What Is A Pelvic Floor Physical Therapist?

Hey little birds.

As many of you may already know, because you watched the kind-of-hilarious-but-very-painful video, I fractured my tailbone in February in Rovaniemi, Finland (in Finnish Lapland). The day after Valentine’s Day, to be exact.

The moments after I initially fractured my tailbone were some of the scariest of my life. I couldn’t get up off the snow or walk, the white-hot pain had enveloped the entire lower half of my body. All I knew is that something was wrong. I just kept saying over and over, “it’s not good, it’s not good, it’s not good.”

It was a huge relief when I finally was able to stand up and hobble to the igloo where we were staying. The first thing I thought to do was take a shower – I needed hot water on the area that had been impacted. But when I got in the shower and let the hot water stream over my tailbone, I realized I couldn’t feel lit. My tailbone was numb, all the skin surrounding my tailbone was numb, and that I had no feeling at all in most of my pelvic region. That was, as you can guess, another really scary moment.

It was hard to believe that one second of my life, sledding like a little kid down a hill, could lead to so much pain.

I won’t tell the entire story again because I told it in this post, but long story short I went to the Rovaniemi hospital and got an x-ray – and it was fractured. 

Soon after, I traveled back to NYC – at least I could justify the upgrade to business class from Helsinki to JFK on Finnair, right? Sitting on a broken tailbone for 9 hours in coach is not recommended. At least, that’s what the lady at the Finnair ticket counter said. ;)

A Pelvic Floor Physical Therapist? That’s A Thing?

When I told one of my closest friends, Nicole, what had happened, she said, “GIRL! You have to make an appointment with a pelvic floor therapist immediately. Things are probably all kinds of messed up down there!” 

A pelvic floor therapist? 

I had never heard of that, but I was intrigued.

“Yeah, make an appointment with Isa Herrera as soon as you can.”

I trust Nicole when it comes to these things, she’s a hormonal health specialist so she’s got the real lowdown on this stuff. As soon as I got back to NYC I made an appointment with Isa, who (luckily for me) has an office in Park Slope, Brooklyn (she also has one in Manhattan, but I like staying on my side of the bridge when I can).

I had no idea what to expect, but I saw on her website that she specialized in healing the coccyx (which I had recently learned is the medically correct word for “tailbone”) so I felt excited to learn more.

My First Pelvic Floor Therapy Appointment

When I got to Isa’s office, I felt like I had just met a new friend. She hugged me and told me she watched my tailbone video on instagram, and she said the same thing Nicole did. “That kind of impact on the coccyx can affect so much more than just the bone being fractured.” 

She told me exactly where all the nerves and muscles were located around my tailbone, and explained why I was feeling the numbness. She was like a walking pelvic anatomy book with the way she was talking. I was fascinated by her.

She told me that she sees women all the time who have pelvic pain after childbirth, and that you can actually damage your coccyx (and even fracture it) during birth. Yikes!!

I won’t go into all the details of the different adjustments she made during our session because who wants to hear that, and I’m too Virgo to tell you. But her level of wisdom and insight about how everything “should be working” down there is astounding, I’ll tell you that. And I didn’t get any of this information at the hospital when I went to get my x-ray.

Along with being super anatomy-smart, she also has such a nurturing energy. Along with the physical adjustments and exercises, she works with herbs and natural remedies, energy and breathwork, visualizations and our powerful emotional connection to pelvic pain.

I’ve continued to go to Isa for physical therapy every few weeks and she gives me exercises and massages to do at home to continue to release the tension from the impact of the fracture (some of which I admit I still haven’t done, waaa I’m a rebellious student to my own detriment!), and she also does in-office adjustments that I didn’t even know were a thing — some involving cold laser therapy around my injured tailbone. (And yes…we had a Gwenyth moment and even talked about jade eggs).

I’m not gonna say much more about pelvic regions because I’ll get too shy but I think this topic is SO IMPORTANT, so I had to share. Isa can give you the rest of the details you’re looking for. ;)

Here’s what I do know. Not only is my tailbone going to heal completely but I will be able to thrive pelvically. HAHA! Thrive Pelvically. Did I just make up a word? And I know that one day if I have a child, I’ll know everything I need to know. Because I have Isa on my team.

The One Thing She Made Very Clear… 

Every time I talk to Isa, she makes it very clear:

You don’t have to suffer in pain or discomfort. 

There are ways to heal. Isa’s work in the world is to give women the tools and knowledge they need to properly self-diagnose pelvic floor dysfunction of any kind – and then teach them how to fix it. 

I’m not only talking about people who’ve had injuries. I’m talking if you have any kind of pelvic pain or discomfort, for any reason.

The reason I share this with you is because before Nicole told me about Isa I didn’t even know there was anything else I could do for my injury aside from getting the hospital x-ray and just laying off of it for awhile. Turns out we’re much more intricate beings than that. 

Ways To Learn More About Pelvic Floor Therapy

• Watch Isa’s free webinar on pelvic floor dysfunction
• Sign up for Isa’s Pelvic Floor Alchemy online course now (only 1 day left to sign up!) (use coupon code ALCHEMY for $100 off)
• Make an in-person appointment with Isa in New York City
• Read Isa’s book, Ending Female Pain

I love this woman, she’s a champion. 

Hope you found this as helpful and eye-opening as I did when Nicole said, “you gotta call Isa.” :)

Lots of love,
Jenny