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Article Review: Birth Control Pills Linked With Depression

In Female Pelvic Pain, Pelvic Health, Pelvic Pain by Emily TranLeave a Comment

By PHRC Admin    Depression, a common and serious medical illness, affects how we feel, think, and handle daily activities. In recent years, there’s been growing concern over the potential link between hormonal birth control and depression. Join us for a review of an article linking Oral contraceptives (OCPs) to depression! We thank Fiona Riddle for writing on this topic; …

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Understanding Chronic Pain: A Journey Through Unseen Struggles

In Pelvic Health, Pelvic Pain by Emily TranLeave a Comment

By PHRC Admin In a world where we’re accustomed to physical discomfort being temporary, it’s hard to imagine what living with chronic pain feels like. It’s not just an ongoing ache or discomfort. It’s a complex, multifaceted experience that can seep into every aspect of life, making even the simplest tasks daunting. Explaining chronic pain to someone who hasn’t experienced …

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Thinking Beyond the Dilators: How Vicki Beat Vaginismus

In Vaginismus by pelv_adminLeave a Comment

By Morgan Conner, DPT, PHRC Los Gatos Sadly, the starting point of this success story is not novel to me as a pelvic floor physical therapist or for many who struggle with primary vaginismus. However, this story has a happy ending (pun very much intended!) as well as an interesting middle. When Vicki (not her real name) married her husband …

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Success Story: How Jennifer Beat Endometriosis

In Endometriosis by Jandra Mueller1 Comment

By Jandra Mueller, DPT, MS, PHRC Encinitas Jennifer was referred to PHRC by her urogynecologist who diagnosed her with interstitial cystitis/painful bladder syndrome (IC/PBS). For more information on this condition, check out Melinda’s webinar on IC/PBS.  She was diagnosed with IC in 2012/2013 because she had been experiencing significant cramping in her bladder, as well as urinary urgency and frequency. …

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Enjoying Sex While Healing From Pelvic Pain

In Female Pelvic Pain by pelv_admin13 Comments

This week, long-time colleague Lorraine Faehnedrich guest blogs for PHRC. Lorraine’s bio and information on her courses can be found at the end of the post. On April 2 Lorraine will be interviewing our own Katie Hunter about how pelvic floor physical therapy can help women recover from painful sex. Stay tuned to our social media for more details! From …

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Michelle’s Postpartum Pelvic Health Struggles…and Success!

In Pregnancy and Postpartum Pelvic Health by pelv_adminLeave a Comment

By: Rachel Gelman, DPT Michelle is a 30 year old female referred by her gynecologist to us for pelvic floor physical therapy following the birth of her first child. Michelle had her son via vaginal delivery and she was roughly five months postpartum at the time of her evaluation with me.  She reports she had a second degree tear with …

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Finding Pleasure in Something that was Always Painful: Sam’s Success Story

In Female Pelvic Pain, Transgender Health by Shannon PacellaLeave a Comment

By: Shannon Pacella, DPT, PHRC, Lexington Sam came to the Pelvic Health and Rehabilitation Center in the beginning of May this year, after her primary care physician recommended seeing a pelvic floor physical therapist as she reported having pain with vaginal penetration. Here’s what Sam had to say: “I am 41 years old, and spent most of my life completely …

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Recovery From Vaginismus and Painful Sex: Martha’s Success Story

In Female Pelvic Pain by Sigourney CrossLeave a Comment

By Sigourney Cross, DPT, PHRC Walnut Creek Vaginismus is characterized as an involuntary spasm or contraction of the muscles around the vagina. This makes it very difficult for women to insert tampons, receive pelvic exams by their doctors and can also make sexual intercourse nearly impossible and painful. It can affect women anywhere from their teenage years to later in …

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Managing Life on or after “The Pill”

In Female Pelvic Pain, Pelvic Health by Jandra MuellerLeave a Comment

By: Jandra Mueller, DPT, MS, PHRC Encinitas If you are a female reader of our blog, have experienced painful intercourse, and happened to have come to the Pelvic Health and Rehabilitation Center (PHRC) for treatment, then you are probably familiar with our talk about how systemic birth control like oral contraceptives (OCPs) or “The Pill,” may be the underlying culprit. …

