Pelvic Floor Physical Therapy for Painful Intercourse (Dyspareunia)
Painful intercourse is also known as dyspareunia. About 75% of women will experience pain with intercourse at some point in their lives. Unfortunately, many of them suffer in silence, or if they are brave enough to bring it up to their doctor, are blown off.
Painful intercourse can often present itself as a burning, stabbing, pressure, or sharp pain.
Fortunately, there is an extremely effective solution for painful intercourse. Pelvic floor physical therapy is an extremely successful treatment for painful intercourse.
What causes painful intercourse?
Oftentimes there isn’t one reason that explains why women deal with painful intercourse. There are several common causes including:
Pelvic floor muscle tension: The pelvic floor muscles are the muscles that sit in the bottom on the pelvis (everyone has a pelvic floor!). When the muscles are tight, penetrative intercourse can cause irritation to the muscles, resulting in pain.
Hormonal changes: Changes to the vaginal tissue due to hormone changes like a decrease in estrogen can cause vaginal dryness or thinning to the vaginal tissue. This can be the result of being postpartum or perimenopause. When the vaginal tissue is dry, penetrative intercourse can be irritating and cause pain
Scar tissue: Scar tissue to the vagina or even the core can cause painful intercourse as well. When there is a scar to the muscles of the core or the pelvic floor, this will result in a stiffness to the core and pelvic floor tissues. Because of this stiffness, vaginal penetration can then result in pain.
Conditions like endometriosis, vaginismus, or vulvodynia. Anytime there is pain in the pelvis, our pelvic floor muscles will go into a guarded position. This will make penetrative intercourse nearly impossible due to increased pain and inflammation.
Stress and anxiety. When we are stressed, our pelvic floor muscles get tight and tense. As we said, pelvic floor muscle tightness does result in a pain or burning sensation.
Since there are many causes to why someone might be experiencing painful intercourse, pelvic floor physical therapy for painful intercourse needs to be individualized and starts with a pelvic floor evaluation.
How Pelvic Floor Therapy Treats Painful Sex
Many times, women are told to “just do Kegels” but unfortunately when it comes to painful intercourse, strengthening exercises such as Kegels can make your symptoms worse.
During pelvic PT for painful intercourse, a pelvic floor physical therapist provides treatment including:
Internal and external muscle release techniques to reduce tension and improve mobility of the pelvic floor muscles. Internal pelvic floor treatments are typically done via intravaginal or intrarectal release work. Similar to how a physical therapist would release the muscles in your back if you were having back pain, pelvic floor PTs release the pelvic floor muscles when someone is struggling with tightness in their pelvic floor.
Relaxation and breathing strategies to decrease stress and improve mobility of the pelvic floor muscles. When we breathe with our diaphragm, our pelvic floor muscles relax. Anything that is restricting us from taking a deep breath can actually have a substantial impact on how the pelvic floor muscles relax. Oftentimes, pelvic floor physical therapy for painful intercourse involves treatment to the back, ribs, core, and diaphragm in order to help maximize your ability to take a deep breath and therefore relax your pelvic floor.
Dilators and pelvic floor wands: Dilators and pelvic wands are tools that can be used to release and relax the pelvic floor muscles.
With consistent physical therapy sessions, women often experience significant change in painful intercourse symptoms with pelvic floor physical therapy
What to Expect at Your First Appointment for Pelvic Floor Therapy.
When you come for pelvic floor PT, your comfort and privacy come first. At Vivid, we pride ourselves on making the whole experience private, comfortable, and modest. We understand that having an internal pelvic assessment might be scary for some people, so we go slow and only perform an internal exam when a patient is ready.
If a patient is ready to have an internal pelvic assessment during their initial session, your pelvic floor therapist will:
Review your health history and symptoms.
Explain how pelvic floor muscles may be contributing to painful intercourse.
Perform a gentle, consent-based internal vaginal exam to assess the pelvic floor muscle tone and movement.
Discover WHY you are having symptoms. It is important for the pelvic floor PT to figure out what might be causing your specific pain, in order to keep it from coming back
Create a customized plan for treatment, exercises, and ongoing pelvic floor therapy treatment.
Why Choose Pelvic Floor Physical Therapy For Painful Intercourse?
Unlike medications or quick fixes, pelvic floor therapy addresses the root cause of painful intercourse. With appropriate treatments, the root cause of your specific symptoms will be addressed.
Pelvic PT is a holistic approach that restores normal pelvic floor muscle function, reduces pain, and helps you feel more comfortable in your body.
At Vivid Women’s Health, we offer pelvic floor physical therapy for painful intercourse. We help patients experiencing symptoms such as:
Painful intercourse (dyspareunia)
Vaginal pain
Pelvic floor tightness
Postpartum pelvic and core scar tissue
Pelvic scar tissue pain
At Vivid Women’s Health we choose to forgo third party insurance contracts so you don’t have the headache of delaying care. Since most insurance companies don’t view painful intercourse as a necessary and functional goal (crazy right?!) we take the headache of pre-approvals off of your plate. With transparent, fair pricing, our goal is to help you resolve your symptoms quickly and effectively.
Vivid Women’s Health Pelvic Floor Physical Therapy has locations in Newtown, PA and Doylestown, PA. To get started today, please call us at (267)685-6368, or click here and one of our team members will call you.
