If You Plan Your Workouts Around Bathrooms, Pelvic Physical Therapy Is For You

Leaking during workouts is one of those things people don’t talk about out loud, but just silently put up with for years.

Maybe they map out bathrooms before a run or they stop mid-set to cross their legs. Some avoid box jumps, double unders, heavy lifts, or sprint intervals altogether. They tell themselves it’s not that bad, or that it’s just part of being active.

Sure it’s common. But, it is not something we have to just accept as our new norm.

Leaking with workouts is not a motivation problem

Many of the people I see for leaking are strong. They train consistently. They care about their health. They’re doing all the “right” things. The issue usually isn’t effort.

Leaking with running, jumping, sneezing, or lifting is rarely about weakness alone. It’s more often about coordination, timing, and how the pelvic floor responds under load. Any time we move in these ways, a lot of force goes through the pelvic floor. Don’t worry it’s designed to handle this. However, if the pelvic floor is struggling to handle this load, it’ll have some symptoms that are less than desirable.

Your pelvic floor has to do a lot in a very short window of time. It has to manage pressure, coordinate with your breath and core, and adapt to impact and speed. When that timing is off, leaking can show up even in very fit bodies.

Why “just get stronger” doesn’t fix it

This is where a lot of people get stuck.

They’re told to strengthen their core. Do kegels. Add more glute work. Brace harder. Try a different program. Now, sometimes those things help, but often, they don’t. That’s because strength without coordination doesn’t translate well to real life movement. Especially not fast, dynamic movement like running or jumping.

Your pelvic floor needs to know when to engage, when to relax, and how to respond automatically. If it’s gripping all the time, slow to respond, or out of sync with the rest of your system, leaking can persist no matter how strong you are.

The bathroom-mapping phase isn’t harmless

A lot of people minimize leaking because it doesn’t stop them from working or taking care of responsibilities. But when our lives involve planning workouts around bathrooms, modifying movement you enjoy, or feeling anxious during exercise, it takes a toll. It chips away at confidence and it makes movement feel stressful instead of fun.

For many people, exercise isn’t just fitness. It’s stress relief, mental health, their identity, or how they build community. It matters when leaking interferes with that.

For some this bathroom-mapping goes beyond exercise and seeps into their work schedule, their traveling, their willingness to make plans in new places. If they don’t know the bathroom situation and are dealing with incontinence, then yeah, that’d be scary.

What pelvic physical therapy actually looks at

Pelvic physical therapy doesn’t start with assuming your body is broken.

It looks at how your pelvic floor works in context:

• How you breathe under load

• How pressure is managed during movement

• How your body responds to impact and speed

• How training volume, recovery, stress, and sleep play a role

Our focus and aim is to help your body do its job automatically, so that you can focus on your workout or other activities, without having to focus on your pelvic floor or bladder. We can think of the pelvic floor as a silent partner in these activities.

You don’t need to earn dryness by avoiding movement

Leaking isn’t just a normal part of aging or something you have to endure if you want to be active. It just simply is a sign that we need to pay a bit more attention to the pelvic floor. Does it coordinate appropriately, is it resilient, does it have a high enough capacity for whatever load we’re placing on it? These are the questions we need to ask rather than just throwing in the towel and walking away from movement.

You might find yourself modifying workouts, mapping bathrooms, or just accepting the lie that this is just a part of exercise. But, this just looks at the symptom, not the actual cause of the issue. You need support. And that support does not require you to give up the activities that make you feel like yourself.

What to do next

If leaking is showing up during workouts, running, jumping, sneezing, or lifting, pelvic floor physical therapy may be a good fit.

👉 Book a consultation to talk through what you’re experiencing and see if pelvic physical therapy is right for you.

If you’re in Greenville, SC, in-person care is available. If you live elsewhere in South Carolina, telehealth may be an option.