Do it right, then do it often

Read "Why a husband trains this" and "Find the muscle" before your first session. Everything here is drawn from the sources linked at the bottom.

Why a husband trains this

His legs are as pillars of marble, set upon sockets of fine gold.

Song of Solomon 5:15 · KJV

Pillars is the husband's track inside The Kingdom Built Couple. It is a twelve-week program for the small muscles at the base of the penis, built from published clinical trials, and it exists for one reason: your body is part of what you bring to your marriage, and it can be stewarded like anything else God has handed you.

Scripture is plain about this. Paul tells husbands and wives not to deprive one another (1 Corinthians 7:3-5). Proverbs tells a man to rejoice with the wife of his youth (Proverbs 5:18-19). Hebrews calls the marriage bed honourable (Hebrews 13:4). And Paul reminds every believer that the body is a temple, bought with a price, to be used to glorify God (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Ten minutes a day of unglamorous work on a muscle nobody sees is a small, concrete way to take all four seriously.

Two things Pillars is not. It is not a substitute for a doctor: erectile trouble can be the first sign of a heart or blood-sugar problem, and the "When to see a doctor" page below is part of the program, not an afterthought. And it is not a promise. The trial this program follows helped most of the men in it and did nothing for about a quarter. Do the work, give it twelve weeks, and tell your wife what you are doing; she is the other side of the arch.

If she asks what the squeezing is about: "It is the muscle that keeps an erection firm. The trial that proved it had men do three hard squeezes lying, sitting and standing, twice a day. I am doing the same thing with a timer."

Find the muscle

You are training the muscles that make up the floor of your pelvis. At the front, the bulbocavernosus (also called bulbospongiosus) wraps the bulb of the penis behind the scrotum, and the ischiocavernosus runs along each side of the root. NHS physiotherapy leaflets teach men to find them this way:

Sit or lie down comfortably with your thighs, buttocks and stomach relaxed.
Tighten the muscles around the back passage as if you were trying to stop passing wind.
Keep that squeeze and, at the same time, imagine stopping the flow of urine mid-stream. You should feel the penis draw in toward the stomach and the testicles lift. Standing in front of a mirror shows it.

Do not practise on a real urine stream. One NHS leaflet allows a real-flow check no more than once a fortnight; the rest of the time you only imagine it. Repeatedly stopping the stream can interfere with emptying your bladder.

Over the first two weeks, as the "find it" squeezes get easier, shift your attention forward so the lift at the base of the penis is as clear to you as the squeeze at the back.

Tight or weak? Read this before Week 3

Most of this program assumes your pelvic floor is weak and needs strengthening. For some men the problem is the opposite: the floor is held tight all the time (physiotherapists call it hypertonicity or an overactive pelvic floor). A 2022 systematic review in Sexual Medicine Reviews found that pelvic floor physical therapy aimed at relaxation helps those men, and the Sexual Medicine Society of North America warns that ordinary Kegels can make a tight floor worse.

Signs that tension, not weakness, may be the issue:

Squeezing seems to make erections or symptoms worse over a few weeks, not better.
A constant feeling of tightness, heaviness or bracing in the pelvis that does not ease with rest.
Urinating or passing a bowel movement takes effort or feels incomplete (as opposed to leaking or urgency).
Pelvic, perineal or lower-back discomfort, especially after long sitting.
Pain during or after sex, or premature ejaculation while feeling "in control."

None of these diagnoses anything on its own. If two or more fit, do this: skip the Long holds for a week and run only Settle, Quick squeezes and a doubled Let it go (use Reset day every day). If that feels better, see a pelvic floor physiotherapist before resuming strength work; an exam can tell tight from weak, and some men are both in different parts of the floor.

The 2025 narrative review in the International Journal of Impotence Research puts it plainly: during sex the floor must relax to let blood in, then contract in a coordinated way to keep it there. Every physiotherapy program for male sexual dysfunction trains relaxation, strength, endurance and coordination together. That is why Pillars ends every session with release work, not just as a cool-down.