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Sex Therapy and CBT for Pain with Sex

In Female Pelvic Pain by pelv_adminLeave a Comment

In 2012, The Journal of Sexual Medicine published an article, What we don’t talk about when we don’t talk about sex: results of a national survey of U.S. obstetrician/gynecologists. The results from the survey revealed that though Ob/gyns routinely (63%) assess their patients’ sexual activities, only 40% of them ask their female patients about sexual problems. Sexual problems may include …

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Vulvodynia, Vestibulodynia, and Vaginismus: what’s the difference and why does it matter?

In Vulvodynia by Stephanie Prendergast3 Comments

  By Stephanie Prendergast, PHRC Cofounder   As many as 28% of women experience painful sex at some point during their reproductive years and that sucks. Knowledge is power and May is Pelvic Pain Awareness Month so we want to provide women with useful information about the three most common diagnoses associated with painful sex: vulvodynia, vaginismus, and vesitbulodynia. Differentiating …

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Beating the Odds: How one woman overcame a traumatic birth and had a successful second birth

In Pregnancy and Postpartum Pelvic Health by pelv_admin2 Comments

Childbirth is no picnic: 85% of women who deliver vaginally experience perineal trauma and a third of those women in the USA and UK require stitches.2 The thought of having another baby after having gone through a traumatic birth can be daunting, to say the least. Returning to sex can also seem like a feat, especially when pain is involved. …

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THINKING OUTSIDE THE GUT: Could Endometriosis be the culprit behind your Constipation or Bloating?

In Endometriosis by Stephanie Prendergast1 Comment

By Iris Kerin Orbuch, MD   Did you know that Gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms are as common as gynecological symptoms in women with endometriosis? Do you suffer from bloating and/or constipation? Endometriosis may be the cause of your bloating and/or constipation. Over 90% of women diagnosed with endometriosis actually present with GI symptoms as their initial symptoms. Before we delve into why …

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Pelvic floor physical therapy for vulvodynia: a clinician’s guide

In Female Pelvic Pain, Vulvodynia by Stephanie Prendergast12 Comments

By Stephanie Prendergast, MPT, Cofounder, PHRC Los Angeles   Recently I was asked to write an article about pelvic floor physical therapy for the treatment of vulvodynia, which will be published later this year as a tool for gynecologists. Since our blog readers are a combination of clinicians and people with pelvic pain I figured I would share it here …

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Jagged Little Pill: Part Two

In Female Pelvic Pain, Vulvodynia by Joshua Gonzalez, MD7 Comments

  By Joshua Gonzalez, MD   After reading my last post, Jagged Little Pill, many of you who have had similar suspected OCP-related problems may be thinking there’s no hope.  Trust me, you are not doomed if you’ve ever taken an oral birth control and you have symptoms of vulvodynia.  My goal this week is to reassure you that you’re …

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Jagged Little Pill: How Oral Contraceptives Wreak Havoc on the Female Body

In Female Pelvic Pain, Stress Urinary Incontinence, Vulvodynia by Joshua Gonzalez, MD9 Comments

By Joshua Gonzalez, MD   The advent of oral birth control pills in the 1960s was heralded as a huge victory for women’s rights.  Finally, women could take control of their bodies and their fertility.  Since then, oral contraceptive pills (OCPs) have become ubiquitous in reproductive aged women with nearly 10 million women today using The Pill as their primary …

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Gwyneth’s Goop and the Pelvic Floor: What They Missed

In Female Interstitial Cystitis / Painful Bladder Syndrome, Female Pelvic Pain, Stress Urinary Incontinence by Stephanie Prendergast4 Comments

By Stephanie Prendergast Last week, Gwyneth Paltrow’s popular newsletter featured an article on pelvic floor muscles, which prompted numerous emails and tweets in my direction. Apparently this is a topic that makes my friends and colleagues think of me. While pondering why everyone, except for me,  seems to be reading Goop,  I took a look. I am glad to see …