As a form of therapy The Bowen Therapy Technique has for me been a bit like unraveling a twisted cord on an old telephone.
After years of limited success with chiropractors, an osteopath, massage, physio, cranial sacral and other therapists for whiplash from three separate accidents I was still experiencing chronic pain and increasing loss of mobility and depression. Drawn by a sign for pain management, I walked into Dr. Bolliger’s clinic ready to try anything. The effects have been very gratifying.
Although I still experience neck pain, especially after long spells at the computer, my lower back is almost completely healed, as has my Achilles tendonitis, plantar fasciitis, headaches, insomnia, menopausal symptoms and depression. Being free to exercise again, I have also lost fifty pounds, partly due to a weight loss program and supplement that Dr. Bolliger prescribed and supervised.
Even during long spans between Bowen sessions I still feel my body unraveling and relaxing, with muscle groups releasing and shifting. Because Bowen deactivates the normal defense mechanisms that can keep the body rigid and delay or prevent healing, I have had to learn to trust the healing process and go with it. At times I have felt vulnerable, even emotional as old trauma is released. But my range of motion has increased dramatically, much to the delight of my general practitioner. Eventually I expect to achieve full recovery even from my neck injury.
I feel transformed. Full of newfound energy and enthusiasm my family and friends are asking what I’m doing to look and feel so much better, and several have become Dr. Bolliger’s patients.
~ Beverley Straight
After 8 years of suffering (Right Thoracic Left Lumber Scoliosis) and trying various therapies like acupuncture, chiropractic treatments, massage therapy , pressure point and even traction, I thought I would have to live the rest of my life in pain.
One day while visiting my mom she gave me an article from the “Vancouver Sun” about how Bowen therapy has helped many people who have not had any success with other types of physiotherapy.
I decided to try Bowen therapy and it has changed my life drastically.
Before Bowen therapy my life consisted of going to work coming home and icing my spine down so that I was able to go to work the next day.
After a few treatments my life started to change for the better , I was able to go for walks without any pain in my lower back and the pain in my rib cage was almost all gone.
Two years later and with only 6 treatments over the period, I am now able to go for 2 hour walks and do 1 hour of hard cardio in the gym on my days off. This is all thanks to Bowen therapy.
~ M. Bernard
So as to not bury the lead: Today is the first day in two years that I haven’t been in pain. I injured my shoulder to years ago and have tried a number of different therapies. Through a dear friend I was recommended to Bowen. I was warned that it would feel as if they weren’t doing anything. That was a bit misleading. It felt like a brief, but very relaxing massage. I felt refreshed and a bit looser after my first treatment. Then three days later I realized that the pain in my shoulder had diminished significantly. I’ve done only two more treatments since and with each day the range of motion increases. Today I noticed that under normal load and activity I had very little discomfort and no pain. I would say to anyone who has given up on finding relief, don’t quit yet. Try Bowen.
~John Marshall Jones, Vancouver 10/09
I first heard of Bowen Therapy through a colleague. Since I’ve been having pain on my right hip and migraine behind my left eye for past several years, I thought why not give it a try. I had three appointments with Dr. Manon and I haven’t had any pain since. I remember during session #2, Dr. Manon asked me to stand up and walk around. I felt my head feeling really heavy and I could tell my balance was a bit off. All Dr. Manon did was touched my crown chakra and voila – the feeling was gone! It was amazing. I believe in what Dr. Manon does and have been thinking about taking some of her course. I highly recommend Bowen Therapy to everyone. Dr. Manon, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!
~ Brigitte R.
For the last three years, I’ve had chronic pain in my right knee that was at times so bad I had to lift my leg up with my hand to get into my car. Five days after the fourth Bowen treatment with Dr. Manon, the pain is 90 per cent better. It’s like a miracle.
I’ve also had numbness in both my feet, which has improved, and I look forward to further improvement as my treatment continues.
~Ken Kollman
I injured my tailbone when I was five years old and lived with the pain, thinking nothing could be done about it. I came to see Dr. Bolliger for a completely different problem – my neck – and just happened to mention my tailbone because, as always, it hurt when I sat down. Dr. Bolliger said, “We can fix that.” I was really skeptical, but in one single Bowen treatment, with very few manipulations, Dr. Bolliger stopped the pain – for good. The pain was so ingrained that, even now, two years later, I still expect it when I sit down or get up, but thanks to Dr. Bolliger, it’s gone!
For twenty years, I had a very bad neck. It hurt and creaked when I turned my head in any direction. Dr. Bolliger’s Bowen treatments completely eliminated the problem. Now, two years later, I still move my neck freely. The treatment is so gentle that such dramatic results seem almost miraculous.
