Once you are no longer producing oestrogen, the muscles that support the bladder and control the flow of urine start to weaken. You can no longer hold the urine in quite as effectively as you once did. Hence those awful dribbles.

Whether or not you take HRT (which helps keep the urinary tract in good order), you should be prepared to spend a few minutes a day doing pelvic floor exercises. Remember them? They were the ones you were told to do after you had a baby, but you probably didn’t bother. Doing these exercises, also known as Kegel’s exercises, helps not only your bladder control, but the whole vaginal area, and so can help your sex life. They are very simple, and you can do them anywhere, at any time. You can do them standing at a bus stop, or at a party, or talking to friends, or watching the television, and no one will ever know you are doing them. Many women start doing them from their thirties onwards, and if they are wise they will certainly be doing them in their forties and fifties. This is what you do:

• Next time you go to the toilet, allow the stream of urine to start, then tighten your muscles to make it stop, and hold the flow for several seconds before releasing it. The muscles you used then are the ones you must now exercise regularly. It is a good routine to do this stopping of the urine several times a day. Perhaps you can only stop the urine for two or three seconds now, but with regular practice you should be able to stop it for ten seconds or even much longer.

Once you know which muscles help to maintain continence, you can exercise them whenever you want. Here are some variations on the same theme:

• Pretend you are stopping the flow of urine, by pulling up these muscles. Hold for a count of five, or 10, or longer if you can, then relax.

• Pull up on the muscles just a little way for a count of three, then pull up further for another count of three, and so on up as many ‘steps’ as you can. You may manage only one or two ‘steps’, or you may achieve five or more. Then let the muscles down again, holding each step for a count of three until you have completely relaxed.

• Pull up on the muscles very slowly, and relax very slowly.

• Pull up very quickly, and relax very quickly.

Repeat each exercise about five times in each session, and for several sessions each day. You can probably think of more exercises you can do.

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