Latest / Libido Lounge / Pelvic Pain Stealing Pleasure and Intimacy? Here’s How to Take It Back with Jana Danielson

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Pelvic Pain Stealing Pleasure and Intimacy? Here’s How to Take It Back with Jana Danielson · Libido Lounge

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The pelvic floor is a group of 14 muscles.
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So for what the pelvic floor muscles do together, make sure that the functionality is
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done truly with ease and grace and with, like, a high level of pleasure.
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Janet Danielson is an award winning wellness entrepreneur who's transformed her personal
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struggle with physical pain into a mission to elevate women and men through self love and
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empowerment.
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As founder and CEO of Bloom Better, she helps people discover their sacred selves by
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integrating physical wellness, mental and emotional health while focusing on mastering
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mindset, movement, and metabolism.
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She's a pilates master instructor, a certified pilates instructor, a certified weight loss
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specialist, an Amazon international best selling author, and more.
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Tight is
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just as dysfunctional as weak.
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Most people think that tight equals strong.
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Right?
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And that is the furthest from the truth.
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Your body is brilliant.
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The more in need those tissues are, the the less amount of health and vitality they have.
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You deserve a body that moves.
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You deserve a body that orgasms.
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The ouch factor is directly related to
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Now let's get going with our episode.
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Hey, everybody.
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Welcome back to another episode on the Libido Lounge.
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I'm your host board certified sexologist, doctor Diane, and I'm so thrilled to introduce
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you to a friend of mine, Janna, who is an amazing, amazing force in not only the intimacy
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space, but also in the health space in helping women and men really get to some of the root
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causes of pelvic pain issues, of pain in their body all over, of helping with weight loss, and
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really building that confidence that we need to have pain free sex, that we need to have
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amazing sex, and frankly, just to feel amazing in our body.
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So I've known Jenna for several years now, and I'm just continually impressed with the work
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she's doing and the work that she's brought into my life.
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We're gonna talk about this cooch ball and how it's changed my life.
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We're gonna talk about this scooch ball of hers, how it's also changed my life, both
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physically and within my sexual experience as well.
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So so good to be with you, my friend.
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Welcome to the lounge.
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Oh, doctor Diane, thank you for having me.
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This is gonna be a fun conversation.
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It is.
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It is.
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And I you know, so much it's, like, such an important topic.
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Right?
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Because I do find that people that are that are interested in their pelvic floor health, that
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are interested in health in general, like, we're talking a lot about, like, okay.
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We gotta help, like, the vaginal muscles work correctly, and we gotta get out of pain.
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We gotta work on posture.
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But there's so much misinformation out there, and I think often too, like we're gonna talk
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about today and and leading into part two of this, is that men are often left out of this
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conversation, and it's important that we bring both men and women in.
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So let's start with big picture here.
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Can you just kinda set the stage for us and talk about how pelvic health is related to
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sensuality as well as confidence?
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Yeah.
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So, I mean, at the very baseline level, the pelvic floor is a group of 14 muscles.
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So first of all, that's one of the myths that I think people think it's like one muscle, and
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it's actually 14.
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And what the pelvic floor muscle muscles do together because there's some of those muscles
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are slow twitch, some are fast twitch, some are smooth, and we don't have to get into the
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details of that, but it just means whether we are going for a run, having sex, delivering a
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baby, or pooping, those different muscles have certain jobs to do to make sure that the the
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functionality of whatever we're doing in those activities of daily living is done truly with
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ease and grace and in the realm of sensuality with, like, a high level of pleasure, which I
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believe so many people, men and women included, they've come to believe that they don't get to
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experience that, that they're, you know, they're not the one, they've never had an
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orgasm, they've, you know, they have a hard time maintaining an erection, and they just
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believe this myth that as we age, it's this steady decline.
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And so, you know, from a very fundamental level, these muscles, because they are muscles
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just like we need strong biceps to, you know, lift bags of groceries and, you know, put our
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Christmas decorations away, in January, we also need to focus on these muscles and I think
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because we don't physically see them like we do other muscles in our body, they just get
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completely dismissed and they're really quite misunderstood.
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Like most people don't even realize that our pelvic floor is a part of our core.
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You know, so many of us think our you know, we think I gotta go strengthen my core.
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What do you think?
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I'm gonna go, you know, bust out some planks or some some crunches because we think the core is
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the abdominals, but yet the core truly and and really quickly is a a three dimension cylinder.
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The pelvic floor lives as the floor, the diaphragm, the main breathing muscle lives as
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the ceiling, and the cylinder becomes the four different abdominals starting from the six pack
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nearest the skin going through the obliques and then into the transverse abdominis which wraps
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us like a weight training belt or like a corset, and the pelvic floor works with all of
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those pieces in a really beautiful way.
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And when there's a little bit of a disruption in how the team is functioning, that's when we
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can start to get that pain or incontinence or waking up throughout the night to go to the
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bathroom.
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So from a very high level, we're dealing with that.
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We're dealing with almost one in three women in North America dealing with pelvic floor pain.
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We're dealing with an incontinence product industry that'll top 20,000,000,000 by next
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year, and we are telling men that they need a little blue or pink pill to be able to
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reconnect into their manliness to be able to, you know, perform sexually, and all of that is
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not true.
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Thank you.
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It's it's a important distinction.
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Right?
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I love distinguishing between normal and common.
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Yeah.
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Because I think, like, so many times these things that are like, oh, like, they're common.
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Right?
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Like, we do know that it is very common for most men to experience a level of erectile
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dysfunction in our lives.
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And so I think then sometimes we just label this as normal and be like, well, this is just
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age that happens to everybody versus, like, this is common and it will likely happen to you
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unless you do the some of these things to prevent it or fix it or to heal it.
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And so I think there's a huge, huge difference.
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I I was I had my parents in town a couple weeks ago.
