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Wonder
From Down Under:
The Bowen
Technique |
by Robert Ullman, ND, DHANP
(Reprinted with permission)
Tom Bowen was a genius -
a natural healing genius from the land of koalas and kangaroos,
aborigines and Crocodile Dundee. Until recently, the only
healing secret that had been imported from Australia was tea tree
oil. That changed when Oswald Rentsch, Tom Bowen's apprentice,
started to teach the Bowen Technique - one of the most effective
forms of body work ever developed.
Few people in this
country have ever heard of Bowen and his work, but the technique is
quite well known and widely appreciated in Australia.
Bowen developed his own
healing methods by studying physics, anatomy and physiology in order
to help his co-workers, friends and neighbors. Oswald Rentsch
describes Bowen in his colorful Australian accent, as "a
genuine backyarder," i.e., a self-made healer.
He gave up his job for a
full-time practice after too many people started coming to see him
on evenings and weekends. Bowen's practice was fully booked for more
than thirty years, treating nearly 13,000 patients a year.
People came to him from all over Australia. He died in 1982 of
diabetes, working from a wheelchair right up to the end, after both
of his legs had been amputated.
His apprentice, Oswald
Rentsch, known as "Ossie", an osteopath and massage
therapist, studied with him for two years. Ossie carefully
watched, made diagrams nd wrote down the moves as he and Bowen
treated patients together, to produce the very systematic Bowen
Technique. Ossie continued Bowen's work after his death, and
only left his own busy practice to teach the technique full time.
With his wife Elaine,
Ossie gives four-day seminars and refresher courses throughout
Australia, and more recently in the U.S. and Canada. A number
of naturopaths, chiropractors, massage therapists and body workers,
mostly in California and the Northwest, have taken the Bowen
training in the last several years and are already making a
significant positive impact on the health of their clients.
Yet another form of body
work? Isn't it enough to have to choose between massage,
chiropractic, osteopathy, craniosacral, Hellerwork, Feldenkreis,
Rolfing and Trager? What makes the Bowen Technique so
special? There are four aspects which have impressed me while
practicing the Bowen Technique on my patients: simplicity,
gentleness, depth of healing and rapid results.
The Bowen Technique is
easy to learn and to apply correctly right after being trained to
use it. While most people will go to a practitioner for
treatments, the simplicity of the technique allows it to be readily
learned for self-treatment as well. There is only one basic move, a
gentle sideways challenge to a muscle belly or tendon, then a brief
rolling motion over the top which allows the muscle to resume its
normal position.
This one move is
modified to treat any area on the body. Subtle, yet powerful, the
Bowen moves send impulses to the muscles, nervous system and brain
which help to align, balance the musculoskeletal system and the rest
of the body. Moves are done in specific patterns so as to
create areas of resonating energy which help help whatever is within
their boundaries.
The Bowen Technique is
so gentle that people hardly notice that they are being worked
on. They sigh and go into a state of deep relaxation almost
immediately as I begin to work on them. This healing trance
requires no induction. Only a few simple, gentle Bowen moves
are necessary to obtain profound relaxation. Two minute waits
between successive groups of moves allow ample time for the body to
respond and for relaxation to occur. There is little
discomfort and no pain involved with the Bowen Technique, because
there is no deep tissue work or hard probing into tender, sensitive
muscles or joints.
Rapid results are the
norm with Bowen rather than the exception. Chronic conditions
may resolve in only one or two treatments, given one week
apart. In some complicated cases, more frequent treatment may
be useful, but it is not usually necessary for most people. I
have been continually surprised by how quickly the body responds to
the Bowen Technique. I am skeptical of treatments until I have
seen them work.
Although the Bowen
Technique is relatively new to this country, other Bowen
practitioners are reported the same kind of good results that I have
seen in my own practice. Because the Bowen Technique is highly
systematic and practiced in the same way by each practitioner, the
results are usually quite predictable, and depend more on the
technique itself and its applicability to a person's condition, than
on the practitioner who is using it.
The third aspect of the
technique is the deep and long-lasting healing. When people
come off of the treatment table after a Bowen treatment, they often
exclaim "the pain is gone!", "I feel really
different!", or "What did you do?" It is
unusual to have no immediate change for the better. Even in
those cases, change often occurs within the next few days, following
a brief healing crisis in which the symptoms are temporarily worse,
then greatly improved.
In most cases, the first
treatment starts the healing process and the second, or occasionally
the third treatment finishes it. While being treated with the
Bowen Technique it is important to avoid other forms o massage,
chiropractic or bodywork for at least one week after each treatment.
The Bowen Technique
results in relief of pain, increased joint mobility, improved
circulation, and correction of joint subluxations and muscle
spasms. Bowen practitioners are able to help back pain,
whiplash, temporo-mandibular joint syndrome (TMJ), sports injuries,
knee problems, frozen shoulders, tennis elbow, bursitis and
headaches. It is also used effectively to adjust the
coccyx, correct pelvic and menstrual problems, and to
stimulate healing in hay fever, asthma, colic and bedwetting.
That may seem a lot for one technique, but it can be really
effective for these conditions, which may have a musculoskeletal or
neurological origin.
Here are the cases of
three people from my practice who responded well to the Bowen
Technique:
Nancy, 23, had had pain
in the hips since she was a teenager. The pain was severe and
radiated down the outside of her legs to her knees. It would
come on particularly when she was angry or upset. Exercise
would make it worse, and it had come on from extensive gymnastic
practice in high school and college. No treatment had ever
been successful in relieving the pain. After two Bowen
treatments, Nancy reported that the pain was completely
relieved. It turned once after an emotional trauma a few
months later and one treatment took care of it.
Sam, 52, had chronic
spasms in his neck and shoulder. He never seemed to be able to
relax. He worked too hard and took his problems home from
work. During his Bowen treatment, Sam went into a very deep
state of relaxation, nearly asleep. When the treatment was
finished, he said that he had not felt that kind of rest in
years. The effect stayed with him and his pain completely went
away within a week after his second treatment. He then took
his first vacation in a decade.
Jill, 49, had asthma and
chronically swollen, painful knees. The Bowen moves were able
to relieve her bronchial spasms and allow freer breathing, but did
not totally cure the asthma. Her knees, however, had a
complete reduction in swelling and pain, and considerably increased
mobility after two treatments. Now she can go up and down
stairs without pain.
These kinds of results
are common for the Bowen Technique. Simple, gentle, deep and
rapid, this is Tom Bowen's healing legacy. It is truly a
wonder from down under.
Dr. Robert Ullman
is
a naturopathic and homeopathic physician and is co-founder of the
Northwest Center for Homeopathic Medicine in Edmonds, WA. He
is the co-author of The Patient's Guide to Homeopathic Medicine
and Beyond Ritalin: Homeopathic Treatment of ADD and Other
Behavioral and Learning Problems. He can be reached at 131 Third
Ave., N. Edmonds, WA 98020, (425) 774-5599 or at
www.healthyhomeopathy.com
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