Urinary incontinence
is
a topic that is not talked about.
But it affects many more people than is believed.
And the majority are women.
Blanca Anzoategui is one of them.
She knows well the complications, the shame, the desperation that something
as normal and human as peeing
can become .
That's why, on International Urinary Incontinence Day, which was celebrated this week, she decided to tell her story.
So that others do not go through that ordeal.
“If any woman is experiencing something similar, it is very encouraging.
I would have liked to meet someone in the same situation as me
,” says this 34-year-old gastronomic and actress who lives in San Justo.
Today, almost a decade after the first symptoms appeared and with several treatments during that time,
Blanca leads a normal life
.
First, her case demolishes two of the main beliefs about urinary incontinence: that
it only affects people over 40 and that women who have it were mothers
.
She does not have children and started leaking urine when she was 25 years old.
“The first times they were very minor losses, I didn't give them importance.
It took me years to accept that this was not normal, that
there was something wrong
,” she says.
At that time, she resorted to panty liners and then larger pads.
She even thought about buying disposable panties.
She explains in detail what she was experiencing, precisely so that other women do not normalize it: “I realized on a sensitive level that a little trickle was escaping.
It was happening to me almost every day.
If the bathroom was occupied,
I would get my underwear wet
.”
"It made me very embarrassed"
And from there, of course,
all the emotional and social connotation
.
He says that she had started studying theater, and that she had to give it up.
Or that traveling from San Justo to Capital was impossible, and that more than once he had to get off the bus and look for a fast food place to go to the bathroom.
For Blanca, incontinence caused many problems in her daily life.
Photo Ariel Grinberg
“
It made me very ashamed
.
Even in the first consultations with the doctors he minimized it and spoke of 'little trickles'.
I went the route of covering it, of putting on big, dark clothes that wouldn't be noticeable.
Or he was having a conversation with someone, he would cut her off and say 'I forgot something, I'm going to look for it,' and he actually wanted to pee,” he says.
Blanca has an
overactive bladder
, a disorder in which the bladder muscles contract even though she has little urine volume, generating the need to urinate.
It is one of the ways in which urinary incontinence occurs.
Christian Cobrero, coordinator of Urology at the Finochietto Sanatorium and president of the Latin American Pelvic Floor Association, explains that “urgent” incontinence like Blanca's usually has neurological causes and can also manifest when the bladder muscle stops working. and patients urinate due to overflow.
However, the majority of incontinence is
called “stress incontinence”
.
“They are generally related to a ligamentous and muscular alteration of the pelvic floor.
There is an imbalance and the normal angles of the position of the urethra and the visical neck are altered,” describes the urologist.
90% of cases of stress incontinence occur in women
, generally who have had two or three births, regardless of whether they were natural or cesarean sections.
In men, the doctor adds, incontinence is usually seen after
prostate cancer surgery
.
It is estimated that, in its different forms, this pathology is suffered by one in four adults over 40 years of age and that 45% do not consult a doctor.
With treatment, incontinence can be reversed.
As did Blanca, who was finally able to study theater and today participates in plays in addition to having a restaurant with her sisters where they make food for factories.
The therapies to address this pathology follow a
therapeutic ladder
, which includes pelvic floor exercises, kinesiology, biofeedback, medication, surgery and, in very specific cases like Blanca's, the implantation of a sacral neurostimulator to restore bladder activity.
Blanca says that with the treatment she regained her routines and confidence.
Photo Ariel Grinberg
She says today that she is “happy and proud.”
That she regained security and confidence in her sexuality, previously always
affected
by shame and fear of smelling like pee.
“Now I can do my routines, I no longer have to carry a change of clothes in my backpack.
“She changed my life
,” she adds.
It also suggests that gynecologists do a routine check on the condition of the pelvic floor to prevent it from becoming weak.
And fundamentally it asks that we adults resume the naturalness we have to talk about “peeing and pooping” with the little ones to take the shame out of these topics.
“You buy into the story that this happens only to you: it's not like that,”
Blanca closes, before encouraging, once again, that women be encouraged to consult.