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I had just gone for a run before they got here, and I had fallen.
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I was gazing in the clouds and kind of just, like, doing my own visualizations that I do
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when I run, which sometimes I should be probably paying attention to the sidewalk
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because I rolled my my ankle right off the sidewalk and and hurt my pelvic floor.
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Like, I the way I landed, like, everything was out of balance, and it was so interesting in
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having my my parents there.
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And, like, I'm doing well now.
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I've been using my cooch ball.
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I've been doing all my exercises, seeing my chiropractor, etcetera.
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And, and but when they were here, their reaction was like, well, you know, you're 45.
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Like, it's just, like, time to start accepting that this is, like, what you're is happening to
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your body.
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And it's like, wow.
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That's so interesting.
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That's such interesting, like, messaging, right, that so many of us get around this is
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just, like, the path of destiny.
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So in thinking about this and thinking about what is normal versus common and say, okay.
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Well, this is happening statistically, as you said, this pelvic floor dysfunction to so many
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people across the board.
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Besides, like, yeah, pain with sex, what are some of the other things that might be keynotes
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for our listeners to say, hey.
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We gotta look at the pelvic floor.
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There's something happening here.
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And then just everybody, I am gonna tie this back to to sex and libido and your arousal, but
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just want you to know and want Janet to help us a little bit, like, when you should be thinking
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about this beyond even just something like pelvic pain.
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Yeah.
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So I mean, there's there's like a a grocery list of I'm gonna say symptoms that we may not
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connect the dots between pelvic floor and, you know, fill in the blank symptoms, so
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constipation, bloating, chronically tight hips.
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Like if you are a golfer or a pickleball player or and you get these chronically tight hips
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that very well could be plugged into a tight pelvic floor, cold tingly feet, low grade back
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pain that is kind of always there but not enough to like you know seek action on it, know
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our feet like plantar fascia is very connected into the pelvic floor, so if you have chronic
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plantar fasciitis, chronically tight jaw, so TMJ is a big connection point into the pelvic
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floor that we just we wouldn't just normally, like, make that connection, and so there's
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there's a few things that might, you know, be like, that's that sounds like me.
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Yeah.
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And I'll I'll even comment on that.
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When I started working more on my pelvic floor, one of the first things I actually realized,
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and I wear a night guard, is that I was, like, waking up, and my night guard has helped a lot
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with, like, TMJ and tight muscles, but working on the pelvic floor has been a huge, like, that
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was a big, like, shift for me of, oh, this is so much more relaxed than my face.
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This is, like, so much more lovely to wake up.
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So, you know, I've really seen that personally.
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So let's talk more about, like, the arousal side of things.
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Like, what have you seen in your work with the exercises you teach, with the products that are
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really designed to support pelvic floor functioning?
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What have you seen with, like, improving arousal and blood flow in the people you Well,
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and so you really just you you you said the key words there, blood flow, and so just like a
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plant, if you're planting a garden, that those those seeds are gonna need water and sunlight
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to flourish.
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Mussels need oxygen rich, nutrient rich, blood flow to support them so they can do their
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function.
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Our muscles wanna do their job.
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Our muscles love to serve us.
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They just sometimes forget what their job is when we either are, you know, healing from an
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injury, you know, we've given birth our our baby is 10 years old, but we're still having to
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double up on our pads when we go for a run.
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Right?
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With the lack of blood flow, the musculature of the pelvic floor for both men and women cannot
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become just juicy and plump, is what is required for arousal.
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Now here's the thing that a lot of people don't realize is that, you know, an orgasm requires
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the physicality of the pelvic floor to be able to contract, contract, contract, contract on
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that upward build, right?
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And then there's the moment, right?
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The moment of release where the orgasm occurs, right?
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And whatever that looks like for you, you have this out of body experience, your legs are
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shaking a little bit, but what is required before any of that can happen throughout, like,
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that that that downward release is those muscles have to completely let go.
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They have to relax, they have to surrender, and that takes a really smart muscle because here's
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the thing, most people think that tight equals strong.
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Right?
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And that is the furthest from the truth.
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Tight is just as dysfunctional as weak, and that's where if you want to go around to the
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Kegel conversation, this would be a great place to have it because for both men and women, the
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pelvic floor just like like there's I'll say it this way there's people that take on stress and
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anxiety and they they get like chronic headaches, right?
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There are some that take that into their heart and they'll get, you know, heart palpitations
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and that kind of shortness of breath.
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There are people that will take it into their gut and there are people that will take it into
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their pelvic floor.
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And most of us, there was a study done that had sensors on women as they were watching a scary
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show to see where in their body were they experiencing the fear, and the sensors in the
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pelvic floor were like the first to fire and the last to actually calm down, and that was
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unconscious to them, like subconscious, they didn't realize that, right?
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They might have felt their shoulders jacking up to their ears or their fists, their jaw getting
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more tense, so when we do not have the functionality of those muscles which requires
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that oxygen rich, nutrient rich blood, it is really hard for even, like, even the vulva to
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get plump with with blood.
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Right?
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As our friend Susan Bratton says, it takes, like, twenty minutes for us to get engorged and
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get ready, you know, before the penetration even happens.
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So and in a male's body, a tight pelvic floor can drastically impact the ability to get and
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sustain anorexion.
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So sensuality is a 100% plugged into this part of our body.
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Yeah.
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Thank you.
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I think it's such an important thing to bring to life that it's like in the arousal world,
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there's so much focus on blood flow.
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Right?
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But we're not thinking about, like, what is the functionality around, like, how do we make that
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happen other than taking a a little pill?
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Right?
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And I do what it is.
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I agree.
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I was thinking as you were talking, like, is a perfect place to talk about things like kegels
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and and jade eggs.
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So I do wanna bring that to light.