~Doris Kiernan, Vancouver
“Although I went into Dr. Bolliger’s office two months ago, a sceptic, and not understanding at all what I was embarking upon, today I am able to say that polymyalgia, the short term disease and fibromyalgia, the life sentence, are no longer a part of my life. Thanks to the gentle hands of Dr. Bolliger as she treated my symptoms and her quiet and confident explanation of what she was doing and how it should help me, I am able to confidently say that the for me. Bowen Treatment has proven itself a complete success for me.“
~Donna Woods
“I have had such a postive outcome with the BowenFirst™ that I would like to share my experience with others. In 2000 I broke my right wrist – not having it diagnosed and immobilized at the time led to chronic pain in my right neck, shoulder and wrist. Soon after that a chaise lounge collapsed on me, and I hyperextended my tailbone. Now I had pain in my low back as well.
The pain on my right side – neck to low back – was constant and debilitating. I progressed from physiotherapy to massage therapy to intra-muscular stimulation. My husband gave me back massages every morning just so I could get through the day. All these treatments provided some relief, but it was only partial, and only temporary.
I heard about the BowenFirst™ from a friend and decided to give it a try. I have had 4 treatments and am very, very pleased with the healing that has occurred. My knots and hot spots have almost disappeared – there are often days when I have no pain at all and when it does appear it is very minimal. I am optimistic that with one more treatment I will be healed. My husband has become pretty darned good at massage, but we are hoping his new career is over!
~ Tish McMurtry
The case stories Manon gave us enriched the learning experience. The protocols were straightforward and easy to learn. The course was comprehensive, it incorporated all the theory and practice necessary to build a foundation for practicing the Bowen technique. Manon has a true gift for sharing and describing the subtle nuances of the body in a way that is easy for a student to understand.
Manon has an innate intuitive healing ability that cannot be taught or learned in a book. She is able to share and transmit some of this ability which is a powerful component of the Bowen technique.
~Mel McLean
Manon’s patience and intuitive nature allowed for an amazing learning experience. Her positivity and reassurance inspired me to excel during the Bowen technique course.
~Jennifer Dyck
Manon’s extensive clinical experience using the Bowen technique allows for a learning experience that is rich, in-depth and comprehensive. She is tremendously generous with her clinical pearls so that all of her students can benefit from and be successful Bowen practicioners.
~Miranda Demierre
Manon has an amazing understanding of how Bowen therapy can be applied for therapeutic results. She does a great job demonstrating her knowledge and experience.
Manon makes learning Bowen easy and accessible. The course was an enjoyable learning experience. Manon’s expertise and knowledge of the material makes her a master teacher.
Manon is a great teacher. I could learn what Bowen is and how to do it in confidence. I recommend this course to everybody who is interested in ‘the body’ and the relation between body & emotion. It was worth coming here from Japan!
Clients I had seen before Bowen college are remarking on the amazing difference since my attending Bowen College.
Thank you for sharing the entire body of Bowen basic. Thank your for the refinements I was able to apply to the contacts and land marking.
The small class size creates an optimal environment for learning. Dr. Manon’s instructions are clear and concise. She demonstrated the ability to teach to all learning styles. Her guidance helped me refine the contact of each move. Clients I had seen before Bowen college are remarking on the amazing difference since my attending Bowen College.
Since attending the class I feel like I have eyes in my fingers.
I thank you, and my clients thank you! ~ M.M.
I was born with medical challenges that got progressively worse over time and further complicated due to repeated traumas and injuries and two major brain injuries. I have seen many specialists, tried many medications, and many therapies with little results until now.
Since having Bowen Therapy I now have a quality of life the medical profession never expected me to have. They said I would be bed ridden.
Before Bowen I used a walker (8yrs), wore multiple braces on my joints (10yrs), fell often and dislocated daily. I had chronic anemia(since birth), insomnia, couldn’t sleep flat and be able to breath, memory trouble, numbness and tingling, spasms, fatigue, asthma, Sjogren’s, DJD, carpul tunnel, stomach trouble, bowel trouble, osteopenia, osteoarthritis, ,neurological issues, hyper mobile lax joints(since birth), chronic pain, and a host of other labels which never got to the root of the problem.
