I used Monte's root lock exercise for 9 months exactly as he said. It did nothing at all to relieve my symptoms but did, somewhat alarmingly, give me bladder control problems. I looked on the Web for info about this and discovered that females shouldn't practice pelvic-type floor exercises like this is without an inserted surface to work against, they produce the said bladder reaction. Is ok for males. I don't know if the same thing would happen with younger premenopausal women.