles should drop into this towel ever so

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slightly and exhale. Belly

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gets smaller. Inhale, belly

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gets bigger. If these pelvic floor muscles are resting

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perfectly, they're going to kind of press down into the

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towel with the inhale and rebound with the exhale.

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But if we're post operative, if we're having pee problems, pain problems,

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poop problems, stress problems, the pelvic floor is resting too tight.

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So we are going to inhale, the lower belly is going to get bigger. The

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pelvic floor is going to drop into the towel. We're going

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to exhale. The belly is going to rebound in, but we're going to try to

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keep our pelvic floor setting on the towel. And

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you are showing your brain where these pelvic muscles are

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meant to rest. And we're not pushing right. We're just

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allowing them to rest. And interestingly enough, some of you

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might be noticing, like, a little ache in your vags,

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if you have one, or in your rectum. That ache is indicative that the

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muscles are actually elongating. It's like you're stretching your hamstring. Isn't

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that fascinating? And if it actually hurts, then again, we

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got to go to a smaller towel roll. But we inhale and we kind of

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like settle into that ache and we say, oh, wow, I can feel it. It's

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like a little rose blossoming. Exhale. Maintain that.

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Good job. And now your challenge. Can

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you keep this pelvic floor down on this rolled

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towel while you gently engage your

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deepest tummy muscles to support your sweet bladder,

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to support your sweet pelvis? And what most of you

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will find is that your rectum and your pelvic floor try to tighten

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as soon as you tighten that tummy. But you can

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do better, I promise. And the fact that you notice that that's hard

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is awesome. That's what this is all about. And you try to hold that deep,

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low tummy in, like, 2% for one or two breaths.

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Yeah, I know. I'm making you breathe too. I'm so evil. And then relax

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everything. Take a couple soft breaths again,

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and then try that one more time. Pelvic floor is relaxed,

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rectums relaxed. On the towel, gently drawing that

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tummy. And breathe. And now your brain is really

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learning that your diaphragm is for breathing, your tummy is

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for supporting your pelvis, and your pelvic floor is on standby for

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now. And if we can master those things in

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that little five minutes, like, that is going to help our

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nervous system and help our Pee, poop, bedroom time function

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so much, not to mention overall athletic function.

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And, you know, if you are out in the gym at cardiac

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rehab, heck yeah. Active abs,

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relaxed pelvic floor with your warmups and with your

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cooldowns to help retrain this normal resting

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tone. And then, yeah, we don't have to think about it forever,

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but while we're stressed and while we're recuperating, we absolutely do.

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So that's your basic. I know. How do you feel? I feel so relaxed,

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honestly. Well, what I'm noticing is I'm

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mentally tired from that. Yeah, it's a lot of work.

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And the key. Oh, and you can come out off of the towels now

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and. And when you come off of the towel, like, just

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appreciate the copious space that even

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if you couldn't sense much happening when you were on the towel, now that you're

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off of it, you're like, oh, wow, there is a lot of real

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estate there that I'm really not connected to. And the

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coolest thing about pelvic floor rehab is there's so many nerves

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involved that it doesn't matter if we did it right or wrong. The fact

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that we tried to do that thing and we were curious about

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how hard it was mentally, or that I really couldn't feel

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anything. When you go to bed tonight, your brain is actually going to

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rewire. It's going to say boots. And Dr. Kelly asked me to do this thing,

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and I could not sense anything happening in my pelvic FL floor.

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That's weird. And as long as we approach it with curiosity,

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it will rewire. And that's called neuroplasticity. And within three to

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four days, friends, you will actually feel things happening,

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not because the nerves were gone, but just because the brain wasn't utilizing

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them correctly. So it is so cool. And it's a. It's

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practical now and forever after because we can't remove all

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stress from life, regrettably. So anytime we're in stress, I want you

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to come back to this podcast and relax your sweet pelvic floor floor and think

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of me. And I just so appreciate that you call our cute butts and our

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sweet pelvic floors and bodies and our hearts. And

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I just so appreciate you and the joy you have brought into my life

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through. Through recording this series. And I cannot wait

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to hear from you listeners on how this has touched you.

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I. I really want to know. And then I'll make sure to let

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Kelly know. Like, we did this because we love your pelvises.

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We did and we want to help you. And I'm sure we're going to do

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it again next year. So give us feedback. What did you like? What do you

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want more of? And we will provide. So thank you so

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much for this opportunity. Boots. It has been wonderful. Yes,

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thank you. Thank you for the time you've spent with myself and the

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listeners and hey, listeners, I want you to think of five

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health that you love, that that you know

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they deserve to thrive. And I want you to send

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the series to them. I want you to send my newsletters to them. If

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you haven't signed up for Dr. Kelly, do that in the show notes. I

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love your pelvis. I love your beautiful heart. Be sure to

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keep coming back for more with open heart surgery with Boots. And if you

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haven't, make sure you've subscribed. Hopefully you have by now because

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this series should have blown your mind and your pelvis. So

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much more to come this year and I can hardly wait.

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So I look forward to being back with you next week. Bye for now.