Heal Pelvic Pain: The Proven Stretching, Strengthening, and Nutrition Program for Relieving Pain, Incontinence,& I.B.S, and Other Symptoms Without Surgery

I have been a sufferer of pelvic pain for about 2.5 years now. I have gone through about 6 months of professional physical therapy (which reduced my symptoms by about 30%). I was looking for a way to handle this problem myself, as the physical therapy requires me to burn "sick time" three times a week, and it's not exactly cheap under my insurance plan. So, I purchased three books on Pelvic pain up here on Amazon. This one is clearly the best written, and the most comprehensive. This book covers all the bases including stretching, trigger point massage, exercise, and diet. The only thing I would consider missing is a chapter on relaxation methods. The good news for many men and women suffering from pelvic pain is that this book can help. The bad news is that this is not a quick fix. If you follow the author's routine for stretching, exercise, and massage you will spend about 2-3 hours a day on it. I'm about a month into the routine, and while I do feel it takes too much of my day, I AM beginning to see results. I expect to be in this for the long haul (6 months to a year) before the pain is gone completely. The regimen works. The question is, how badly do you want to get better? I just decided that Amy's regimen was going to be my new "hobby". Since I usually spend about 2 hours a day on various other hobbies, it was easy for me to find the time. If you have a lot of other hobbies you are not willing to give up, Amy's regimen may be too time demanding for you. Amy's stretching routine takes most of the time, but I feel the stretching is the key to recovery.......at least for me. Amy's regimen is designed to stretch and strengthen all of the muscles groups in the pelvic floor, and her illustrations are easy to follow. Something I felt my physical therapist did not cover very well. This is a great read, and (for many of you) will be the key to eliminating your pelvic pain symptoms. Highly recommended!

I bought this book as a last ditch effort to try to help the excruciating pelvic/vaginal pain I'd been battling for over a year from pelvic floor disorder. I had the constant feeling of a UTI with negative labs. Physical therapy that provided some relief for short periods of time, and medication that did nothing whatsoever, had me feeling hopeless and depressed that I'd ever get better. Being in the medical field, I have done extensive research on ways to find relief, and none seemed to be the definitive answer. Then I purchased this book. I did the first part of the exercises for relaxation. Within 2 days, my pain was 90% gone! Within one week, I was completely pain free. This was a miracle for me. I am now 2 years out and completely pain free. I continue to do the exercises here and there and more consistently if I feel the "twinge" of pain starting if I over do my exercise routine. If anyone is reading this review and is at his/her wit's end with frustration over the pain and hopelessness of a pelvic floor disorder, please purchase this book. Amy goes into great detail with regard to diet, stress management, exercise and is very adamant about following the order in which the exercises are done, so this is fool proof! If you are struggling and want relief, please give this book a try. I can't say enough wonderful things about how life changing this was for me!

I had this book sitting on my Kindle shelf for too long, but when I finally got to read it I finished it in a very short time. It is a good primer on what causes pelvic pain and how to deal with it. The book is marvellous in that it explains why a lot of pelvic pain is due to muscular problems. It helped me overcome darker thoughts and fear for cancer and other threatening diseases. I have had pain for years, but it really got severe about 12 months ago. I had to stop exercising because the pain afterwards was so difficult to cope with - and it would last for days after even simple exercise. 6 months ago I found a physiotherapist who understood the problems really well, and his approach is very similar to Amy Stein's. It has helped a lot, and I am now almost pain free and back to exercising 4 times a week. Amy Stein's stretching program did not work for me. The exercises in the book actually made things worse when I tried to follow it. But that only shows how a program should be individually tailored, so talk to your therapist if you need help. I now stretch 30 minutes before every workout (even before warming up). Moving the stretch routine from after to before exercise has made it much more efficient. I spend 1-5 minutes on each exercise (most on the buttocks/glutes because they are more problematic for me). I do not stretch on days when I don't exercise, so I do 4x30 minutes per week now. I have not really used the self massage techniques, although I am certain they will help if you can find ways to incorporate them into your routine. When I was in pain, I tried to stretch every day, and it does work. Getting the larger muscles under control was really important for me, and it relieved a lot of the pain. I warmly recommend this book. I wish I had read it much sooner.

