Well here it is – my 100th blog! If you had told me that when I wrote my first blog just two and a bit years ago that I would write 99 more this quickly, I wouldn’t have believed you. But writing blogs has been a most liberating, worthwhile experience. I love writing! It’s interesting because when I was at school I had an English teacher who refused to like anything I wrote and regardless of what it was, it was only ever worthy of a ‘C’. So if by chance you are in Grade 11 or 12 and reading this and you are struggling to achieve high marks for English at school – do not despair, because you too may start writing much later in life – free of the burden of ‘gaps‘ and ‘silences’, ‘discourses’ and ‘deconstruction’ – and unworthy assessment!
Of course writing is easy when it involves something you are passionate about and there is no doubt I am passionate about my work. All us Continence and Women’s Health Physios are passionate about our chosen field – that’s why amongst our worldwide group of Women’s Health Physios we call ourselves the #pelvicmafia. It’s a useful way to communicate on Twitter by following certain articles and tweets with #pelvicmafia and allows us to keep in touch on the various forms of social media.
Word press is a great medium for my blog – it’s free, it’s easy to use and they are continually updating the blog site capabilities and communicating these updates via emails and blogs. A recent email I received talked about a blog by Jon Negroni  which went viral and received 4.4 million hits. The blog was about The Pixar Theory – a detailed treatise on Negroni’s theory that every Pixar movie is connected. In it he comprehensively explains how and possibly why this is. Having read this (4.4MILLION HITS!!!!!!!) it is now my dream that blogs by us #pelvicmafia Physios worldwide with strategies about how to manage urinary and faecal incontinence, how to prevent vaginal or rectal prolapse from getting worse, how to treat pelvic pain plus lots more will one day receive 4.4 million hits. Mainly because it would be much more helpful (life-changing) than any blog on Pixar Movies will ever be (apologies Jon- no offence).
Just imagine it- in Australia there are about 4.1 million women, men and children (Deloitte Access economics research) who are suffering with urinary incontinence at this point in time. So if every one of those people read our#pelvicmafia blogs, their anxiety-producing, socially-restricting problems related to pelvic floor dysfunction could be significantly improved and even cured. Wonderful Australian Physios like Dr Trish Neumann and Dr Helena Frawley have led the research which has shown that conservative strategies taught by Women’s Health physiotherapists should be the first line of attack with managing urinary incontinence and prolapse. Simple, easy-to-learn strategies which can change your life. These continence problems cost a fortune also- individually for patients (costs of pads, decreased ability to work) and nationally for the Australian government (loss of productivity, costs of pad programmes) and globally – the problem of pelvic floor dysfunction is huge and will be growing dramatically in the future due to the ever-increasing aging population.
Another important preventative role of my blogs is to highlight the importance of pelvic floor friendly exercising. It is self-defeating to try to do something about your fitness by going to a gym, doing Pilates, lifting weights and then due to performing the wrong sort of exercises (sit-ups, double leg lifts, plus others or your pelvic floor condition) end up with pelvic floor dysfunction such as vaginal or rectal prolapse or urinary incontinence. There is no point to having wash-board abs at the expense of vaginal prolapse. It’s a message which we all need to embrace, because thankfully we are all becoming much more aware of the virtues of exercising in order to have a happy, independent and physically active old age.
So my deep desire when posting this memorable (for me anyway) 100th blog is that armed with all this information, we all become much more ‘Pelvic Floor Aware’ and to do this I need your help to help me get a fraction of those 4.1 million views that the Pixar story blog received. So forward it to your friends and relatives, share it on Twitter and Facebook and let’s get talking about saving the pelvic floor.
If you have pelvic floor problems please don’t hesitate – act now to get help. Contact details below will point you in the right direction.
APA Find a Physio Contact details
Continence Foundation of Australia 1800 33 00 66