Pelvic Floor Series: What is the Pelvic Floor and what does it do?
The first article in our series by contributor Helen Keeble - our resident Pelvic Floor expert!
What is the pelvic floor and what does it do?
By Helen Keeble
The pelvic floor is the name given to the group of muscles at the bottom of our pelvis. They form the floor to our core (see diagram) and are present in both men and women. If you took a cross section through your entire body at the level of your hips and looked down and into your pelvis, the pelvic floor would be visible as a muscular hammock/cereal bowl with three (if you’re female) or two (if you’re male) holes going through it.
The cereal bowl type shape is very helpful as part of the function of the pelvic floor is to support the three pelvic joints (one at the front and two at the back) and the three pelvic organs (bladder, uterus and bowels). This part of the pelvic floor is the deepest of two layers and is only accessible or visible internally.
There is a smaller, but no less important, outer layer to the pelvic floor that wraps around our holes. This provides another one of it’s important functions – to keep us continent ie not leak urine, wind or feaces, unless we’re meaning to. It is this outer layer that also gives rise to part of it’s role during sexual function due to the clitoris being embedded within.
The pelvic floor is, arguably, the most crucial part of our core cylinder (see diagram). Now that we are upright, a lot of physical demand is placed on our pelvic floor during everyday life and even more with high impact or high load (heavy weights) exercise. To a certain extent this is good as it keeps it strong. So when the pelvic floor is working optimally, it supports and provides our core strength.
Interestingly for most people a ‘core’ exercise may focus on the abs, but next time you find yourself doing an ab based exercise, give a thought to your pelvic floor and see if its working too, it should be!
Look out for further articles in the series!