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And also for men, I imagine some men listening have heard of even, like, penile weightlifting,
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And I look at that as the same, you know, very, like, the the male version of, say, jade egg
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practices or or Kegels, these things that are, like, designed to strengthen and strengthen and
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strengthen and strengthen and strengthen.
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And much of the time, these things are, like, done wrong.
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You know, I've even seen I've I've never actually worked with anybody that a man that
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has done is the penile weight lifting.
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So I haven't seen this from personal experience because I don't recommend that.
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But I've read stories of people that have had, like, major injuries from this sort of thing.
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So I do think there's some level of when people are doing these activities, they're
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legitimately doing them incorrectly, which anytime we do that, we're gonna run into
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problems.
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But I do think another component of it is, you know, is just focusing so much on, like, the
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strengthening.
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And so when I think about this, I think about, like, an analogy of, like, going to the gym and
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just being like, okay.
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Well, I'm not doing something like holding a, you know, weight in a bicep curl and just
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holding that for as long as I possibly can.
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Like that, I'm not gonna do that without doing something counter to that.
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So can you talk to us a little bit about that around, like like, the importance from this?
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And so, like, what happens?
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Like, what is essentially happening when we are doing these practices where we're just, like,
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tightening, tightening, tightening, tightening, tightening?
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Like like, what is that doing to us from a standpoint of blood flow and functioning
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perspective?
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Yeah.
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So I mean, it's it's taking those muscles and it's teaching them that a contracted shortened
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position is where that muscle group is gonna live.
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Right?
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A functional muscle knows when to work and when to rest, and if all you're doing is
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strengthening and loading, right, it's it's gonna just get shorter and shorter.
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That group will get shorter and shorter and shorter in relation to the load.
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So now what you're teaching or you're creating is a situation we call hypertonic.
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There's too much tone.
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Alright?
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So this and this is where so many people get confused is because they will be consistent
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with their Kegels, they'll be out with their friends and they burst out laughing, and they
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leak a little bit.
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And the immediate thought is, oh, shit.
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I gotta do more Kegels.
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Right?
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Like that's what they'll that's what they will think.
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But here's what's actually going on is we've been Kegel ing or, again, we hold our stress
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and tension in that area, so we're always on guard.
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We're guarding.
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Right?
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And so as that muscle group gets more and more tension, more and more hypertone, intra
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abdominal pressure like a cough, a sneeze, a laugh, you might start to sing.
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I mean, we saw Jessica Simpson just a few weeks ago on the Today show.
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I think it was yeah.
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She was live in New York City singing, and she peed her pants.
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Right?
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And so what does the media cover is the embarrassment of that.
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But what's actually happening in that moment is the downward force of the cough, the laugh, the
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sneeze, holding a note when you're singing, those little muscles are like holding on for
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dear life because you've taught them to be tight, and now there's this big force going
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down on them in that cough sneeze laugh and they can't hold on anymore, so we leak.
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And again, because we don't talk about this, we just assume we are still too weak, so we
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continue to kegel, which exacerbates the problem, and there becomes the hamster wheel
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that, so many people are on.
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Yeah.
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It's so sad, right, that, like, I hear that story.
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It's like, well, what a great opportunity for the media to bring light to this around, like,
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hey.
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How many of you have experienced this?
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This is why this happened.
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Let's all have compassion for the fact that a lot of people are in the same scenario.
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It's like, it's really sad that it's like used as the embarrassing moment versus like, hey,
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what an opportunity to bring awareness to people from a standpoint of health.
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Yeah.
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But, you know, from the standpoint of that, I do think, like, we can talk and really learn
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from that experience around us.
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And so I know there's a lot of, you know, there's a lot of different conversations
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around, different, say, ways to relax muscles, those kind of things.
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What makes what makes this your cooch ball?
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And I've, like, noticed this a lot.
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Like, I can tell you, Jan, I haven't I haven't told you this yet that, like, the first time I
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sat on this for and it was only probably, like, like, thirty seconds the first time I used it,
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and there was, like, such a shift happening.
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It was, like, so apparent to me, like like, how much work I had to do here because I could feel
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that instant, almost like yeah.
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Almost like somebody giving you, like, a a deep massage or something.
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You don't realize, like, oh, wow.
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I'm like really holding here and I didn't even know.
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It was just a a huge point of like, okay, I thought I was doing pretty good stuff for my
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pelvic floor, but like, I have like realized that I still have work to do.
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So what is like so unique about this as far as like technology of this product and how it's
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helping people?
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You know, the the idea was inspired by research that was released kind of the like, 2014, 2015
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by doctor Bruce Crawford who is a urogynecologist, and his research showed that
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ninety percent of pelvic floor dysfunction is not a medical issue.
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It's actually a fitness issue, and that's where he kinda was a Jerry Maguire moment.
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Like, he had me at hello, and I was like, what?
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Right?
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Because as a Pilates instructor, I mean, I own my studio.
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I own my clinic.
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I had pelvic floor physical therapists in my clinic, so my process was just sending people
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for pelvic floor PT.
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But all of a sudden, I was like, wait.
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What?
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You mean it is if this truly is if this research is correct and it is blood flow and
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it's posture and it's breathing, I can cover off the posture.
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I can cover off the breathing in my classes, but how would I without sending someone to
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pelvic floor physical therapy, how would I help them in a class so that when they do go for
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pelvic floor PT, they've got a new situation that that therapist can, you know, really
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progress them forward?
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And so as the mom of three boys, I went downstairs.
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I sat on every mini basketball and floor hockey ball that my boys had, and I knew that I wanted
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to create a release situation, like you said, almost like that massage, but there was a
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really key indicator that I had to work with, and that is our nervous system because
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something too much is gonna trigger the sympathetic nervous system, which can then put
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us into that trauma response.
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And if it's not enough, it's just kinda like meh.
21:45
Right?
