We are always striving to have the healthiest lifestyle possible. This may include eating well, exercising, getting enough sleep, and managing stress. Can these lifestyle habits like diet, stress management, and exercise solve urinary incontinence and improve your pelvic floor health? Spoiler alert-yes they can! Let’s explore more. 

Diet and Urinary Incontinence: 

Certain dietary changes can improve leakage, urgency of urination, frequency of urination, and bladder pain. Some foods and drinks can lead to bladder irritation, causing an increase in urinary symptoms. Some of the most common contributors are caffeine, alcohol, carbonation, artificial sweeteners, marijuana, and nicotine. Decreasing or eliminating these irritants can often help improve your symptoms. 

I know what you’re thinking, I cannot give up my coffee! You can try decreasing from 2 cups (or more) down to 1 cup per day. You can also try switching from regular to decaf either for one of your cups or make your coffee half-calf. It is also important to drink water before drinking coffee, this will help to dilute the irritants in your system. 

In addition to coffee and caffeine, dehydration in itself is a bladder irritant. It is important to stay hydrated, drinking at least 64 ounces of water (half gallon) every day to keep your bladder nice and happy. I know people try to avoid drinking a lot of water to avoid leakage, but trust me this will help keep your body happier. 

Stress and Urinary Incontinence: 

Stress levels are on top of many people’s minds. With demanding jobs, taking care of everything on the home front, and everything that life throws our way, it can be difficult to manage stress. 

Stress causes our nervous systems to be heightened, often resulting in us holding extra muscle tension. Ever notice your shoulders are hiked up too far or you’re clenching your jaw? This is your body holding stress. The pelvic floor and bladder do the same thing, which can cause leakage, urgency, frequency, and bladder pain. Managing stress can surely help to improve these symptoms. Managing stress in healthy ways can include exercising, meditating, praying, reading, or doing something fun. However, when managing stress, be aware that smoking can have negative effects on your pelvic floor symptoms. Nicotine and marijuana can irritate your bladder! 

Exercise and Urinary Incontinence: 

Exercise can help improve pelvic floor symptoms by building strength in the hips and core. Weight training will especially be helpful in building strength. Having your hips and core do their job will help prevent unnecessary pelvic floor stress that can lead to leakage. 

Additionally, exercise helps reduce systemic disease risk, including diabetes and high blood pressure. Diseases such as diabetes and high blood pressure themselves can increase the risk of leakage, and also the medications used to treat these conditions can increase leakage. I know what you are thinking, though…if you have leakage with exercising, this seems like a roadblock. Many people come to see me, and they want to get healthier and lose weight; however, they have leakage with exercising, and this holds them back. This is where pelvic floor physical therapy is likely needed to get you on track. 

Closing Out: Lifestyle Changes to Solve Urinary Incontinence

Lifestyle changes can certainly help to improve bladder conditions. However, this may not fully solve your problem. Pelvic floor physical therapy can help fully solve the problem! During therapy we will assess your hips, low back, and core and also internally assess the strength and tone of the pelvic floor muscles. This will give us the information we need to rehab your pelvic floor and meet your highest functional goals. Ready to solve your problems for good? Reach out to one of our pelvic floor experts today!