Gemma Collins, 43, admits she thought her 'waters had broken' and questioned whether she was pregnant after struggling with incontinence while jumping on a trampoline

Gemma Collins has admitted she thought that she was pregnant and her 'waters had broken' aft struggling pinch incontinence while jumping connected a trampoline.

The erstwhile TOWIE star, 43, shared her battles pinch nan communal ailment during an question and reply connected Friday's This Morning.

Gemma admitted that she 'broke down successful tears' and feared she was 'going to die' aft going to nan bath and 'seeing water' pursuing an incontinence leak, and added that her pelvic level exercises person been 'crucial' successful her recovery.

While urinary incontinence usually affects women pursuing childbirth, it tin beryllium caused by different pressures specified arsenic weight summation and constipation.

Gemma told hosts Alison Hammond and Dermot O'Leary that she first realised she had incontinence while visiting a trampoline parkland pinch her nephew Haydn and stepson Tristan, whose begetter is her fiancé Rami Hawash.

She said: 'I commencement jumping. All of a abrupt nan floodgates open. I'm successful mid-air and I'm like, americium I dying?'

'I don't want to ruin nan kids' day. I'm soaking bedewed and this is conscionable shocking. So, I went to nan loo and it was water. And past I was conscionable like, ''I'm going to die.I request an operation. Something's happened to me''.

'I'm jumping mid-air, reasoning ''am I'm pregnant and nan water's breaking?''. I'm truthful embarrassed. I've not moreover had kids yet.'

'So, I was beside myself. I retrieve going home. My fiancé wanted to spell for meal that night. I was conscionable emotion truthful low. I went into nan bathroom. I started crying. I was like, my life's over. It was conscionable truthful bad.' 

'Then, obviously, I did my investigation and 1 successful 55% of women successful nan UK are experiencing this. All shapes, each sizes, each ages. Opener to maine arsenic well. It's affecting truthful galore women's confidence.

'And for illustration me, if I'm going connected holiday, I want to do what nan kids are doing. I want to spell connected nan pitchy skis and, you know, beryllium that nosy personification that I am. 

'But surviving pinch that fearfulness that group person connected a regular ground really affected my confidence.'

Despite fearing she would request room to dainty nan problem, Gemma confirmed that she's importantly reduced her incontinence leaks pinch regular pelvic level exercises.

'I person almost reversed my incontinence by 95% by doing my pelvic floors.

'I was successful Benidorm 2 days ago. I was laughing my caput off. A small spot travel out, but thing for illustration what it would usually do.'

Urinary incontinence is common, affecting an estimated 7 cardinal women successful nan UK, though meticulous statistic are difficult to travel by because truthful galore women are hesitant astir talking astir their problem.

It tin hap astatine immoderate time, though it becomes much communal pinch age.

'What Gemma experiences is thing called accent incontinence, triggered by a weakening of nan pelvic level beneath her bladder, bowels and womb which causes urine to leak out,' Myra Robson, a pelvic wellness physiotherapist astatine Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust, previously told MailOnline successful 2023.

This typically occurs arsenic a consequence of childbirth. The weight of carrying a babe weakens nan pelvic floor, nan hammock-like set of musculus that runs from nan pelvic bony astatine nan beforehand to nan tail bony astatine nan backmost and which helps support nan entranceway to nan bladder firmly shut. When nether unit — for example, during a coughing fresh — urine tin leak.

Yet while it's a communal problem for mothers, it tin besides impact those for illustration Gemma who haven't had children.

Chronic constipation, terrible coughing, a important summation successful weight complete a sustained period, and lifting dense weights successful nan gym, tin besides trigger it, explains Myra Robson.

These each origin unit successful nan abdomen, successful move putting unit connected nan bladder and, 'unless nan pelvic level is giving nan requisite support', it tin lead to leaks, adds Gill Davey, a continence caregiver for Bladder Health UK.

'Gemma's acquisition is very usual,' she says. 'The problem tin beryllium exacerbated pinch property and peculiarly aft nan menopause erstwhile nan assemblage is nary longer people producing nan oestrogen that helps fortify nan pelvic floor, which is wrapped astir nan urethra [the conduit that exits nan bladder] and has an opening and closing system known arsenic nan sphincter.

'When nan plumpness of nan pelvic level is weakened from deficiency of oestrogen, it [the sphincter] won't ever adjacent efficiently.'

The origin successful Gemma's lawsuit is not clear.

In 2015, past aged 34, she underwent a well-publicised non-surgical process to rejuvenate her labia — 'a designer vagina' — but she's been assured that, arsenic a cosmetic treatment, it had nary effect connected her pelvic floor.