Brittany Mahomes tells moms ‘take care of your pelvic floor.’ KC doc says she’s right

Fans who follow Brittany Mahomes on social media know she shares a lot there about her personal life, whether it’s revealing her children’s food allergies or how her hair started thinning after having babies.

This week the co-owner of the Kansas City Current women’s soccer team became an Instagram crusader for a topic some, perhaps many, women are uncomfortable talking about: gynecological health.

“Just your daily reminder: Once you have kids please take care of your pelvic floor,” the wife of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes wrote in an Instagram Story. “Seriously. From: A girl with a fractured back.”

When Dr. Gary Sutkin, a urogynecologist with University Health, saw her message “my first thought is I’m a big fan of Brittany Mahomes, so I’m excited that she is talking about this ... so glad that she’s spreading the word of how important it is to take care of your pelvic floor.”

Sutkin specializes in urology and gynecology, diagnosing and treating conditions that affect the pelvic floor — the hammock-like set of muscles stretching from the pubic bone to the tailbone that support the uterus, bladder and rectum.

When they become weak, stretched out or deteriorate, a whole host of problems can follow.

Mahomes also mentioned that she has fractured her back, but didn’t elaborate. Without more details, Sutkin was uncertain how her advice about the pelvic floor was connected to a back injury.

“But you can imagine that the back goes all the way from the neck, all the way down to our bottoms,” he said. “And so a big part of the spine, a big part of the back, overlaps with the pelvis, so I’m wondering if she’s talking about that.

“The other possibility is there are a lot of muscles in the back that connect to the muscles of the pelvis, and so women that have problems with some of their back muscles can have problems with their pelvic floor muscles, too.”

Pregnancy and childbirth — notice Mahomes addressed fellow moms — are common causes of Pelvic Floor Dysfunction, which the Cleveland Clinic describes as a “condition where you can’t correctly relax and coordinate the muscles in your pelvic floor to urinate (pee) or have a bowel movement (poop).”

Pregnancy and childbirth, along with aging, being overweight and surgery can weaken the pelvic floor muscles.

“These are muscles that sit right there where the baby is sitting. So first of all during pregnancy, the weight of the baby as it grows is sitting on these muscles and ligaments and causing changes to them,” said Sutkin.

“And then all of these muscles and ligaments have to spread and move to the side as the baby comes out, as the baby delivers. And so these muscles can get bent out of shape, they can get stretched, they can get torn, they can hurt just from the weight that’s been on them the whole time.”

Mahomes has given birth twice, to daughter Sterling Skye, on Feb. 20, 2021, and Patrick “Bronze” Lavon Mahomes III on Nov. 28, 2022.

Multiple births and delivering “bigger babies” can also affect the pelvic floor, Sutkin said, but women who have never had children can have problems, too.

“Genetics plays into it,” he said. “Some women are more susceptible to this. Some women cannot have babies or have small babies and still have pelvic floor issues. And of course there are some women who have multiple large babies who don’t have pelvic floor issues.

“But either way I think her advice is spot-on, which is just that when you’re pregnant, and especially after the pregnancy’s over, that’s a really ideal time to work on your pelvic floor.”

Work that pelvic floor

Sutkin encourages patients to think of strength and coordination exercises for the pelvic floor muscles like working out any other part of the body.

“It’s not that different from going to the gym and working on your biceps or working on your quads,” he said

And “those good, old-fashioned Kegel exercises are wonderful for the pelvic floor.”

You might benefit from Kegel exercises, the Mayo Clinic says, if you leak a few drops of urine while sneezing, laughing or coughing, or have strong, sudden urges to urinate right before urinating a large amount.

They can be done discreetly, anytime. No one has to know that you’re contracting and relaxing your pelvic floor muscles during that Zoom meeting, at the movies or while watching TV.

Here’s a how-to guide from University of Michigan Health.

If you can’t figure them out, ask your doctor.

Sutkin tells his patients “it’s the sensation of you’re sitting on the toilet and the phone rings and you have to cut off your urine stream to go answer the phone,” he said.

Many patients who see him and his partners in Kansas City and Lee’s Summit are having bladder problems such as urinary incontinence and excessive urination, all of which can be “signs that there’s something wrong with the pelvic floor,” he said.

“But it’s also reasonable to go to a urogynecologist or doctor just saying, ‘you know what, I want my pelvic floor assessed. I want to know what’s the status of my muscles, how did pregnancy affect my muscles, how strong are they?’

“Pregnancy can sometimes affect the shape of the muscles and that’s something we can assess. So it’s reasonable to ask that question.”

And don’t be afraid to use the word vagina, Sutkin said.

“Vagina is the most common word I use at the dinner table when I talk about work and I have two teenage boys and it just embarrasses them,” he said. “But we have to say the word vagina.

“It is an important word. So yes, I would encourage everybody to talk about vaginas.”

For every person who gets a little embarrassed about Mahomes talking about this topic, Sutkin said, “There’s going to be a lot more women who are going to feel empowered to talk about their own pelvic floor health.”