Women's Health

Female pelvic pain treatment can be enhanced with counseling, mental skills training, relaxation, and physical therapy treatment.

Other Treatment Choices

Counseling and mental skills training help you learn the mental and emotional tools for managing chronic pain and the stress that makes it worse. Commonly recommended approaches include:

• Cognitive-behavioral therapy focused on changing the way you think about and mentally manage pain. See a psychologist, licensed counselor, or clinical social worker who specializes in pain management skills.
• Biofeedback, which is the conscious control of body function that is normally unconsciously controlled.
• Interpersonal counseling, focused on best managing your life events, stressors, and relationships.

Physical therapy can help you learn specific exercises to stretch and strengthen certain muscle groups. Physical therapy helps you to improve posture, gait, and muscle tone.

Alternative pain treatments for chronic female pelvic pain are not well studied but are considered helpful for managing stress and building mental mastery over pain. Acupuncture and transcutaneous nerve stimulation (TENS) have shown some success in relieving painful menstrual periods. Acupuncture has also been used as a treatment for nonmenstrual chronic pelvic pain but is not yet well studied.¹

Other low-risk alternative pain treatments that many people use to help manage pain include:

• Relaxation and breathing exercises.
• Hypnosis.
• Guided imagery.
• Aromatherapy.
• Meditation.
• Yoga.
• Massage therapy.

What To Think About

Chronic pelvic pain takes time to develop and can take a long time to treat. Take charge of how you cope with pain by using one or more of the treatment choices above. Combine your treatment with the practices you prefer for keeping a positive state of mind. For more information, see the topic Stress Management.