Athletic Incontinence – What Is It?

Ever been halfway through a workout or a run and have a little oops I peed a little moment? You are very far from alone. Incontinence occurs when there is more pressure from above the pelvic floor (and downwards on the bladder) than there is back stop pressure coming from the pelvic floor and urethral sphincters.

Generally speaking we divide incontinence into two main categories – stress incontinence which is when the above happens, or urgency incontinence which is more of a signalling and trigger issue. Stress incontinence typically occurs when there is increased intra-abdominal pressure for example during a cough or sneeze or jumping activities and is often associated with weakness in the pelvic floor.

How is this different to athletic incontinence? Athletic incontinence is often seen in trained individuals during sport specific activities in the presence of what we would typically call adequate or good pelvic floor strength.

So what is happening here? Usually one of two things:

• It’s a coordination and task performance issue with the pelvic floor, something is going wrong with the patterning and timing of recruitment of the pelvic floor muscles preventing it from providing adequate backstop pressure when it needs too.

• Or, it’s a timing and task performance issue with muscles OTHER than the pelvic floor which are then preventing the pelvic floor from being able to do its job, or creating too much intra-abdominal (downward pressure) on the pelvic floor.

If this sounds like it might be you let’s chat, because it doesn’t have to be.