Form checklist

Keep breathing. Holding your breath raises blood pressure. If you catch yourself holding it, count out loud during the squeeze.
Buttocks, thighs and stomach stay relaxed. Rest a hand on your lower belly; it should not firm up.
Lift up, never push down. Bearing down (the toilet push) strains the floor and is the opposite of the exercise.
Relax fully between squeezes. Letting go completely lets blood and oxygen back into the muscle and stops it fatiguing. You should feel a clear "letting go" at the end of every hold.
Long holds are maximal. From Week 3 on, squeeze as strongly as you can while still breathing. Quick squeezes are sharp and rhythmic, not strong.
Hold only as long as the squeeze stays strong. If you feel the muscle drop before the timer ends, let go, rest, and use a shorter hold tomorrow. Build from 3 seconds toward 10.
Sore is fine, pain is not. A mild worked-muscle ache is normal. Sharp pain, burning, or pain lasting more than a day means stop and get it looked at.

How a session is built

Every training day uses the same shape, so you never have to think about what comes next.

Settle (30 s). Slow breathing with everything relaxed before you load the muscle.
Long holds. The main strength work, taken from the Dorey trial: maximal squeezes in lying, sitting and standing, with a rest at least as long as the hold. Holds build from 3 seconds in Week 1 to 10 seconds by Week 8. NHS guidance is the same: work up to about 8 to 10 holds of up to 10 seconds, resting 10 seconds between.
Quick squeezes. One second on, one second off. NHS leaflets pair the long holds with a set of short, rhythmic squeezes.
Half hold (Week 3+). A steady squeeze at about half effort for 15 to 25 seconds. Dorey asked the men in her trial to hold 50% of maximum while walking; NHS leaflets describe the same sub-maximal hold. It builds the endurance that keeps an erection from fading mid-way.
Let it go (45 to 60 s). Breath-led release. When you breathe in, the diaphragm moves down and the pelvic floor drops slightly and lengthens; when you breathe out, it rises back with a gentle lift. That description is from the 2025 narrative review's Figure 3, and an NHS physiotherapy handout prescribes the same belly breathing for 5 to 7 minutes a day to relax the floor. You follow your breath and let the floor sink on each inhale. No pushing, no straining.

Day 7 of every week is a Reset day: four minutes of breathing, relaxation and light work. It is recovery, not a day off.

How this compares to the trial. The Dorey program was three maximal contractions in each of the three positions, morning and evening, every day. Pillars packs similar volume into one session a day, and from Week 10 asks you to add the 90-second Quick set later in the day so you are also squeezing twice daily, as the trial did. After Week 12, keep the Week 12 session at least three days a week or do a Quick set most days.

Two habits from the trial that fit anywhere: after you urinate, tighten the floor strongly once to clear the last drops (after-dribble); and during sex, tighten the floor rhythmically to gain and keep rigidity.

Why this helps a venous leak

An erection is a plumbing event. Blood flows into the two chambers of the penis; as they swell they press the small draining veins shut against the tough outer sheath, so the blood is trapped. "Venous leak" (veno-occlusive dysfunction) means that seal is not holding well, so you can get hard but not stay hard, or lose it on a change of position.

The pelvic floor adds force to that seal. When the ischiocavernosus contracts it drives blood from the root of the penis forward into the chambers; when the bulbocavernosus contracts it forces more blood in as well, and Dorey describes its front fibres pressing on the deep dorsal vein that drains the penis. Together they push the pressure inside the chambers to several hundred mmHg, far above blood pressure. A 1990 study that stimulated the bulbocavernosus in men measured the pressure rise directly and found the muscle reduced the inflow needed to keep an erection. Stronger, better-timed muscles mean a tighter seal, which is exactly what a leak needs.

