Sadly, it is a true statistic that up to half of all woman experience weakness of both the tummy muscles and pelvic floor muscles. Up to a third will still have a gap of their tummy muscles after pregnancy. This can sometimes lead to reduced strength of the core muscles and can develop into pelvic pain, back pain, bladder and bowel symptoms, and sexual dysfunction.
All too often in clinic ladies will say to us ‘I thought it was just something I had to put up with having after I had my baby’. This is not the case! It can be treated with specialist physiotherapy. It is recommended that women have an initial assessment (Mummy MOT) ideally after their 6-8 week GP check, however we treat many women who gave birth years ago that have pelvic floor related issues or a tummy gap dysfunction and they can still gain positive results even that far down the line.
A Mummy MOT is a specialist postnatal examination for women following both vaginal and caesarean deliveries. It will assess how your posture, pelvic floor muscles and stomach muscles are recovering after birth. Then the physiotherapist can provide you with exercises and treatment to help in your recovery and to return to life and exercise safely. Every assessment is different as some ladies may to choose to focus on one particular area and others would like a full screen, we tailor it to your needs and request. Please get in contact if you think we can help.