21:45
So I was looking for this, you know, using a three bears analogy, I was looking for the
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porridge to be just right, and I couldn't find it on the market and so the simplicity of the
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technology here is what you can't see.
21:58
So we have the rubberized bladder of the ball and then around the ball we wrap it with this
22:02
really cool nylon thread in a unique pattern and then we put the cover on it.
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So then when you fill it, you keep it a little bit squishy.
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When you sit on it, it's meant to bear the weight of an adult.
22:12
Right?
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And the squishiness and the nylon threads create this communication or this conversation
22:19
between the body and the ball, and then we add the proper diaphragmatic breathing, which is
22:25
really key because when we don't breathe, again, the brain's gonna be like alarm bells,
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sympathetic, fight, flight, freeze.
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So even though, like, you know, in your case, in my case, there might be some degree of ouch
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factor as we call it.
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The ouch factor is directly related to it's like an inverse relationship.
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So the higher the ouch factor, the more in need those tissues are, the the less amount of
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health and vitality they have.
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So that's how as a woman or man when you're using the cooch ball, you can actually be
22:58
confident that you are improving your pelvic floor function because the ouch factor is gonna
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decrease the more consistent you are as you bring that healthy blood flow in, and that's
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really what it is.
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So for people with hypertonic pelvic floors, sit on it, it becomes like that internal
23:16
massage, but for the people that truly are hypotonic or lacking tone, the cooch ball gives
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the brain something to feel that you can start to, like, lift away from.
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So think of it almost like if you're too tight, the pelvic floor is the massage or the cooch
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ball is the massage therapist.
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If you're lacking tone, the cooch ball becomes like the personal trainer getting you to do
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push ups, right, to get to get that strength.
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So in a nutshell, that's really how this works.
23:45
I love it.
23:46
I love it.
23:47
And it is like that hypotonic component of it is like I think I look at it a lot as like that
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neuro like nervous system, like, finding the muscles again.
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It's almost like this element where, you know, due to trauma or stress or, you know, whatever
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it is that dysregulates the nervous system, it's like the brain can't quite find that
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muscle to fire correctly.
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So something that is helping the anything that is helping the brain almost, like, see that
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muscle again.
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And then the more we fire like correctly, like from a standpoint of, you know, brain muscle,
24:17
the more that not only helps with things like arousal and blood flow, the more it even helps
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with orgasm.
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Or like for men, like things like like orgasm control and, you know, delayed orgasm so they
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can last longer.
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Like, the more we have, I think, the, the control and the functioning on both sides,
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making sure we can properly have the strength but making sure we can properly have the
24:39
relaxation, then we really gain full control over that muscle to utilize it for for pleasure
24:45
and joy.
24:46
Right?
24:46
Well, and it's true.
24:47
And, you know, you know, in a when you are having sex, you can actually build some fun
24:53
ways to, you know, practice that.
24:56
Right?
24:57
So, you know, when the penis has penetrated the vagina, you when those muscles are functional,
25:03
you should be able to, you know, give the penis a hug essentially, and then let the hug go.
25:10
And then you play with it, like, give them give them that give the penis, like, three little
25:13
quick hugs and then let it go.
25:15
So that's how you can really start to, you know, almost make this a fun way with your
25:23
partner to start testing what's happening inside your body.
25:27
Yeah.
25:28
And that's another way I've seen that that women and men work really well together from a
25:32
standpoint of orgasm control around, like, okay, you know, like squeezing more to bring
25:37
some more blood flow, to bring some more sensational, you know, getting a little close
25:42
to the edge, like, okay, let's back it off.
25:44
Like, let's relax.
25:45
Let's, like, allow some more space there and a little bit less stimulation so that zone can be
25:50
that sweet spot of like, oh, I'm at a, like, a seven, eight, nine, like, not quite over the
25:55
orgasm hill, and it it really helps, like, men and women work together in penetrative sex to,
26:01
like, stay in that sweet spot zone.
26:02
It's really fun.
26:03
Agreed.
26:04
Just a quick reminder, if you've not head over to wanttowantit.com, get your copy of my new
26:11
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26:18
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26:23
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26:28
mismatch, communicate about sex better, improve pelvic pain, erectile dysfunction, and so much
26:35
more.
26:36
Now let's get back to our episode.
26:38
Well, I know we're gonna bring everybody over to part two, so you guys remember that you can
26:43
always access our exclusive content in part two where with Jana, I'm going to be talking a
26:48
little bit more about exercises for men and women.
26:52
So I do wanna wrap this up.
26:53
Is there anything that we want to leave our audience with?
26:56
We're gonna, below this video, everybody give you links for how to get the cooch ball.
27:01
I do wanna also make sure that everybody knows I'm gonna put links for the scooch ball in
27:05
there too as this little ball I've seen to be just amazing for getting into, like, all the
27:11
little nooks and crannies.
27:12
I've been using it on my feet a lot after running.
27:15
I've been using it, like, even on, like, my shoulders, like, the front of my shoulders,
27:18
these hard places to get to after working out.
27:22
So is there anything else that you wanna say about this or anything else before we wrap up
27:26
today?
27:27
Well, I think it is such a good intro about the scooch ball.
27:31
She came about about two years after the cooch ball, really, the cooch ball's little sister,
27:36
and exactly for what you said, you know, the the nooks and crannies of the body that the
27:40
cooch ball doesn't quite get into to get to the fascia release that is gonna allow us to just
27:46
it it just really does from, like, a metabolic health or a cellular health perspective.
27:50
Blood flow is queen and king, and when we can have tools that are simple to use, that you can
27:57
be watching a Netflix series, you're on the floor, and you're just adding value.
28:02
So that's exactly what this is and and how they work together so synergistically.
28:06
And, you know, I think what I would wanna leave everyone with is that no matter where you are,
28:11
like, no matter what your age is, no matter what your, you know, your level of sensuality
28:16
or pleasure is, we are in a moment of time where you can decide really quickly that those
28:26
belief systems don't serve you anymore.