I have IC (Interstitial Cystitis) and associated hypertonic PFD (Pelvic floor dysfunction) as of the past 2 years following a mistreated bladder infection that went haywire resulting in a bladder injury. I have been determined to heal and like everyone that has meant tons of research, remedies, professionals, books etc etc. We have to be careful with the hope cycle of IC and PFD because nothing is a silver bullet and often supplements or books don't do what they say. Anyway this book actually HAS Helped me!!! It is so affordable and I got it quickly on my kindle which was great. The information about PFD and the pelvic floor is not as thorough as "Migraine in the Pelvis" which everyone with pelvic pain should read ( it is not well written but the core information is crucial and excellent). This book here is well written, short, concise and the exercises are excellent. I am a former yoga teacher and I recently went back to hot yoga because the warm class took away pain instantly...but then I found myself in a terrible flare which I am still recovering from. I sensed that some of the exercises were helping and some were harming me..and that led me to this book. As I suspected (even though my pelvic physio didn't know about this) the ab exercises in yoga were making things far worse for me! I need to be doing only stretching around the pelvic floor and not tightening..anyway I was in a rough patch and I followed this protocol for several days and it really helped to reduce my persistent pain..so that I was able to get back to work on a project I had to postpone..I am still dealing with this flare and I have not been following the protocol because I wanted to see another better pelvic physio to do better analysis...but now I will go back to it. It also helped me mentally just to know there was SOMETHING I could do to get some relief during a flare...I found that some of the positions did not work well for me but most of them did, and then I modified to include deeper stretches I already know about. I also feel amazing during massage. I think this author knows what she is talking about. Keep in mind, pelvic pain is caused by many factors and so depending on what your factors are this may not work for you...but it's cheap and worth a read for sure...in case also you find some activities you are doing may be making things worse. PS my new physio got me a kabooti cushion..this is also helping...and I did bio feedback to actually see my pelvic floor muscle control. I don't think the food information section is useful as it is too general: anyone with IC should be following the IC diet and doing an elimination diet to find out what works for them and what doesn't , along with using prelief and other supplements to help the bladder. These things also helped me immensely. Anyway I am really grateful to have this book in my toolkit and I'm so grateful I found it when I did and that it gives me some relief. On a side note, because IC and PFD impact quality of life...what I like is that this protocol also addresses quality of life and wellbeing outside of IC symptoms....the stretching leaves me really relaxed and at peace..and doing more exercise only helps in so many other ways. So it's nice to feel that even if IC or PFD bring down my quality of life sometimes, some of these other things can add to my quality of life..and of course the idea is that it really helps with PFD. The other nice thing about this book is that it is designed for people with a too weak or a too tight pelvic floor and has separate sections for each. It's a really good one to try out. Good luck everyone! and best wishes for full healing to you!

Correct information about palvic floor

Super Buch! Informativ und kommt ohne sich ständig wiederholende Informationen und endlose Erfahrungsberichte und Anpreisungen der Autoren aus, wie sie mir in englischsprachigen Ratgebern schon öfter negativ aufgefallen sind. Hätte ich gerne eher gefunden! Falls man zusätzlich Rückenprobleme hat, sollte man meiner Meinung nach die Übungen vor der Durchführung mit nem Physiotherapeuten besprechen, da nicht alle z.B. bei Bandscheibenvorfällen geeignet sind.

Ottimo e dettagliato

very informative, and more importantly the exercises work! i've had a lot of pelvic joint pain for 5 years during and following 2 pregnancies. despite doctors advice that the pain would go once i stopped breast feeding, the pain started to intensify on stopping and i also started to develop back pain. to say it was making me pretty miserable was an understatement. i decided to purchase this while waiting for a physio appointment. i'm still just using the 1st set of exercises and i can only fit them in once a day (author recommends more) as they take me 30mins, but they have helped a great deal. but you really have to commit to the exercises - once in a blue moon won't cut it! i recently gave myself "a few days off" and my pain started to return pretty rapidly. i've had the problem for a long time and i think recovery will also take time. the exercises involve a lot of lying down (my type of exercising!) but it's all about increasing your flexibility and strengthening your core (my physio basically told me my core and stomach muscles are shot, hence a lack of support and hence all the pain). but don't worry it's not all sit ups - more leg and thigh stuff. initially i was shocked at how difficult i found it (i kinda thought i was semi fit - i've got 2 little ones to run around after, i walk a fair amount and i'm pretty average build). i was really struggling to just to get myself off the floor! but that has improved a lot, although i'm still getting some stiffness (think i'll go with a joint supplement). basically this book is access to a physio who is an expert in her field and it's a great buy. it'll give you some really valuable tools to aid recovery. well it has for me :)