We've Gone From Being Too Embarrassed to Talk About Peeing Ourselves… to Laughing About It. And I Think We've Got It Wrong.
By Michele, Founder of Embrace Wellness Haven
There’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately, especially since offering pelvic floor treatments at Embrace.
For generations, women simply didn’t talk about bladder leakage.
Our mothers and grandmothers certainly weren’t sitting around discussing what happened when they sneezed, laughed too hard or jumped on a trampoline. Many wouldn’t even tell their own husbands.
They just quietly dealt with it.
A little pad in the underwear. A change of clothes tucked away just in case. Avoiding certain activities. Knowing where every toilet was before leaving the house.
It was embarrassing, it was private, and for so many women, it was something they suffered with in silence.
Then, somewhere along the way, we swung completely in the other direction.And in many ways, thank goodness we did.
Women started talking. We became more open about our bodies, childbirth, menopause and all those things nobody had ever warned us about.
We started sharing stories with our girlfriends.
“Oh my God, I can’t jump on a trampoline anymore or I’ll wet myself!”
“Don’t make me laugh, I’ll pee!”
“Ever since I had kids, I can’t sneeze without crossing my legs!”
And everyone laughs, because half the women around the table know exactly what you’re talking about.
I love that we’ve taken away so much of the embarrassment. I genuinely do.
But here’s the part I think we’ve got wrong. Somewhere between being too ashamed to talk about incontinence and being comfortable enough to laugh about it, we’ve started treating it as though it’s just an unavoidable part of being a woman.Had babies? Of course you leak a little.
Over 50? Well, what do you expect?
Going through menopause? Just another thing to add to the list.
But common doesn’t mean normal, and it certainly doesn’t mean we should just put up with it.
I wonder how many women are laughing along with their friends while quietly making little changes to their lives because of it.
Not going for that run anymore.
Giving up jumping classes.
Wearing a pad every day, just in case.
Worrying about leaking during intimacy.
These might sound like little things, but when you add them together, they’re not so little anymore.
They’re pieces of our confidence and freedom that we slowly give away. And this is why pelvic floor health matters so much to me.
Since introducing the Emsella pelvic floor chair at Embrace Wellness Haven in Wanneroo, I’ve had conversations with women that have genuinely opened my eyes.
Women who have lived with urinary incontinence for years. Women who thought a weak pelvic floor was simply the price of motherhood. Women who have been quietly managing bladder leaks since menopause.
And women who had never really considered that there might be something they could do about it.
The thing is, there ARE options.
Pelvic floor physiotherapy, appropriate exercises, bladder training and treatments such as Emsella can all have a role, depending on what’s causing the leakage.
Emsella uses electromagnetic technology to stimulate pelvic floor muscle contractions, and for suitable women it may help improve pelvic floor function and bladder control.
It’s not the answer for everyone, but it’s one of the reasons I’m so passionate about making these conversations happen.
Because I don’t think women should have to quietly rearrange their lives around their bladder.
So here’s what I’d really love us to change.I don’t want us to go back to the days when women were too embarrassed to tell anyone they were wetting themselves.
Not for a second.
I want us to keep talking, sharing stories and absolutely keep laughing with our girlfriends.
But I also want us to stop at the end of that laugh and say:
“Hang on, have you actually looked into doing something about that?”
Because there’s a big difference between normalising the conversation and normalising the condition.
We need to normalise talking about incontinence, not normalise living with it.
We should absolutely normalise talking about bladder leakage, asking questions and getting help.
But we shouldn’t normalise women giving up parts of their lives because they’ve been led to believe there’s nothing they can do.
We spent generations being too embarrassed to talk about it. Let’s not spend the next generation laughing it off.
And if this sounds familiar, please know that you can talk to us at Embrace. No embarrassment, no awkwardness and certainly no judgement.
Just a genuine conversation about your pelvic health and what options might be right for you.
Because you deserve to laugh until your cheeks hurt, without worrying about what’s happening in your underwear.
Mish x
Embrace Wellness Haven | Wanneroo, Perth