28:28
Right?
28:29
And the one thing you could start doing today to chart start to change your pelvic floor
28:35
health, because literally the pelvic floor is the downstairs neighbor of the main muscle
28:40
called the diaphragm, is learn how to breathe properly in through your nose like you're
28:44
smelling a fresh baked apple pie, exhale out of your mouth like if you live in an area with
28:50
with seasons, like you're warming up your hands, forgot your little micro minis as you
28:54
were outside, that exhale, that is that's literally what's gonna start to change.
29:00
It when the diaphragm moves, it wakes up the pelvic floor.
29:05
When we're breathing into our neck, not only are we taking stress and tension through the
29:09
jaw, the neck, the shoulders, but the the diaphragm is not moving, and as the pelvic
29:14
floor looks up at her and doesn't see any movement, she also is not gonna move.
29:18
So that is the one thing that I tell everyone to start with is morning, noon, night,
29:24
whatever, one hand on your sternum, this flat bone here on your chest, one hand on your belly
29:29
button, breathing into that bottom hand, exhaling melting away from that bottom hand,
29:34
and believe me when I say that that is one of the simplest ways that we can start to wake up
29:41
our pelvic floor.
29:42
I love it.
29:43
What a great message to leave us with, and thank you again for being here.
29:47
Thank you everybody for listening.
29:48
Please do like, subscribe, share this with your friends, and check out all these great links
29:53
below.
29:53
We'll see you in another episode.
29:55
Ciao for now.
29:59
Hey, club members.
30:01
I have another amazing guest to share with you.
30:05
This is my dear friend, Janet Danielson, who is a pelvic floor expert.
30:10
And as always, I'm not going to read through her bio here because I want you to go listen to
30:16
that in part one, and listen to that episode that we already did with her because she really
30:22
laid the foundation for us of pelvic floor health for women and men and how this is
30:27
related, how the pelvic floor is related to blood flow, to arousal, as well as a lot of
30:34
other health symptoms and is often an area that just does not get talked about, but it really
30:39
can be so related to your arousal, your sex life, your lubrication, your comfort, and even
30:47
things like back pain and more.
30:48
So definitely go listen to episode number one.
30:50
Now we're talking today in this, in this conversation about some ways, some actionable
30:59
steps that you guys can take to to really get your pelvic floor to a point where it's
31:05
functioning more.
31:07
So we did introduce this product in part one called the Cooch ball and really talked about
31:13
the uniqueness of what this design, this technology that Jana created, what it has done
31:19
for pelvic floor health.
31:21
I can tell you, as I mentioned in part one, that I recognize the change in my body, like,
31:26
pretty instantaneously, and I also recognized the change, like, the level of my need for
31:32
working on my pelvic floor pretty instantaneously when I was using this.
31:37
I was having a very, very, very small, luckily very small level of incontinence, mostly when I
31:45
would it would really just happen when, like, I was hanging out with my girlfriends and got
31:49
laughing too hard, which at least it was just with my girls.
31:52
But, you know, one of those things that that I noticed, so far, I've not seen any of that
31:57
since I've incorporated this into my life.
32:00
And I also know that, you know, that so many men and a lot of Jana's work is also now
32:05
bridging into helping men because it's an a hugely untalked about thing for men as far as
32:13
their pelvic floor health.
32:15
So that's the intro.
32:16
I'm so happy you're here with me again.
32:18
Thank you, Jana.
32:19
Thanks for having me.
32:21
Part two.
32:22
Part two.
32:22
Here we go.
32:24
So before we go into some exercises, can you just talk a little bit more around anything if
32:30
there's anything we didn't mention in the first episode, and if you feel complete, we can move
32:33
on.
32:34
But I'm wondering if there's anything we didn't mention around why this is so important for men
32:38
and women.
32:39
Anything else you think we need to mention there?
32:41
I mean, I mean, I think we covered the why, you know, pretty good in in episode one.
32:48
I I think the one piece to help your listeners understand is the one question I get quite
32:53
often is, well, how long do I have to do this for?
32:56
Right?
32:56
Like, they'll come with their whatever, you know, incontinence or constipation.
33:01
And my answer usually is, like, ever.
33:05
Forever.
33:05
Right?
33:05
Like, would you would you just brush your teeth once a month and have good oral hygiene?
33:10
No.
33:10
You know, would we only wipe our bum once a week?
33:13
No.
33:14
Right?
33:14
So there's, you know, I try I try and give some of these funny metaphors, but that's really
33:19
it's it's important because, you know, the stress in our life, how we sleep, traveling,
33:25
not sleeping in our own bed, like, all of this, like, this experience is different from day to
33:29
day.
33:29
It's not like that today is better than yesterday is better than last week.
33:34
Like, it's you can really get this beautiful reconnection back into your body because you
33:41
may not even realize how much you're holding on to until you get on your ball, and some for
33:48
some people, like I've had clients reach out to me and say, I just balled my eyes out today on
33:54
my cooch ball, like what is that?
33:56
Right?
33:57
And so understand that, yes, this is a physical tool, but the body is physical, the body is
34:04
emotional, the body is energy, and when you understand this trifecta, it really helps at
34:14
least it helps for me and how I position this for my men and women in my community is if you
34:19
have trouble being consistent with something, I truly believe that it hasn't really plugged
34:24
into your why.
34:26
Like, why are you doing this?
34:28
Right?
34:28
Is it is it helping?
34:29
Or or or the pain point hasn't been amplified enough for you to be consistent and and bring
34:35
this into your life.
34:36
And so that's what I feel why it's super important to do this on consistent basis
34:41
because there's the physical aspect, there's the emotional aspect, and that healing.
34:46
Right?
34:47
Healing to experience the pleasure.
