How to relax your pelvic floor muscles: a step-by-step guide for women

To relax your pelvic floor, breathe slowly into your belly and let the muscles between your sit bones soften and drop as you breathe in, the way they do when you start to pee. Do it lying down first, 5–10 minutes a day, then add a few gentle hip stretches and practise the same drop sitting, standing and on the toilet. Most women who need this also pause hard Kegels until they can feel the muscle let go.

Below: who needs pelvic floor relaxation, six exercises with times and reps, a four-week plan, how to relax on the toilet and during sex, how to bring Kegels back safely, and when to see a pelvic floor physical therapist.

Why relaxing your pelvic floor matters

Your pelvic floor is a sling of muscle from your pubic bone to your tailbone. It has to do two things well: lift and close when pressure comes, and drop and open when you pee, open your bowels or have sex. Most advice for women covers only the first half. But a muscle that can't fully let go can't fully contract either, and one that stays half-clenched all day tires, aches and can make leaks, urgency and pain worse.

Doctors call muscles that don't relax when they should overactive or non-relaxing pelvic floor muscles. You may also see hypertonic pelvic floor. Learning to relax them is the first step in treating it, and a useful skill for every woman who does Kegels.

Signs your pelvic floor needs to relax

Pain with sex or tampons, or a burning feeling at the vaginal opening.
Peeing often but only a little; a slow or stop-start stream; pushing to start.
Constipation or straining, or feeling you can't finish.
Aches in the pelvis, tailbone, hips or low back, worse after sitting.
Kegels that make you worse, or that haven't helped after weeks of careful practice.
Catching yourself clenching your bottom, belly or jaw through the day.

Our guide to tight pelvic floor symptoms in women goes through each sign, with a table for telling tight from weak and the causes behind it.

How to relax your pelvic floor: 6 exercises

Wear loose clothes and find a quiet spot. None of these should hurt; if one does, skip it. Breathe through your nose if you can, slowly, and never hold your breath.

1. Belly breathing (5 minutes)

Your diaphragm and pelvic floor move together like two ends of a piston: as you breathe in, the diaphragm drops and the pelvic floor gently drops and widens with it; as you breathe out, both rise. Belly breathing uses that link.

Lie on your back, knees bent, feet flat, a pillow under your head. Put one hand on your chest and one on your belly.
Breathe in through your nose for about 4 seconds. Let your belly rise into your hand and your lower ribs widen to the sides. Your chest hand barely moves.
Breathe out slowly through your mouth for about 6 seconds, as if fogging a window. Let your belly fall without pushing.
Repeat for 5 minutes. If your mind wanders, count breaths to 10 and start again.

2. The pelvic floor drop (10 breaths)

This is the core skill, sometimes called a reverse Kegel. Once belly breathing feels easy:

As you breathe in, picture your sit bones moving apart and the muscles between them softening and bulging very slightly down, like a flower opening or the moment just before you start to pee.
Don't push or bear down. It's a letting go, not a strain. Nothing should leak.
As you breathe out, let the muscle drift back up on its own. Don't squeeze.
Do 10 slow breaths like this, twice a day.

Not sure you're doing it? Sit on a firm chair and feel the muscles between your sit bones meet the seat a touch more as you breathe in. A small mirror held below the vulva can help too: on the drop, the area between vagina and back passage should ease gently down, not tighten up.

3. Child's pose (1–2 minutes)

Kneel, big toes together, knees wide apart. Sit back toward your heels.
Walk your hands forward and rest your forehead on the floor, a cushion or folded arms.
Breathe into your back and belly, and do the pelvic floor drop on each in-breath.

Knees sore? Put a pillow between your calves and thighs, or rest your chest on a stack of cushions.

4. Reclined butterfly (1–2 minutes)

Lie on your back, bring the soles of your feet together and let your knees fall out to the sides.
Put a pillow under each knee so the stretch is gentle, never sharp.
Breathe slowly, letting your inner thighs and pelvic floor soften on each in-breath.

5. Happy baby (1 minute)

Lie on your back and bring your knees toward your armpits, shins pointing up.
Hold the backs of your thighs, your shins or the outside edges of your feet, whichever reaches comfortably.
Rock gently side to side and breathe into the drop.

6. Supported deep squat (30–60 seconds)

Stand with feet a bit wider than your hips, toes turned out.
Sit down as low as is comfortable onto a yoga block, thick book or low stool, heels down.
Rest your elbows inside your knees, breathe, and let the pelvic floor widen on each in-breath.

Skip this one if your knees or hips complain; child's pose does a similar job.

A four-week plan to relax your pelvic floor

Ten minutes a day, with the drop practised in short moments through the day as well.

Week	Daily routine (about 10 minutes)	Through the day
1	Belly breathing 5 min, twice a day, lying down. No Kegels.	Notice when you clench: driving, at your desk, before sneezes
2	Belly breathing 3 min; the drop 10 breaths; child's pose and reclined butterfly 1 min each	3 slow breaths before every toilet visit
3	Same, plus happy baby and the supported squat; practise the drop sitting	Do the drop sitting at a red light or a desk, 3 breaths
4	Full routine; practise the drop standing	Check in on your jaw, belly and bottom every hour or so and let go

Keep a few lines of notes each day: pain from 0 to 10, how easily you started peeing, any urgency or leaks. In week 4 compare them with week 1. Memory tends to count the bad days, notes don't.

