Pelvic Floor Muscle Pain

BACKGROUND

Once one has had rectal pain, it is not uncommon for people to keep the rectal sphincter muscle very tight in response to the pain. As is the case with any muscle that is kept tight, this can lead to pain in its own right.

Sadly, most physicians are not familiar with pelvic floor pain. There is a small subset of physical therapists though who specialize in treating pelvic floor muscle pain (ask a local physical therapist if they know one specializing in pelvic pain). This can be very helpful.

TREATMENT

Therapies & Advice

Rectal muscles

When you are on the commode, see how far you can relax your anal/rectal and urination muscles without anything coming out. You will probably be amazed at how much extra tension is kept in these muscles. It is good to get in the habit, throughout the day, of releasing the muscles as much as you can (of course while staying continent).

Sitz baths

Symptoms can also be helped by sitting in a sitz bath. This can be made by filling your tub several inches high with comfortably warm to hot water and squatting in the water so that the warm water circulates on the anal area and soothes it and helps it to heal.

SHINE

Also, use the SHINE Protocol described in this application (see SHINE under the "More" tab) and online (see reference link below) — though it focuses on fibromyalgia muscle pain, it applies to pelvic muscle pain as well. Also see the book Pain Free 1-2-3 (which includes a section on pelvic pain). This mix of treatments can be very helpful for pelvic muscle pain.

For pelvic pain in females, see Pelvic Pain, Females.