chronic pain

This installment of Pelvis Problems from Caitlyn Tivy, the pelvic health PT, talks about interstitial cystitis (IC) and chronic prostatitis (CP), disorders that can cause pain with peeing, along with a number of other symptoms, what causes them, how they can be diagnosed and how they can be treated so you can pee without pain again.

For those of us with chronic pain, living our lives with other people -- be that with sex or something else -- can be tricky. Why was I often having such a hard time communicating such basic things? I realized that some of the survival strategies I used to get through the day were coming back to bite me. Over time, I developed some strategies for re-learning how to listen to myself.

It can be incredibly frustrating when a part of the body we strongly associate with, and expect to give us, pleasure ends up causing us chronic pain. If you have chronic pelvic pain, what do you do if you want to get sexual with yourself or someone else? How can you be physically intimate if you’re in pain? How do you talk to your partners? If it starts hurting, should you stop? This guide from Nicole Guappone offers some great help with all this and more.

How do you navigate a relationship when one or both partners are dealing with pain?