How to relax your pelvic floor on the toilet

The toilet is where many women clench hardest without knowing. Small changes help:

Sit, don't hover. Hovering over a public toilet keeps the pelvic floor and thighs braced, so the bladder has to push through a closed door. Line the seat with paper and sit fully.
Feet on a stool. A small footstool raises your knees above your hips and lets the muscle around the back passage open.
Lean forward, elbows on knees, belly soft.
Breathe, don't push. Three slow belly breaths and a drop on each in-breath. Let the urine come by itself; pushing to pee is a habit worth breaking.
Don't rush off. Give it a few more seconds at the end, rock gently forward and back, and let the last of it come.
Treat constipation. Fibre, steady fluids and walking help; straining tightens the floor further.

Relaxing your pelvic floor for sex

If sex hurts, the muscle often guards against the pain, and the guarding makes the next time hurt more. Breaking that loop takes patience:

Do your breathing and the drop for a few minutes beforehand, and during, as often as you remember.
Use plenty of lubricant, and for dryness after menopause ask your doctor about vaginal moisturisers or low-dose vaginal estrogen.
Go slowly, choose positions where you control depth and pace, and stop if it hurts.
Pelvic floor physical therapists also teach the use of vaginal dilators, small smooth cylinders in graded sizes, to help the muscles learn to stay soft.

Painful sex always deserves a check with a doctor too: infections, skin conditions, endometriosis and menopause changes are all treatable causes.

Stress, sitting and other daily habits

Stress. The pelvic floor tenses with the rest of the body. A few slow breaths several times a day do more than one long session.
Sitting. Get up every 30–45 minutes. Sit on both sit bones, not tucked under on your tailbone.
Holding your stomach in. Letting your belly be soft at rest lets the pelvic floor rest too.
Workouts. Heavy core and high-impact training can keep you braced. Breathe out on effort and let go fully between sets.
Warmth. A warm bath or a hot water bottle on the lower belly can make the exercises easier.

When to bring Kegels back

A relaxed pelvic floor still needs strength to stop leaks; the aim is a muscle that can do both. Most therapists bring squeezes back once you can feel a clear drop and your pain or urgency has eased. Do it gently:

Start lying down with 5 soft squeezes at about half effort, each held 3 seconds.
After each one, let go completely and take one or two belly breaths with the drop before the next. The let-go should take at least as long as the squeeze.
Build slowly over weeks, and stop and drop back to relaxation if pain or urgency returns.

Our guide to how to do Kegels correctly covers finding the right muscle, five self-checks and a full build-up, with the let-go as half of every rep.

If you'd like to see the four things leaflet Kegels usually miss, the let-go included, our free 1-minute check shows them one short fact at a time.

How long does it take to relax the pelvic floor?

There's no fixed timeline, and no trustworthy number for how fast it works for everyone. Many women notice small changes, such as peeing starting more easily or less ache after sitting, within the first few weeks of daily breathing. Pain that has built up over years usually takes months, and often needs hands-on help. If nothing has changed after four weeks of the plan above, that's the time to see a specialist, not to try harder.

When to see a pelvic floor physical therapist

A pelvic floor physical therapist (a pelvic health physiotherapist in the UK) can check by exam whether your muscles are tight, weak or both, and teach relaxation with tools you can't use alone. Cleveland Clinic reports that biofeedback, where sensors show your muscle's activity on a screen, helps over three-quarters of people with pelvic floor dysfunction gain better muscle control. Therapists also use hands-on release of tight spots and graded dilators.

Book one if:

You can't feel the muscle drop or lift at all.
Four weeks of relaxation hasn't changed your symptoms.
Sex, tampons or exams hurt.
Kegels have made things worse.

And see a doctor first if you have blood in your urine or stool, burning when you pee or a fever, can't empty your bladder, have severe or new pelvic pain, numbness in the saddle area, or any bleeding after menopause.

Frequently asked questions

What does a relaxed pelvic floor feel like?

Soft and slightly heavy, as if the area between your sit bones has widened a little. Many women describe it as the feeling just before peeing starts.

Is a reverse Kegel the same as pushing?

No. Pushing or bearing down uses your belly to force pressure down. A reverse Kegel is a gentle letting go with the breath. If you feel strain or leak, you're pushing too hard.

Can I relax my pelvic floor while sitting at work?

Yes. Sit on both sit bones, feet flat, belly soft, and take three slow breaths with the drop. Doing this a few times an hour builds the habit faster than one long session.

Can I do Kegels and relaxation exercises together?

Yes, once you can feel the muscle let go. Pair every squeeze with a full release and a breath. If your symptoms come from tightness, pause the squeezing until relaxing feels easy.

Should relaxation exercises hurt?

No. A gentle stretch is fine; pain is a sign to ease off, change position or skip that exercise, and to get checked if it keeps happening.

Five minutes tonight

Lie down, knees bent, and breathe slowly into your belly for five minutes, letting the pelvic floor soften on each in-breath. That's the first rep. To see why so many women find Kegels don't help, and where the let-go fits in, take our free 1-minute check. More on leaks, urges and the pelvic floor after 40: all our pelvic floor guides.

Sources: Messelink B. et al., Standardization of terminology of pelvic floor muscle function and dysfunction (International Continence Society), Neurourol Urodyn, 2005. Faubion S.S., Shuster L.T., Bharucha A.E., Recognition and management of nonrelaxing pelvic floor dysfunction, Mayo Clin Proc, 2012. Cleveland Clinic, Pelvic floor dysfunction. Hodges P.W. et al., Postural and respiratory functions of the pelvic floor muscles, Neurourol Urodyn, 2007. This guide is education, not medical advice.