I struggled with vaginismus for over a decade.

First shame, guilt, and fear held me back from sharing anything with my medical providers. Once I started treatment, a purely physical approach was all that was offered to me. I quickly saw improvements, but I also quickly plateaued. I struggled to get exactly what I needed through talk therapy. It wasn’t until I took a break from the traditional and started experimenting with other modalities of healing and change that I started to see progress through exercise and dilating. This is the story of how I got there.

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I tried everything “natural” or “holistic”— massage, energy work, Reiki, chakra healing, somatics, manifestation, super intense breath work, coaching, journaling, primal screams, and more— bit by bit, these practices helped me identify and let go of things I hadn’t realized I was clenching on to. Eventually, I realized there were patterns to the things I was holding.

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The patterns I needed to navigate to move through vaginismus were simple. They were also uncomfortable and challenging. They went against a lot of my conditioning, but embracing these not only benefitted my pelvic floor, it has helped me live a more aligned and empowered life. In order to heal, I had to:

Balance My Nervous System

I wasn’t aware, but I was often stuck somewhere in between fight, flight, freeze, and fawn— vascillating between fear, anxiety, exhaustion, and people pleasing. Rarely was I regulated. That means parts of my body were chronically clenching, including my pelvic floor.

Rewrite Limiting Beliefs

Many subconscious thought patterns held me back from feeling confident in who I was, respecting my own needs, and taking action toward the things I needed. Every time I acted in accordance with those limiting beliefs, the smaller I felt, the less positive actions I took, and the tighter I clenched.

Explore Emotions, Pleasure, and Play

I held tightly to all emotions— the good, bad, and ugly. Sometimes I chased pleasure yet never let myself catch and enjoy it. I fought the urge to play in fear of seeming silly or immature— killing my creativity and joy in the process. The more I suppressed and the less I felt, the more I clenched.

Release Shame, Accept Power

I felt ashamed of most things that make me human and guilty about things I did or didn’t do at some point in my past, rather than accepting myself as a normal human that sometimes makes mistakes. Any time I felt strong, accomplished, or proud, I was wary of falling from that new height. So I held tightly as if on a cliff, and I clenched.

Trust Intuition and Interoception

I often went against the signals of my body— not eating when I was hungry, or eating when I wasn’t, staying up late when my body needed rest, ignoring or avoiding pain, saying “yes” to things my body was saying “no” to, or saying “no” to things my body was saying “yes” to. Every time I did this, I clenched.

Establish Healthy Boundaries

I craved acceptance and understanding from the people around me, likely because I didn’t accept and understand myself. I easily lost myself in the needs of others, and became devastated, exhausted, or resentful when my own weren’t met. Eventually I learned to avoid this process by avoiding connection. More clenching.

Connect With Something Bigger

I pushed away so many of my needs, I had trouble moving toward my desires, because if my basic bodily functions, thoughts, “yeses,” or boundaries weren’t worthy of honoring, why would my connection to a higher purpose, direction, or power be important or valid? So I clenched.

Speak My Needs

“If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all,” was a refrain of my youth. Because I believed speaking up for myself, voicing a need, or simply disagreeing with someone wasn’t “nice,” this meant I didn’t have a whole lot to say. Instead I kept it clenched inside.

Upgrade My Environment

I’d let myself easily get distracted by people, places, or things that went against my best interests, healthy habits, and bigger goals. I had a chip on my shoulder about busting through obstacles. I relied too heavily on willpower and over-indexed on hard work vs. cultivating places and spaces to allow for flow and ease.

Within each one of these lessons, I took a holistic approach to break my old patterns and build positive habits.

I took a top-down approach by reverse engineering behavior— deconstructing the beliefs that prevented me from acting in a manner conducive to change, and rewriting my thoughts to promote the actions I wanted to take.

That was supported through a bottom-up, somatic approach to release everything I had been holding so tightly to, and learning what it felt like to be confident and strong in my body.

In the middle, I met myself.

Releasing my old patterns and creating new ones was like going from walking through a jungle with a butter knife to strolling down a paved road. Translation: dilating and exercise became easier and I saw results.

Eventually, I had a “you had it in you all along, my dear,” Wizard of Oz moment.

The exercises and breath work I was given in physical therapy could all be found in my yoga asana practice. The identification and deconstruction of my patterns was something I had seen in the philosophy I learned through yoga teacher training and the behavior change theories I studied in grad school. I started piecing together the tools and lessons of various modalities into lessons and themes, mostly so I could make sense of my own experience.

When I learned more about the commonalities many people with vaginismus face, I realized these resources could be helpful for those walking this path after me.

That’s how Yoga for Vaginismus came to be. It’s gone through a few iterations over the years, and its sure to go through more. My goal through this space is to continue to evolve and share the tools and teachings that helped me move out of my own pain and into my power, so you can do the same.

The Yoga for Vaginismus Tool Kit

  • Reflection and introspection were key parts of my journey. I explore what that process looked like for me in VagQuest: The Podcast, the Yoga for Vaginismus blog, and course work.

  • Movement and breath work were and still are foundational aspects of my day. You can find on-demand practices through YouTube or catch me at a live workshop.

  • I’m a little loose with my definition of spirituality. I see this as synonymous to connection— to myself, nature, a higher purpose/power, and to you. I’d love to connect to hear about your own journey with vaginismus and welcome outreach via my website, social media, or catch me in a class.

Have a question? Want to connect?