About Us
What is
Hypopressive/Low Pressure Fitness?
Hypopressive exercise was originally created by Dr. Marcel Caufriez in the 1980s as a breathing technique that therapists could use to help postnatal women prevent and/or recover from pelvic floor dysfunction - incontinence and prolapse.
Thanks to Dr. Tamara Rial and Piti Pinsach of Spain, Hypopressive training has evolved into a fitness program that is being used by women and men of all ages who are seeking to restore their pelvic health and train the true function of their core.
Low Pressure Fitness is a unique and comprehensive system of movement and postural exercise that incorporates a hypopressive or abdominal vacuum to create reduced pressure throughout the abdomen and pelvic girdle. Traditional approaches to pelvic health and core exercise focus too much on one segment of the core at a time with exercises that typically increase intra abdominal pressure. Hypopressive training reduces intra abdominal pressure and addresses the true essence of the deep core - diaphragm, pelvic floor, transverse abdominals and multifidi - to balance and counterbalance our everyday movements.
About Jeanne
My name is Jeanne Herbert and I’m a personal trainer. I came to this profession somewhat late in the game. I’ve always had an athletic bent but athletics for girls wasn’t a priority when I was in school. So I found different ways to release my inner athlete.
I was a cheerleader in middle school, played church league softball in high school and returned to cheerleading in college. But I didn’t find my passion, weight training, until I was 46. I had never lifted a weight until that time but I fell in love and never looked back. Fast forward to today and I’ve been training for 15 years.
In October 2019 I began to notice that something wasn’t quite right. When I would do heavy leg press my insides felt like they wanted to exit the premises. Sorry if that’s TMI but it’s the reason this blog has begun. After seeing my OB and then another visit to a pelvic reconstructive specialist, I learned that I had pelvic organ prolapse, a term I had never heard.
Prolapsed uterus, bladder and bowel, and a hernia - all repairable with surgery. I didn’t even know enough about the condition to know what questions to ask. I was told no weight lifting for eight weeks. But worse than that, in my mind, was that going forward all the research I could find said that post surgery I should never do a sit up again and that I should never lift more than 30 pounds. Impractical and unacceptable!
So I found a pelvic floor physical therapist in Scottsdale, AZ, (long story) and she told me that I might want to look into hypopressives as a means to “safeguard” my surgery going forward. I took her advice and began my online training to become a certified Low Pressure Fitness/Hypopressive instructor.
If you find yourself in my position or if you have slight prolapse issues, leaking or are trying to recover your abdominal and pelvic floor heath post partum, please don’t hesitate to contact me.
