Stop the Cycle of Pelvic Pain

Prompt treatment can head off a spiral of conditions

A picture of beauty—Amanda Sellers overcame chronic pelvic pain with medication, physical therapy and lifestyle changes—including yoga. Her experience led her to a health career; she’s earning an M.S. in counseling and clinical health psychology at Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine.

Chronic pelvic pain isn’t your typical party conversation topic, but if Amanda Sellers of Slatington had her way, people would talk about it more. The 22-year-old Miss Pennsylvania contestant suffered from the condition for years before finding relief. Now, she advocates awareness of chronic pelvic pain as her pageant platform.

“I reached an all-time low last year when I woke up and could barely walk,” says Sellers, a recent Cedar Crest College graduate. “I thought to myself, ‘This is crazy. I feel like I’m 90 years old.’ I knew I needed to find someone who could help me.”

She found a specialist who explained how the pelvic structures operate as a unit. “Because all the muscles and nerves are interconnected, if one area is irritated it can lead to problems in other areas,” says pelvic pain specialist Joseph Patruno, M.D., of Lehigh Valley Hospital and Health Network.

Sellers had irritable bowel syndrome as a child, and was diagnosed with endometriosis (a painful, scar-producing uterine condition) in college. By her senior year, she had interstitial cystitis (chronically inflamed bladder wall) and a variety of other pelvic problems.

Sadly, her experience is a common one. “The majority of my patients with pelvic pain have multiple conditions,” Patruno says. “Many have been from gynecologist to urologist to gastroenterologist to psychiatrist. By the time they see me, pelvic pain has become the biggest problem in their lives, affecting them physically and psychologically.”

Because these conditions often occur in clusters, there is no single miracle cure. “The good news,” Patruno says, “is that when all the ‘pain generators’ are attended to, improvement will occur, although it may take some time. Often you have to look outside the box in managing patients with chronic pelvic pain.”

For Sellers, relief came with a combination of medication, lifestyle changes and especially physical therapy. “When something is not right in your body, the nearby areas get out of harmony or have a sympathetic response to the initial medical problem. This is a huge issue in pelvic pain,” says her physical therapist, Karen Snowden of Lehigh Valley Hospital and Health Network. “Physical therapy can relieve conditions from urinary incontinence to painful intercourse by strengthening and conditioning the pelvic floor muscles.”

After therapy, Sellers was able to walk again like a normal young woman. “Once I realized relief is possible, I became empowered,” she says. “So many women suffer who don’t have to. If their pelvic pain is new, I tell them to call a doctor quickly before it leads to something else. If they’ve been suffering awhile, I tell them to find a specialist. My experience changed my life and it continues to fuel my quest to educate others.”

Want to Know More about Kegel (pelvic floor) exercises and how to practice them correctly? Call 610-402-CARE or click here.

Published from Healthy You Magazine, September-October 2008

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