What the hell just happened? The day I wet my pants skipping!

The day I wet my pants while skipping

I was at a bit of a loss for some exercise to do on that pandemic morning.

My gym was closed, and I had run the day before – I never run on consecutive days.

Of the myriad choices I had from my PT kit, I chose the skipping rope that I’d only recently purchased.

If I’m going to include skipping in my clients’ programs, then I should do some skipping myself was my thinking.

I grabbed the rope and went for a short walk to a nearby park for a quick cardio workout.

Oh dear!

Just as I was thinking how great I was to be a fit 50-something year old, wee started leaking from my bladder as I skipped.

I could only skip for a few seconds before it started to flow, but I persisted because I was determined to complete at least two rounds of Tabata (a type of 4 minute interval training).

The crotch of my undies and tights ended up very damp.

Thanks to my penchant for wearing dark coloured exercise tights, my accident was not obvious. I still had to walk home in my wet pants.

What the hell just happened?

I’d heard of ‘light bladder leakage’ and stress incontinence, but I only associated it with a weak pelvic floor due to pregnancy and childbirth.

I clearly had a problem with my pelvic floor but was in real denial because I have never been pregnant/given birth.

Denial and shame

Apart from the initial denial, I also felt ashamed.

I thought I was a freak and wondered why this had happened to me.

What had I done to myself to be wetting my pants?

This is not my only problem ‘down there’

A more pervasive problem was my frequent, sudden and powerful urges to wee, sometimes leaking in the rush to get to the toilet.

This and the experience of wetting my pants, exacerbated my practice of the ‘just in case’ wee.

I’m not the only one to do this – emptying one’s bladder whenever one has the chance – you know, just in case.

Many women tell me similar stories

I’ve started to share my very personal story of incontinence and just in case weeing with the women in my life since I learned that these are all-too-common experiences.

Most women relate back similar stories with different movements – joining the kids on a trampoline or bouncy castle, sneezing or coughing, lifting, jumping exercises.

It also turns out that I’m not the sole member of the ‘just in case’ wee club.

Sadly, there is an acceptance that leaking and needing to wee a lot is just part of being a woman, especially after having a baby.

Leaking wee is COMMON, but it is NOT NORMAL

It seems that leaking wee has become normalised because it is so common.

The problem here is that women stop doing things they need and want to do.

Skipping is a fun and very effective exercise, and I would like to do it regularly, but I packed away my rope and stuck with other things that don’t make me leak.

I still had options, but what if there are lots of physical activities that precipitate leaking?

You might just stop exercising altogether, and many women do.

Since exercise is vital for health and wellbeing, inactivity is simply an unacceptable solution.

Help is at hand

The great news is that help is available, and we do not have to live with leaking.

A pelvic health physiotherapist is a highly trained professional who can diagnose and treat incontinence.

I’ve shared my experience of consulting a pelvic health physio and how they helped me in another blog. Click here to read that one.

I did not learn about the pelvic floor in my PT course

You might think that a common muscular dysfunction that can manifest itself during exercise would be part of the foundational education for fitness professionals, but this is not the case at all.

I learned exactly NOTHING about the pelvic floor in my PT course.

This is because pelvic floor problems mostly affect women and fitness education is largely based on research carried out on fit young men.

I’m appalled that I have been training female clients – and myself for that matter – with such a large gap in my knowledge.

Ongoing education

It is a shame that we must undertake further education to learn about the pelvic floor and exercise considerations for women generally, but I’m doing just that.

I now know that incontinence and pelvic floor dysfunction can have multiple contributing factors, including hormonal changes of perimenopause and menopause, and I did not have to deny my problem because I’ve never had a baby.

Now I can train myself and, more importantly, my perimenopause and menopausal women clients with more consideration to our specific needs during this time of life.

I’m still learning and will be a much better personal trainer as my knowledge grows.

One of the best courses I’ve done is EVEolution^™ by Mish Wright

The best thing about this course is that it’s not just for fitness professionals like me to learn more.

It’s a course to help anybody exercise safely at any stage of their female life.

If you’re like me, wetting your pants when you exercise and always needing to wee, EVEolution™ is for you.

What is EVEolution™?

EVEolution™ is an online course that educates and empowers you to exercise safely through all stages of your female life.

It’s information that’s missing from your fitness trainer’s education that every trainer and woman needs to know about.

It provides the learning directly to you, so you know what to ask your trainer.

It’s a gateway to awkward but necessary conversations – we need to talk about this stuff!

I’m proud to be an EVEolution™ partner

As a woman who exercises, EVEolution™ has taught me how I can train safely with consideration to my stage of life – post menopause.

As a personal trainer, EVEolution™ is closing the gap in my knowledge and I can better serve my fabulous over 50 female clients.

Learn more and buy your own EVEolution^™ course

As an EVEolution^™ partner, I can make this brilliant course available to you.

Simply follow the link to my website below to learn more and buy your own EVEolution^™ course.

https://fiftyfitness.com.au/eveolution/

Keep in touch

Please reach out to me if anything in this article resonates with you.

You can email me at kate@fiftyfitness.com.au or connect via social media.

I’m on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn.

You can have a read of my previous blogs here 🙂