Twerking Has Multiple Key Health Benefits for Women?

On July 11, 2024, an Instagram user claimed in a video that twerking has several key health benefits for women, such as removing stagnant blood and fybroid cysts from the uterus, empowering one's womb space, increasing circulation to the sachal chakra, and boosting creativity.

The Instagram user @estarsuniverse, who described herself as an "empowered wombman" and an "international singing yogini," amassed more than 97,000 likes and 2,900 comments on her post at the time of this writing.

Here's a transcript of what she said as she twerked on camera:

You call this twerking but it was originally known as mapouka, which quite literally means the same thing.

Mapouka — or twerking — has the power to remove stagnant blood from the uterus and even fibroid cysts. Not only that, but it empowers your womb space and it increases circulation to your sacral chakra, okay? So this how we gain more creativity.

So if ever you're dealing with low self-esteem, creative block or womb trauma, I encourage you to practice mapouka. You're welcome, and I love you.

One Instagram user wrote in the comments: "I twerk when I have really bad cramps sometimes!!! It came to me intuitively. Didn't realize it was an actual thing!!!" 

"Come to think of it I was happier when I was twerking on a regular basis," another added.

"Sis having a whole conversation while causing earthquakes," a third said, adding a laughing emoji.

Similar posts appeared on X, Reddit, YouTube, and elsewhere on Instagram in May 2023.

However, the first Instagram user's claim was a mixture of true, false and undetermined information.

Benefits

Twerking, which as the Instagram user claimed is also known as mapouka in Côte d'Ivoire (the Ivory Coast), has health benefits related to all types of dancing and exercise, and some that are specific to it. 

Like all dances, twerking has both physiological and psychological advantages. A 2024 meta-study (a study of studies) published in Sports Medicine showed that dancing improved the quality of life of patients with Parkinson's disease, but also anxiety and depression. Not only that, it concluded that dancing was "superior to other physical activity interventions to improve motivation, aspects of memory, and social cognition and to reduce distress." Appeasing mental health conditions can promote creativity, lending credibility to the woman's claim.

Dancing, like all exercise, can help promote physical health as well, by lowering blood pressure, increasing aerobic capacity, building muscle and bone, and more. But it also helps with balance, among other things, according to Harvard Medical School. Exercise can also prevent fibroids and potentially stop their growth, according to the Midwest Institute for Non-Surgical Therapy (MINT).

But due to the specific movements of twerking, it can also be an excellent bodyweight strengthening workout. The positions a twerker must hold while practicing — deep squats, half squats, sumo squats, half forward folds, full folds, or even handstands against the wall — are often part of strength workouts. In twerking, the dancer must isolate groups of muscles. Hips move while the core and legs remain static. Holding a position for a long time is known as an "isometric hold." In their isometric form, these postures help to maintain strength, according to the Mayo Clinic. 

But dancers can also change positions rapidly, dropping into squats and standing up repeatedly while shaking their hips back and forth. Squat repetitions are beneficial for all adults. They help develop muscles, bones and joints of the legs, pelvis and hips. The balance they require also promotes core stability. The rapid hip swaying and squatting requires its practitioners to develop flexibility and control in the hips and pelvis. And in a more rapid form that includes other movements, twerking can also be an aerobic dance.

As for "stagnant blood in the uterus," this is a concept we found in Eastern medicine, understood as poor blood circulation related to impeded flow of qi — life force. Blood stasis, traditional Chinese medicine says, is the cause of endometriosis — a condition in which endometrial tissue grows outside the uterus, often causing pain in the pelvis — though this is a claim that Western medicine has not proven. However, a small study has shown dance can relieve endometriosis-related pain. 

Furthermore, some studies have shown that dancing and swaying the hips before and during labor can help manage the pain of giving birth and also improve the experience for women. "There is likely benefit to encouraging women to be upright and active to improve pain control and increase comfort in labor," the study said. "Low-impact dance may be one way to encourage the combination of both upright positioning and movement during the first stage of labor." However, the study also said there may be complications with implementing these recommendations because, "in Western cultures, women are encouraged to lie down during labor, often to facilitate fetal monitoring."

For these reasons, dancing in general and twerking in particular can be part of a healthy exercise practice, with benefits for both body and mind.

Questions Remain

Contrary to @estarsuniverse's claims, however, most exercises, which would include twerking, cannot shrink or remove existing fibroids, according to MINT. Also, there is no evidence that exercise, which includes dancing, can by itself treat or prevent endometriosis, as most people who suffer from it require further intervention.

Lastly, the concept of chakras is part of the tradition of Hinduism and Buddhism. There are seven main chakras, according to Hinduism (four in Buddhism), located along the spine and from the top of the head to the perineum. They are thought to be vortices of energy that act like hubs for energy channels. However, no scientific evidence has ever backed up this idea, despite some scientists pointing out that these points may correspond to nervous plexuses — places where nerves meet.

But given its multiple benefits, whether chakras exist or not, it is safe to say that dancing can help improve well-being at large.