The Core Connection Breath
This is one of my all time favourite exercises.
I teach it to almost all of my clients (pregnant, postpartum, or none of the above). It’s the first exercise that I give clients after giving birth and you can start it whenever you are ready (you don’t have to wait until your 6 week check up).
What is the Core Connection Breath?
The core connection breath is an exercise that helps you connect to your pelvic floor and deep abdominal muscles in a subtle and gentle way. The connection breath allows you to:
Learn how to gain and release tension through your pelvic floor muscles (key part being release)
Re-connect with your deep abdominal muscles
Coordinate the movements of your diaphragm, pelvic floor and deep abdominal muscles
How is the Core Connection Breath different from a classic kegel?
'
When a pelvic floor contraction (kegel) is done correctly, there are two distinct phases; the contraction or shortening phase, and the release or lengthening phase. Often, kegels are taught in a way where only the contraction part of the movement is emphasized. You’re encouraged to squeeze squeeze squeeze to ‘strengthen’ your pelvic floor muscles. This ends up being not all that helpful.
WHY?
Here’s the thing. What we’re learning is that more often than not, folks are walking around with TOO MUCH tension in their pelvic floor. The core connection breath is great because it emphasizes both the lengthening/relaxation phase along with the contraction/shortening phase.
Quick anatomy recap
So before I teach you the Core Connection Breath, let's review some anatomy.
The diaphragm is your primary breathing muscles. It sits within your rib cage. When you inhale, your diaphragm contracts and lowers. Because the diaphragm has moved down, the volume in your thoracic cavity (chest) increases and the pressure decreases. As a result of this decrease in pressure, air rushes in.
(Anyone getting vivid flashbacks to high school physics 🫠 🫠 🫠 )
When you exhale, the diaphragm relaxes and lifts up causing the volume in the thoracic cavity to decrease and pressure to increase, forcing air to flow out of your lungs. It's all about pressure management.
Your pelvic floor muscles are a group of muscles that lie at the base of your pelvis. They attach from the pubic bone in the front, to the tailbone in the back, and then from sit bone to sit bone. They consist of many layers of muscles and form a diamond shape.
The pelvic floor muscles are unique in that they work reflexively and responsively WITH the diaphragm and surrounding abdominal muscles. They are constantly responding to changes in intra abdominal pressure (IAP). When you inhale and your diaphragm lowers, your pelvic floor muscles respond to that change in pressure by lengthening and relaxing. When you exhale and your diaphragm lifts, your pelvic floor muscles respond to that change in pressure by contracting and lifting up.
This is why pelvic floor contractions are typically taught on the exhale - because that is when the pelvic floor muscles are already naturally contracting.
When working well, these two groups of muscles form this beautiful coordinated dance together.
How does this relate to pelvic floor symptoms?
Sometimes, this coordinated patterning of the diaphragm and pelvic floor muscles can be disrupted for a multitude of reasons (pregnancy and birth being one of them, but not the only). When this happens it becomes important to retrain these muscles to work in a coordinated way.
Some hints that your pelvic floor muscles may not be working optimally include:
Leaking or incontinence of either urine or fecal matter
A feeling of heaviness or bulging in the pelvic floor
Pain in the pelvis (front or back) or low back
An urgency to pee
Pain or discomfort with sex
If you are experiencing any of these symptoms, I would highly recommend your first step be to visit a pelvic floor physiotherapist :)
Now just to be clear, I am NOT suggesting that you should be walking around all day thinking about how your diaphragm and pelvic floor are contracting and relaxing together on every breath. In fact, in daily life you shouldn’t be thinking about it at all.
The core connection breath is a way to practice coordinating the diaphragm with the pelvic floor muscles, in a slow paced, intentional way, reinforcing these neuromuscular patterns so that when you step into your life it happens automatically.
Okay, so let's get to it.
The Core Connection breath
Move into a comfortable position, either lying down on your back or side, seated on a chair or exercise ball, or on hands and knees.
[Side note: I’d encourage you to try to this exercise in various positions at different times]
On the inhale, send the breath into the sides and back of the ribcage, into your belly, and all the way down into the pelvis. See if you can feel the sits bones widening apart (note: your bones are not actually moving, it is a cue to feel length across the pelvic floor muscles). Feel your belly relaxing, and your rib cage expanding to the side and back.
As you exhale feel the breath leave your body and the pelvic floor muscles gently lift up and together. Remember how the pelvic floor muscles form that diamond shape? See if you can visualize the sides of the diamond drawing together and lifting gently up into the pelvis.
Repeat.
On the inhale, expand the rib cage, lengthen and relax through the pelvic floor. On the exhale gently gather and lift the sides of the diamond shape up into the pelvis.
Other cues that can be useful for the inhale/ relaxation phase:
Imagine a flower blooming in your pelvis
Imagine your sit bones widening apart
imagine the breath filling up your pelvis and going out your bum
Feel for your belly relaxing
Other cues that can be useful for the exhale/ contraction phase:
Imagine you're drawing a blueberry up into your pelvis
Imagine you're sipping a smoothy with a straw up into your pelvis
Imagine your pelvic floor is like a trampoline, recoiling up into your pelvis
Image you are stopping the flow of urine
Different cues work for different folks. If one doesn't work for you, try another!
A few notes:
Sometimes it’s helpful to think of the pelvic floor muscles like a trampoline. As you inhale the muscles widen and stretch apart, as you exhale they reflexively draw in and up just as a trampoline does.
We don’t want to use full force when doing the pelvic floor contraction. There’s no need to engage more than a 2-3 /10. This is a gentle lift, not a full on squeeze.
If this feels hard for you, or you aren't able to connect to any of these sensations that's OKAY. You are not alone. We're trying to connect to muscles we probably don't connect with much. Give yourself a break and try again at another time. Try from a different position. Try using a different cue. Try again.
Here is a short explanation of the Core Connection Breath for you to come back to when you're practicing. 👇👇
The core connection breath is one of the many tools I use, when working with my clients to optimize movement strategies and get you tuned into the deeper parts of your body. Give it a try, and let me know what you think!
