Could a connection between your jaw and your pelvis be part of why pelvic pain treatment isn't working?
Violet Meyers is a clinical massage therapist based in London (Instagram @battersea.massage) who works with people experiencing chronic pelvic pain, vaginismus, and vulvodynia. In this episode, she explains what fascia actually is - the connective tissue that surrounds and links every structure in the body - and why it's an often-overlooked piece of the pelvic pain puzzle. For anyone who has followed the standard treatment pathway without reaching the improvement they expected, the fascial lens offers a different set of questions to ask.
What fascia is and why it matters for pelvic pain
Fascia is often described as a web - a continuous sheet of connective tissue that surrounds muscles, nerves, organs, and bones, linking them into a single integrated system. It is not separate from the structures it wraps; it is part of how those structures communicate with each other and respond to load, stress, and injury. When fascia is restricted - through injury, chronic tension, inflammation, or holding patterns in the body - those restrictions can transmit to areas that seem completely unrelated to the original problem.
For people with vaginismus or vulvodynia, the fascial system is relevant in ways that go beyond the pelvic floor itself. Restrictions anywhere along the fascial chain - the diaphragm, the hip flexors, the jaw - can create tension patterns that contribute to pelvic floor tightness and pain. Understanding the body as a connected whole rather than a set of isolated components changes what you look for in assessment and what you address in treatment.
"Fascia is this internal scaffolding that holds everything in the body. It's like a web - a spider web - that basically helps us to connect. Surrounds everything in the body, surrounds the muscles, surrounds the joints, surrounds the bones, surrounds all the vessels, and holds everything together."
The jaw-pelvis connection: what your body is telling you
One of the most counterintuitive - and clinically well-supported - observations in bodywork is the relationship between jaw tension and pelvic floor tension. The two areas share developmental origins and fascial connections, and chronic bruxism, TMJ issues, or habitual jaw clenching can contribute to patterns of hypertonic tension in the pelvic floor. It works in the other direction too: addressing jaw tension is sometimes what allows the pelvis to release when direct pelvic floor work hasn't been enough.
Violet discusses how she assesses for fascial restrictions across the whole body and why this whole-system view is part of what clinical massage therapy brings to chronic pelvic pain. For listeners who have been working with pelvic floor physiotherapy without full resolution, exploring whether restrictions elsewhere in the fascial system are maintaining tension in the pelvis is a productive line of enquiry.
"If you imagine I have put this fishnet top and sock around my hand - for those who listen and don't see, if you take a fishnet tie or a sock, you can see that everything is connected. Pull one part and you feel it all the way through."
The biopsychosocial approach: why fascia doesn't work in isolation
Violet's practice is grounded in the biopsychosocial model - the understanding that pain is not purely mechanical but involves biological, psychological, and social factors that interact with each other. Fascia holds not just physical tension but the imprint of stress, trauma, and emotional experience. A body that has been in chronic pain, or that has been bracing against anticipated pain for a long time, develops holding patterns in the fascial system that outlast the original trigger.
This is relevant to vaginismus and vulvodynia because it means that the most effective approach is rarely purely physical. Violet discusses how gentle breath work, movement, and a sense of safety in the body can create the conditions in which the fascial system can release - and why these seemingly soft tools are doing real structural work rather than just offering comfort.
"The pelvic floor muscles and all the pelvic floor can become super tight and stays in that pattern each time... because there is a nervous system connection with the emotional connection. So working with the fascia - with the whole body - is how we reach that."
Practical tools for fascial health at home
One of the things that makes this conversation accessible is Violet's attention to what people can do themselves. Fascial health is supported by gentle, varied movement - not vigorous exercise that maintains or increases tension, but the kind of slow, exploratory movement that allows the connective tissue to hydrate and release. Breath is one of the most direct tools available, because the diaphragm sits at the centre of the fascial system and its movement directly affects the pelvic floor.
Violet shares practical tools for supporting fascial health through breath, gentle movement, and self-directed touch. For people in the middle of active treatment, these approaches complement physiotherapy and other interventions rather than replacing them - giving the body the daily inputs it needs to support the work being done in clinical sessions.
