According to a recent webinar co-sponsored by the American Urological Association, chronic uncertainty is one of the major forms of stress in today’s culture. More importantly, the chronic uncertainty associated with urinary incontinence can cause women to feel levels of stress similar to that felt by people suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome (PTSS). That’s a lot of stress!

What Women with Urinary Incontinence Stress About
Women coping with symptoms of urinary incontinence tend to stress about numerous issues on a daily basis, most of them dealing with uncertainty. They wonder if they:

- smell like urine
- will have an embarrassing accident and leak urine while in public or during sex
- can make it to the bathroom before an accident
- can find enough bathrooms at work
- will be able to get up the courage to ask for help
- will be able to afford adult diapers and other medical aids
- will ever find a cure for their urine leakage symptoms

… and that’s just a short list of worries that can cause a woman to feel chronic uncertainty.

The Stress of Chronic Uncertainty in Urinary Incontinence
The first few times they experience urine leakage, most women feel worry and embarrassment. When the symptoms of urinary incontinence don’t go away, but linger or even get worse, many women begin experiencing chronic uncertainty.

The stress of this uncertainty becomes a factor of everyday life, not just an occasional worry that pops up from time to time. In fact, this kind of stress can have such a strong effect that many medical organizations have recently started recognizing this kind of chronic uncertainty as a “health-related quality of life factor,” and begun using it as a factor in making policy decisions.

Are You Stressing Unnecessarily?
The worst thing about the stress associated with urinary incontinence is that it is usually unnecessary. There are many new and innovative therapies available today for women suffering from urine leakage, and the success rates of these therapies are very high.

So ask yourself what is worse: the daily stress you suffer from dealing with the uncertainty of urinary incontinence, or the possible embarrassment of seeking help from a health practitioner?

Avoid Chronic Stress and Get Help for Urinary Incontinence
Life is stressful enough without having to deal with urinary incontinence on a daily basis. Learn how women are successfully alleviating and curing their symptoms of urinary incontinence by reading these short stories:

Is This You?
How the Story Ends