UCPPS - Prostatitis, Interstitial Cystitis Forum

Is it something that's huge part of your recovery or something that just might be helping a little or not at all?

99% of those who have recovered no longer read this site, Tweeze. You're better off reading the success stories. I'd say is that it is important, but that conscious relaxation of the pelvic floor is more important. Even breathing can be important.

Here's an example of how powerful breathing is, from my own experience. Recently I caught flu and had quite bad abdominal pain — an infection with a diarrhoea virus. I passed everything out of my body but still I was experiencing severe cramping and gripes, making me go to the toilet again and again, even though nothing was in the bowel. A few drops of what looked like plain water would be expelled, if that. The pain was so intense that I considered going to a hospital (has anyone else noticed that flu and gastro germs seem more virulent these last few years?).

Anyway, when all medicines failed to help, I lay down in a darkened room and decided to use my mind and breathing to control the pain. My abdomen was hard and distended to the touch, too painful to push on. I began breathing slowly and deeply with my stomach, IOW by pushing my stomach out to breathe rather than my chest. It took about 15 mins, but I was able to quell the pain almost completely! I eventually fell asleep and awoke some hours later, feeling much better. This is not the first time I have controlled quite nasty pain just by breathing in a specific way. There is a book on breathing to control pain in my Amazon shop, called The Miracle of Breath. It's amazing that frightening pain can be so simply controlled.

As for internal massage: in my own case, I did internal massage on myself (using primitive tools and purely on my own intuition and initiative), but only about 10 times (in the early 1990s). It definitely helped to get me down from the worst levels of flare.

The Wise-Anderson wand may become available within the next, oh, maybe year, maybe sooner. When you've got one of those, you can self-treat very effectively.

Tim Sawyer tells everyone that the relaxation / meditation is more important, which is telling in itself. His share of the patients' time at the clinic is also less than Dr. Wise. And I have come to believe this as well. And Tim Parks obviously had results without massage. I will say, however, for the OCD among us, that actually having a tool that you can physically use, and feel like you are accomplishing something has been very helpful for me (mentally). I use the wand most days. But tweez, you keep asking some of the same questions in different ways. You're never going to get "the" answer, "the" silver bullet. With your symptoms, it seems like a no brainer to start a program of internal stretching. It's benign. Don't fear it. It's no big deal. The wand will facilitate everything, so hopefully webslave is right, that it will soon be available in the US, But don't stress on finding trigger points. Your body will guide you. Just listen.

It was and still is important for my recovery. I get the most benefit from external trigger point. My glutes, hamstrings, piriformis, quadratus lumborum (QL) were full of trigger points. I go once a month now - today I had a session as a matter of fact. These muscle groups all have effects on my pelvic and back pain. I wish I would have explored this sooner to be honest but better late than never.

I don't have any internal trigger points according to my pelvic therapist...so I can't really give an opinion on the benefits but I would assume it could help if found.

I do agree with relaxation / meditation / breathing as a big component for me. I do bikram yoga and it has calmed my mind and body as well as gives me a workout. I still need to do some work on better breathing techniques as I believe that will help outside of the yoga room.

I agree that Yoga is right for this condition. It is also empowering as it is something you can completely control.

Be well,

Robert

I just wanted to add a question. I have had this problem for about fifteen years and didn't really get serious into any sort of treatment. After about 8 years, had a remission of about 85% for about four years. I was going through a lot of stress with work and having another baby and it all came back. I ended up flying to California and attending Dr. Wise's clinic, that was at the end of September. I am doing the protocol daily but have been a little bad with the internal work lately. My question is that I have gotten my pelvic muscles to relax continuously throughout the day and am anyways checking to make sure, I have noticed some minor improvements I think but with keeping the muscles relaxed how long until I should notice more results? I have also been practising belly breathing and can get things feeling better. I'm just wondering if at some point it will be like flipping a switch and I will be like wow. Also since I have been doing all the stretches I have noticed my muscles always feel tight (legs, hamstrings) and now I'm having hip and back pain that I never had before. Any ideas why? Thanks, I'm going to do my internal work tonight and then every two to three days again and stick with it. Just hoping two get that switch to flip.

You're only 2 months out from the clinic, Gary. You have to diligently do the physical and mental aspects to see, on average, a 46% improvement in 6 months. This is not a "Wow, it went away overnight!" thing, and you should know that by now.

. This is not a "Wow, it went away overnight!" thing, and you should know that by now.