34:49
And then there's the energy.
34:50
Like, you know, that that energy is sensuality.
34:53
It's creativity.
34:55
And so, you know, if you've got a a big project coming up or you've got this block and you your
35:00
creativity is, like, being challenged, well, it actually could be the energy of the pelvic
35:06
floor.
35:06
So it's it's drastically it impacts so many different aspects of our life.
35:11
It does.
35:12
It does.
35:13
And it's like, it reminds me of things like the body keeps score, the biology of belief,
35:17
especially the but the body keeps score of, like, you know, these books and this research
35:22
that really goes in and says and looks at, like like exactly that, like the emotions that we
35:27
hold oftentimes in our body.
35:29
Yeah.
35:30
And this is like no different than somebody getting like body work and being like, wow.
35:33
Like like, you started, you know, rubbing my hamstrings and massaging my hamstrings.
35:38
The next thing I know, I'm like in full tears.
35:41
So same thing with this.
35:42
It's like like when we start releasing these things, like it's not just physical tension
35:46
that we're releasing in, but it's emotional tension.
35:50
And I want everybody to also think about this as what I'm about to ask Jana about some
35:54
actionable steps for you guys of how to use this.
35:57
And one of my favorite things about, you know, about your technology here is it's like it's so
36:02
from a price point, it's so affordable for people, and it's like all the different things
36:06
that we, like, find, you know, we spend money on, and here's, like, a technique at a really
36:10
good price point of, that we can use for life to to help us.
36:15
And so we're gonna talk about techniques and how we do release the pelvic floor.
36:18
But as you guys are listening, just like, you know, just like what Janice said around, hey.
36:23
This is something that is, like, a lifelong thing.
36:27
Remember that, like, the research, and I've talked about this at other points in the club,
36:31
like, remember that the research on habits, some of the research on, like, atomic habits
36:36
and and tiny habits really is around, like, habit stacking.
36:39
And, you know, in episode one, Jana mentioned, like, oh, you can, you know, do some of this
36:43
stuff if you're, like, it's so easy to do when you're watching Netflix.
36:48
Or, you know, so many people hopefully are working on visualization exercises or breathing
36:53
exercises.
36:55
And if you're doing those things anyways, you already have the time.
36:58
It's then you just like habit stack and say, hey, I'm doing this anyway, so I'm gonna spend
37:02
spend my, you know, first thirty seconds to five minutes, and we're gonna ask Jana about
37:07
timing, you know, but that's my that's my educated hypothesis on what she's gonna tell
37:12
us.
37:13
So we're gonna ask you that in a second.
37:14
But where, like, the idea is, hey, I'm gonna spend my first little bit of doing that
37:19
activity using something like the cooch ball since you're just sitting on it for some of the
37:23
exercises, and you're already doing those things anyway.
37:26
So the more we habit stack these things and look to say, hey, what sort of things in your
37:32
life are you doing anyways where you could sit on this?
37:36
It really becomes one of those things that then we just have to work on some sort of cue, you
37:40
know, sticky notes, alarms, you know, putting this someplace that's obvious where you see it.
37:46
You know, something like that is the cue to remember to do it, but it doesn't have to be
37:50
something that is actually even an extra job.
37:53
It just is like, how do we fit this into the habits that you are already cultivating in your
37:58
life?
37:59
So tell us a little bit more then with that, you know, that info.
38:02
Yeah.
38:02
A little more like how we use this, how long people start, as well as, like, do you have
38:07
kinda like an intro exercise that you could talk to us about?
38:11
Yeah.
38:12
Okay.
38:12
So three minutes is like the goal.
38:16
Right?
38:16
You wanna work your way up to three minutes.
38:18
At three minutes in the world of fascia, and just really quickly, fascia is connective
38:22
tissue.
38:23
Fascia is different.
38:24
It's got a different personality than muscle.
38:27
Like, let's say let's say fascia and muscle are like cousins.
38:31
Right?
38:31
Like, they come from the same family tree, but they've got very different, you know, they
38:35
they're both soft tissues.
38:36
They work on with around movement, but they have different personalities.
38:40
Alright?
38:40
And so like most muscles start and end at joints like a bicep ends, you know, between
38:45
your shoulder and your and your elbow, fascia is not like that.
38:49
Fascia is like sheath.
38:51
It's like it's like a spider web, and it actually gives us shape.
38:55
So we want to release this fascia, and there's layers of it.
39:00
Think of it like layers of saran wrap almost.
39:02
Right?
39:03
And in between these layers, there should be, like, juicy blood.
39:07
There should be hydration.
39:08
There should be nutrition.
39:09
And so, you know, it it but for most of us, it's like beef jerky.
39:15
It's, like, dry, and it it it sticks to muscles, bones, joints, organs at a force of
39:24
2,000 pounds per square inch.
39:26
So when you sit on this cooch ball, and you mentioned, that, you know, the first time you
39:31
did it, it definitely wasn't three minutes.
39:33
Same thing for most people.
39:35
It almost can take your breath away, and that's the number one.
39:38
That's the only thing you have to remember in the cooch ball universe.
39:42
When you sit on this ball, as long as you are breathing in a calm, relaxed way, and in the
39:49
training videos, I show you how to amplify that through the proper diaphragmatic breathing, but
39:54
as long as you're breathing in a calm, relaxed way, you stay.
39:57
Even if the ouch factor is kinda jacked up, if you can close your eyes and, you know, your
40:02
face isn't all contorted and you're not, like, squeezing your butt.
40:05
Right?
40:06
But as soon as the breath becomes erratic or, you know, that it's just not flowing, that's
40:12
your sign that you've had enough and you come off the ball.
40:16
And you can if let's say that's a minute.
40:18
Right?
40:18
You've got two minutes left, you can just sit and breathe and feel when you get off the ball
40:23
because, as you know, when you get off the ball, sometimes it feels like the why shouldn't
40:28
lead the witness?