What the research found

Dorey and colleagues, 2004 and 2005. A randomised trial in 55 men with erectile dysfunction for at least six months. The exercise group (pelvic floor training taught by a physiotherapist, with biofeedback and lifestyle advice) beat the lifestyle-advice-only group at three months. In the blinded assessment reported in the 2005 paper, 40% of men had regained normal erectile function and 35.5% had improved; 24.5% did not improve. The authors recommended pelvic floor exercises as a first-line approach. Be aware that 22 of the 55 men left the trial early, which the authors report openly.
Van Kampen and colleagues, 2003. 51 men treated with pelvic floor exercise, biofeedback and electrical stimulation: 47% regained a normal erection and 24% improved. The outcome was most favourable in men with venous-occlusive dysfunction.
Claes and Baert, 1993. 150 consecutive men with erectile dysfunction and proven venous leakage, randomised to vein surgery or a physiotherapist-supervised pelvic floor program of five weekly sessions. Surgery was not superior, subjectively or objectively. 42% of the exercise group were satisfied with the result and refused surgery. The authors' conclusion is specific: pelvic floor exercise is a realistic alternative to surgery for mild degrees of venous leakage. The 2025 review's summary table lists the exercise arm as 46% cured, 28% improved, 26% unchanged.
Sahin and colleagues, 2025 narrative review. Twenty-six articles on pelvic physical therapy for male sexual dysfunction, with a results table covering every ED trial above. Across the five ED studies in that table, "cured" ranged from 35% to 47% and "improved" from 24% to 40%. The authors conclude pelvic physical therapy should be suggested for erectile function, and note it works best in mild to moderate ED.
Myers and Smith, 2019 systematic review. Ten trials, of low to moderate quality. Every trial that measured erectile dysfunction reported improvement, and the authors concluded pelvic floor training appears effective, but the programs varied too much to say which protocol is best.

A pelvic floor that is always tense can cause the opposite problem. A 2016 review by Cohen, Gonzalez and Goldstein notes that high resting tension in the floor can keep enough blood from entering the penis, and that relaxation techniques may resolve that kind of erectile dysfunction. The Sexual Medicine Society of North America adds that Kegels can make an already tight floor worse. That is why every session here ends with a release block and why Reset day exists. See "Tight or weak?" above for the self-check.

The rep counts and the 12-week build in Pillars are a practical schedule assembled from the trial protocol and NHS physiotherapy leaflets; the trial itself prescribed three maximal holds per position twice a day for six months.

Lifestyle multipliers

Both groups in the Dorey trial got lifestyle advice on smoking, alcohol, fitness, diet, weight and saddle pressure. The exercises work on the seal; these work on the supply.

Smoking, blood pressure, cholesterol, weight, activity, alcohol and diet are the cardiovascular risk factors Healthy Male (Australia's national men's health organisation) lists as the ones to manage when erectile dysfunction appears. They are the same factors that narrow the penile arteries.
Sleep. In a University of Chicago study published in JAMA in 2011, ten healthy young men who slept under five hours a night for a week saw testosterone fall by 10 to 15%. It is a small study, but the direction is clear.
Cycling. The Dorey trial advised on saddle pressure. A 2018 UCSF survey of 4,102 athletes in the Journal of Urology found cycling did not harm erectile function, even at high volumes. Genital numbness was the real issue: standing out of the saddle more than 20% of the time cut the odds of numbness, and handlebars set lower than the saddle raised them.

When to see a doctor

This program is a safe, evidence-backed first step, and it works alongside medical treatment. It is not a substitute for a check-up.

ED is a heart warning. Healthy Male reports that erectile dysfunction can show up two to three years before cardiovascular symptoms and three to five years before a heart attack or stroke, because the penile arteries are only one to two millimetres wide and narrow first. In a four-year study of 1,700 men, ED roughly doubled the rate of cardiovascular events. Ask your GP to check blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol.
Confirm the leak. A urologist can measure it with a penile Doppler ultrasound after an injection that produces an erection. An end-diastolic velocity above 5 cm/s is the standard sign of venous leak. Knowing the cause tells you what else, if anything, to add.
Check your medicines. MedlinePlus lists blood pressure tablets (thiazide diuretics most often, then beta blockers), many antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs, finasteride and dutasteride, some antihistamines, opioid painkillers and others as causes of erection problems. Never stop a medicine without talking to the prescriber.
Stop and get seen for pain during the exercises, blood in urine or semen, a new bend or lump in the penis, or ED that started after an injury.
Give it three months. NHS guidance says you may not notice change for several weeks and the best results take three to six months of daily practice. If there is little or no change after three months, see a health professional such as a specialist pelvic floor physiotherapist, and take this app's log with you.

This app is for education and training. It does not diagnose or treat any condition.

Sources