Urinary Incontinence Symptoms and Causes
The medical condition of having bladder leaks or being unable to hold urine is called urinary incontinence. Although it is a quite common problem, especially for women, most people feel uncomfortable when it comes to talking about it. This can prevent you from visiting a doctor for your suspicions. In this article, we will talk about Incontinence Symptoms and Causes.
So, if you are suspecting that you have an incontinence problem, you may be wondering what signs you should look for. In this article, we gathered common incontinence symptoms you can recognize and the possible causes for these symptoms. Let’s see what you can experience if you have incontinence.
Common Incontinence Symptoms
There are multiple types of Incontinence with various problems. Depending on the symptoms you experience you can get an idea about the type you might be suffering from.
The most common incontinence symptoms involve small accidents that happen while you are trying to hold your pee. You may have small leaks when you made a sudden movement. Most women who experience incontinence deal with leaks when they sneeze, cough, or laugh at something. These leaks can also happen when you are trying to move a large object. These signs are typical stress incontinence symptoms.
Another example of incontinence symptoms is having peed drips even after you used the restroom recently. This may be caused by weak bladder muscles that fail to empty all the urine from your bladder. And bladder neck may fail to stop the leaks too.
Some people can also experience uncontrollable urination following random strong urges to urinate. Not only drinking a certain amount of liquids but even hearing some sounds, or touching water can trigger this urge. And women that suffer from urination unwillingly might have urge incontinence. This type of incontinence can also cause wetting your bed at night.
There are also other types of incontinence problems that can cause functional incapability. So you would not need to look for incontinence symptoms, but rather if the person in question is functionally able to use the restroom by themselves or if they can time their visits.
Causes of Incontinence Symptoms
If you are experiencing incontinence symptoms, you may be wondering about the reasons for them. Incontinence is not always caused by the same reasons.
You may experience incontinence because of an infection, or you may also have been consuming certain foods or drinks that can cause it. But these are usually temporary. So, let’s look at these temporary causes of incontinence symptoms first.
For example, if you get a urinary tract infection, your bladder can get sensitive, or swollen. This may cause you to have problems with holding your pee or having leaks. But these infections can be treated with antibiotics and the incontinence symptoms can disappear.
As we mentioned, some foods and drinks can cause you to experience incontinence symptoms too. As you may already know, drinks that contain alcohol makes you urinate more. This also applies to carbonated drinks, especially the ones that contain caffeine. Some spices like chili can also irritate your bladder and cause incontinence symptoms. But of course, these symptoms are temporary until you pass these drinks and foods out of your body.
Similarly, you can experience incontinence symptoms while you are suffering from constipation. As the end of your bowels is full, it can put pressure on your bladder and some nerves that are responsible for your bladder movements. So, you can show incontinence symptoms until your constipation passed too.
Although the causes we mentioned above are temporary and can be solved when you deal with the original causes, other incontinence symptoms can be caused by more permanent changes in your body. These causes require special treatments to remove or at least mitigate the symptoms.
One common cause that makes women experience incontinence symptoms is the changes around the bladder during and after pregnancy. The pregnant body produces hormones that loosen the muscles around the bladder. Moreover, during labor, some muscles and structures can change around this area and prolapsing can happen. These changes can cause women to experience incontinence symptoms permanently.
Similarly, having lower estrogen levels can also cause changes around the bladder. These changes can cause incontinence symptoms. This is why you can experience these symptoms during a week of your regular menstrual cycle too. Those symptoms disappear after your period. But after menopause, the estrogen levels go down permanently. So, you may get incontinence symptoms after your menopause too. But this time, they may stay, unless you get them treated.
While the previous causes we mentioned are related to stress incontinence, you may also experience urge incontinence. This type is usually related to wrong signals that the bladder gives to the nervous system, like a constant need for urination. These problems in the nerves can occur because of various reasons. You may have an accident or a surgical operation that damaged your nerves, or a disease can affect your nervous system. It is also possible that a tumor is giving off signals that cause incontinence too. So, if you are experiencing urge incontinence symptoms, you may need a thorough check-up.
More Info
For more information about incontinence, you can check our related articles. You can also learn about treatments for incontinence symptoms by checking our other articles on the topic. We have many other articles on health tips too. Don’t forget to follow us on social media for our latest tips on health and beauty.
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