40:29
Tell us.
40:30
What what have you felt when you come when you came off the cooch ball, doctor Diane?
40:34
I mean, like, the nervous system's a really important thing to talk about here because
40:38
that's one of the big initial shifts is, like, that, like, down regulation of, like, a, like,
40:42
a calm kinda more relaxing.
40:46
It's like, the words I would use are is, like, like, there it is or, like, fine.
40:54
You're, like, faint.
40:54
Something something like that.
40:56
Right?
40:56
Yeah.
40:57
There's this, like, kind of relief, and and I I love the way you're talking about this too
41:01
because in, like, when I've done my friend is a rolfer, which is a, you know, a technique,
41:05
right, that works on the fascia more than the muscles.
41:08
So I actually do more rolfing type of work than true massage on my own body because I have
41:14
found that when I get my fascia in alignment, it is so much better from a posture pain
41:22
perspective.
41:23
It does so much more for, like, for my body than, like, a muscular massage.
41:27
And it's, like, the same thing that she tells me around, like, I'm so used to, like,
41:31
historically many years ago, was like, oh, yeah.
41:33
The deep sports tissue and get in there and you, like, get your face all contorted like
41:36
you're saying.
41:37
And, you know, and, like, she said the same thing to me around, like, like, we want to do
41:42
this, that it's never supposed to feel anything more than what you are present with.
41:48
The moment you're, like, out of your body and you're thinking about something else and you're
41:51
not able to stay present with the sensation and present with the breath.
41:56
So I know she's watching my breath when she gives, like, massage or I'm like, oh, she's
42:00
holding my breath her breath.
42:01
Okay.
42:01
I'm going too far.
42:03
So it's like the same thing.
42:04
Right?
42:04
And I think that's why I noticed, like, that shift in relaxation because there is it's
42:09
almost like a meditative standpoint of, like, you're it's so much focus too on not only
42:13
releasing the muscles, but on staying present with what is happening with the muscles.
42:18
Right?
42:19
Well, it is.
42:19
And have you felt, like, warmth or tingliness when you come off the ball?
42:24
Warm.
42:25
Yeah.
42:26
Yeah.
42:26
Warm.
42:27
Mhmm.
42:27
Yeah.
42:27
And that's a sign of that that's a sign of blood flow.
42:30
Right?
42:30
Right.
42:30
So that's what you that's what we're looking for.
42:33
And for some people that can happen the first time, and for some people it could be on day 42
42:38
that that happens.
42:39
Right?
42:39
Depending on what's been going on, and so it really becomes this custom experience.
42:44
And so what's important to understand, and we talked about this in episode one, is that
42:48
breath truly is the you know, with or without the cooch ball, if we breathe
42:54
diaphragmatically, we are gonna be helping our pelvic floor health.
42:58
The second thing to understand is actually our posture, So when we're standing, optimal
43:03
standing posture is 60% of our weight back in our big heel bone called the calcaneus and 40%
43:10
of our weight across the metatarsal, so not under the toe pads but under the area of the
43:15
foot where the toe is kind of attached to the main part of the foot those those little
43:18
knuckles there they're called the metatarsals.
43:20
So our foot has 26 bones in each each foot right?
43:24
So anytime a body part has small little bones, it's meant for movement.
43:29
Hands, feet, spine as example, versus legs and arms which are big long bones.
43:34
So here's where the body gets super confused is that we get conditioned to stand with too much
43:41
weight forward on our feet about 80%, so you know what happens then is our glutes and our
43:48
hamstrings turn off, our quads are on all the time, Our calves are kinda compromised.
43:53
Our low back starts to hurt.
43:55
We start to get things like bunions and heel spurs because, again, we're not absorbing
44:00
gravity like we should be, and our pelvic floors in both a man's body and a woman's body
44:06
are also being compromised because now the bony structure right?
44:11
Imagine jumping on a trampoline that didn't have good structure.
44:14
Well, you you probably wouldn't be jumping on it.
44:17
Right?
44:18
That's what has to happen with our body, and so with proper breathing, proper standing posture,
44:23
then seated posture because so many of us are seated for majority a majority of our day.
44:28
If we depending on how cushy your chair is, but if you get past your ego and, like, literally
44:34
move your butt cheeks out of the way, the right butt cheek goes right, the left butt cheek goes
44:38
left, those bony butt bones called your ischial tuberosities, when you're sitting, they
44:43
essentially become your feet.
44:45
So when you can sit and feel those bones underneath you versus the bones behind you or,
44:51
like, that slumpy posture, right, you're also gonna be putting yourself in a more positive
44:56
situation for your pelvic floor.
44:59
Right?
44:59
So those two things are really important, breathing and posture.
45:03
From a movement perspective, what a lot of people don't realize is the basic bridge.
45:08
Alright?
45:09
So, you know you're laying down, can be on your bed, on a couch, on a mat, and you bend your
45:14
knees and you have your feet on the floor.
45:17
Doing a basic bridge has been proven to be 56% more impactful than a Kegel and the reason why
45:27
is because again through doctor Bruce Crawford's research, he found that the pelvic
45:32
floor, those 14 muscles don't work on their own.
45:35
They actually have other teammates in other parts of the body.
45:38
Our inner thighs, known as our adductors, the gluteus medius, so the medius part of the glute
45:45
that kind of comes off the tailbone and wraps to the outside of the of the leg, and then the
45:50
deepest set of abdominals which we talked about in the diaphragmatic breathing part, the
45:53
transverse abdominis.
45:55
So, you know, putting the cooch ball between the knees and doing some bridging coaches those
46:03
muscles to be functional.
46:04
Right?
46:05
Where, like you talked about the Kegel, would we ever hold a a weight in a bicep curl
46:09
position and just cross our fingers that our biceps are getting stronger?