I know, was just having one of those moments!!
The reason I was asking is because the only thing I feel I'm doing correctly is dropping and relaxing the pelvic floor. And I guess the straight forward question is could I still be getting better doing this along with the correct breathing and staying more relaxed even if I wasn't correctly doing the trigger points. I no I'm early in on treatment but its frustrating no being sure I'm doing the treatment correctly and hitting all the spots. I have no plans on slowing down on my regime of tp internal and external stretching and relaxation . Strange that now I have sit bone pain when sitting along with back and hip pain? Any ideas?

Gary, I think that everyone's case is a little different, something you probably already know. Some have had this for 10+ years, some just months. Some have back issues that complicate things, some over did it with sex and mb and some just got it from too much stress/tension in pelvis. And the list goes on and on. I say this so when I tell you what works for me you know it might not work for you. This probably one of the biggest things I've learned about this condition.

I've only had my condition for 6 months and it all started after WAY too much sex and MB and porn. FOR ME dropping the pelvic floor throughout the day has been a HUGE help, I wear a watch that vibrates every 15 min to remind me. Also relaxing every day and doing deep breathing is HUGE.

I have had ALL the classic symptoms of chronic prostatitis / chronic pelvic pain syndrome for 6 months, it f'ing sucks!! I started this thread because I felt like I was getting better without internal TP therapy and wanted to know if I should start it. I am still getting better every week without TP therapy, but again my case is different, like everyone.

Some of MY KEYS that help are:

• Keep a chronic prostatitis / chronic pelvic pain syndrome journal to document what's working, what's causing flares, etc
• Relaxing
• Dropping pelvic floor all day
• Cardio, mainly walking 3 times a day for 20 min
• Eliminating porn and anything OVERLY mentally sexually stimulating (this is the #1 cause of flares and problems for me, so in retrospect this is the number one thing I can avoid to help me get better)
• Relaxed driving
• No prolonged sitting...taking many breaks
• FORGETTING ABOUT THIS CONDITION. Literally
• Not getting happy if the pain goes away, because when it comes back the happiness will go away too.
• Living my life, being happy and again forgetting about this condition. You hear this a lot and its SO easy to dismiss but this is one of the most important things that helps me. I attribute it to the fact that when I'm happy I am completely relaxed. You don't have anxiety and tension when you're happy. Forgetting about this condition is the first step towards true happiness.

Good luck!!

Relaxed driving

This can be very important. Use cruise-control! I noticed a major difference in stress levels when I started using cruise control on the San Diego highways. Get in the middle lane and let all the cowboys whizz past you. Chill.

Yeah, the relaxed driving was a pretty big addition to my regimen. I recline my seat back and have a little pillow behind my head, I also sit on a 2" latex pad with a big cutout in the center. Then I'll get in the right lane, put on cruise control at the speed limit and focus on deep meditative breathing......and let all the cowboys whizz by. I also put on really chill music, sometimes meditative type music. Its pretty awesome actually. I actually kinda look forward to my 1.5 hr drives to Tucson, AZ.

Trigger point therapy and massage are the only real way out. Relaxation is great but it mostly helps to keep the progress made with massage in a good spot. If you go back to old habits you will upset the muscles again and drive them into a tightened state. This happens often in that we have to live our lives and are dating people or active with our partners.

You will get to a spot where the massage can be done quickly as part of a routine and you are simply keeping good maintenance. Keep these methods up and don't keep tightening the pelvic floor and you will start to climb out of the pit. There is no way in hell that you are going to simply relax your way into a cure for this. Again, relaxation is good but is only a part of the approach. You need to do all things in tandem, calm down, relax daily, take hot baths, eat well and take a basic vitamin, stop aggravating the muscles with the activity that caused the condition and most of all MASSAGE the muscles out gently. Once the muscles start getting better you can introduce reverse kegels but never do standard kegels. Think of this like a sports injury.

It sounds like your condition has only gone south as of 6 months ago but you have been building toward this thing for many years. You are lucky to get a hold on this early but you still need to do all parts of the therapy. It will take a couple of years of effort because the muscles are complex. Massaging will stir things up in the beginning but it will get better. My advice is to not overdo it with massage though. I did that early on and it just continued to aggravate things. I take it very easy now and use my fingers and a wand for deeper stuff. I hit all 4 major areas each day and leave it at that. I also make sure not to ignore the external muscles. These areas are huge and effect the inner muscles too. If I stir things up I back off and wait for a few hours and then go back and lightly release the area that was over aggravated. Sometimes I have to go back twice in a day to get it resolved. Once I have the area relatively pain free I go for a few days until life aggravates it again.

Anyway, you need to be doing massage. You will never fully beat this condition otherwise.