46:12
No.
46:13
We wanna work through ranges of motion.
46:15
So simple exercises like the bridge is really important.
46:20
Even the squat and the lunge are two exercises that have been shown to be extremely beneficial
46:27
for pelvic floor health when done appropriately.
46:32
You know, one of the toughest things to do without hands is get up off the toilet or up
46:38
off your office chair.
46:39
Right?
46:39
We tend to, like, put our hands on our desk or on our thighs and stand up.
46:44
Well, that's a way that we can be practicing functionality of the pelvic floor when we're
46:49
getting up out of a chair away from the kitchen table.
46:52
Right?
46:53
You know, the other one that I really like to mention is that when we are even as simple as
47:01
on all fours, and some of these might be accessible for some people versus others.
47:05
So think about all fours, and even think about it from, like, when you're in the middle of
47:08
sexy time.
47:09
Sometimes you might be on all fours.
47:11
Right?
47:12
And so going through that cat and cow exercise where you're tucking your tailbone and then
47:17
kinda letting your booty go all back, right, that is even more functional than a Kegel.
47:23
So it's important to understand that that those simple exercises really do impact the pelvic
47:31
floor as its 14 muscles plus its co recruiters.
47:34
So helpful.
47:35
You're you're making me remember some of the blue zone research.
47:38
And for those of you guys that know that don't know blue zones, there are areas around the
47:42
world where people live statistically more, like like, longer for in a healthier way.
47:48
So there's been, you know, studies on blue zones, and one of the things that has been
47:52
studied as one of the the correlations is that people in these zones tend to sit on the floor
47:59
more.
48:00
So it's like the theory of, like, hey.
48:02
You have to and it's like a lot of these types of, like, movements you're talking about to,
48:06
like, push yourself off the floor and to, like, engage.
48:09
And so I I, you know, I wonder if, like, that's part of, like, the blue zone too around, hey.
48:13
They're on the floor more, so they're actually engaging in that those motions, you know,
48:18
similar to, you know, similar muscles as we're talking about here.
48:22
Well and and, you know, when you think about what our our hip mobility, we talked about it
48:26
in episode one that, you know, chronically tight hips usually are a function of of the
48:31
pelvic floor being dysfunctional.
48:33
Think about sitting.
48:35
Like, we're we're bearing weight through our pelvis in a similar way throughout the day, and
48:41
even though we're not bearing weight the same way when we're sleeping, if we are side
48:46
sleepers and you like to sleep with your knees bent, you're essentially in a seated position
48:50
just 90 degrees over on your bed.
48:53
So, you know, you're bearing weight the weight of gravity differently, but that body posture
48:59
is it you you you get stuck in it, and so it's important to yeah.
49:05
Like, once a week, have a picnic supper.
49:08
Like, put down a blanket and sit on the floor and eat dinner.
49:11
Right?
49:12
Like, that's I mean, we do that.
49:13
I used to do it when the boys were little.
49:15
We would do that a couple times a week, and they loved it.
49:17
Right?
49:17
Because it just gets the hips in a different position.
49:22
Yeah.
49:22
I love that.
49:23
And and one more question, then I know we have to wrap things up and get you on your way.
49:27
But I I I know people are be asking this, which is when we're talking about engaging these
49:33
muscles correctly and and we're talking about bridge and lunge and squats, do you see value
49:39
in people doing this, like, non weighted, at least, like, a set of these non weighted in any
49:44
way to, like, help their body just, like, not deal with the weight and more just, like, focus
49:49
on the movement?
49:50
Where does where do the weights versus non weights come in?
49:53
Yeah.
49:53
So, you know, the whole and I'm just about to launch the cooch ball method, which is actually
49:59
13 prescriptive movements that plug into all of this, and none of it is weighted.
50:04
The only time we will use the cooch ball sometimes, like I said, in in bridge to really
50:09
engage those inner thighs, but it's the execution of the movement that is key.
50:17
So I would say get really good at these without weight, and then if you wanted to add like, if
50:24
you're gonna add weight, you're you're just cut you're kinda shifting the why behind you're
50:31
doing it.
50:32
You know?
50:32
Do you know what I mean?
50:33
So the pelvic floor doesn't need more weight.
50:35
It needs, you know, it doesn't need the three carat diamond.
50:39
It needs the the half carat, but way better clarity and cut and color.
50:43
Right?
50:44
That's what it is.
50:45
It's quality over quantity.
50:47
Yeah.
50:47
Beautiful.
50:49
Well, thank you.
50:49
This has been so helpful.
50:51
And and, everybody, I'm gonna have links as always to part one, like I said, but also where
50:55
you get the cooch ball.
50:57
We talked in episode one about its sister or cousin ball, the scooch ball.
51:02
So make sure you listen to episode one to learn about this too because this one is really
51:08
important for other areas of the body beyond the pelvic floor to just make sure all your
51:12
fascia is functioning well.
51:15
And is there any final words you wanna leave us with today?
51:19
You know, I just want everyone to remember that, you know, your body is brilliant.
51:23
Alright?
51:24
You deserve a body that moves.
51:27
You deserve a body that orgasms.
51:29
You deserve a body that has, you know, erections whenever you so choose, and I I
51:36
believe that pleasure is is our birthright.
51:40
It's not something that where people are either have it or they don't, and it starts with just
51:47
the bay our basic cellular health in this in this arena.
51:51
And, when you can be consistent with it, your body will respond.
51:55
Amazing.
51:56
Well, thank you so much, Jana, for all your wisdom.
51:58
Really appreciate you, and thank you club members for listening to another episode.
52:03
We'll see you again soon.
52:07
Thank you for listening to the Libido Lounge.
52:09
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52:11
Please share this with your friends.
52:12
You can find me on YouTube, on Instagram, as well as how to work with me at mylibidodoc.com.