Since having Bowen I no longer wear braces or use a walker. My legs don’t give out on me anymore and I rarely fall or dislocate my joints. My iron is under control, my body accepts iron (never did before), and my cycle is regular and more normal (hemorrhaged before). I sleep every night (without medication) and I can now sleep flat. My memory has improved so much I’m doing and learning new things all the time. The numbness and tingling has improved greatly and I have more energy. My immune system is stronger as I get sick less often. I no longer use inhalers. I no longer need carpul tunnel braces. My stomach is improving and my bowels are regular. It turns out my broken tailbone was blocking my bowel. I am off many of the medications for pain as the pain has reduced and the rest for spasms have been reduced. The neurological issues are helped with the Bowen as are the spasms and jerking. My body is no longer always fighting itself.
Due to a broken collarbone that healed wrong and a surgery to fix it that further complicated things, Bowen is the only therapy I have found that helps my body relax and helps it align in a safe way allowing it to release and to heal. The results are more than the therapists who worked on me expected and my doctors are amazed. I am so grateful to have mobility and quality of life and I believe in Bowen so much that I have learned the Therapy myself. I have been working with A.I.S.H. to try and get Bowen covered I believe everyone should have the right to safe effective options for their health and well being. Bowen helped me mentally, emotionally and physically and gave me my life back.
~Sherry Barrett
My miraculous recovery from Bronchiectasis/COPD
In October 2008, following a bad 6-month bout of misdiagnosed pneumonia, I ended up with a condition called Bronchiectasis, a form of COPD. .
For the next 5 years I slept sitting up in a reclining position, would have to lie down every evening at 5 pm in order to cough up, clear out, ¼ cup of ropy yellow mucus. I would wet my pants during the coughing, so I had to keep extra underwear with me for this protocol. In my personal life, I was too ashamed to overnight with anyone, avoided all evening outings, air travel, long drives, dentist visits, massages, anything at all where I’d have to risk lying life flat, because that would start the endless coughing up of copious amounts of gunk. I ate no mucus-forming foods. But, the truth be told, the worst part of it all was never telling anyone how bad my life had actually become. I was so ashamed. I learned to lie and make up all kinds of stories about why I couldn’t do things, so nobody would know, not even my family.
At the gym I would run into the ladies’ bathroom between sets of lie-down triceps extensions, and when nobody was looking would cough up mouthfuls of thick mucus into the sink or toilet. My lungs were always filled with mucus, and felt continually raw and gritty from the perpetual cough. I would feel very sad, and very depressed, and would often sink into feelings of hopelessness, a sense that I wouldn’t be able to live like this forever.
After consulting three allopathic lung doctors over the 5 years, two Chinese doctors (dutifully brewing up all the prescribed medicinal herbs), spending 20,000 dollars in total on a battery of alternative treatments, I was almost at the point of believing that I might have to live with this nightmare situation, or “manage” my situation, for the rest of my life. All 3 of the lung specialists that I had consulted indicated that Bronchiectasis is never cured; only at best it can be managed with steroid inhalers, bronchi-dilators, and regular interval treatments of a cocktail of antibiotics.
During a visit to Sloan Kettering in New York, where I had gone for one more final opinion, another $1,000.00 USD, I was told that I should be on antibiotics continually, but again, that there was not cure. One can go on line and clearly see that that allopathic medicine says that there is absolutely no cure for Bronchiectasis. The sites explain that with Bronchiectasis the lungs are permanently damaged, have no immunity to inhaled bacteria, are stripped of the necessary cilia to sweep up mucus, and that the inner lining of the bronchial tubes has been so stretched from the coughing that it has lost most of its peristaltic function. This is a grim picture.
Being an alternative person, refusing to take “no” for a definitive answer, and deep down still trusting that “where there is a will, there has to be a way”, I did not give up hope that I could cure myself. It was just a matter of time and patience. I prayed for help, for a cure to present itself, for information that would lead me to heal myself. I prayed for a miracle. Something had to give.
One evening a friend of mine, Allan Knight, called me, raving about this particular homeopathic doctor named Dr. Manon Bolliger in Vancouver. He told me that I absolutely had to have a session with her, that she did something called “Bowen Therapy”, that she had cured herself of 4th stage cancer…ect
As fate would have it, for some reason I made an instant decision without hesitation to go to Vancouver from Montreal to have a session with this Dr. Manon. I had no money, but I knew I had to do this; it felt right, no questions asked. So, within a few weeks, early last August, I jumped on a plane and flew off for a consultation with Dr. Manon..
I must admit that when I met Dr. Manon for the first time it was love at first sight. There was something so open and compassionate about her, qualities that not one of the western doctors had shown any sign of back in Montreal. My heart melted. Dr. Manon proceeded then, in the typical homeopathic manner, to interview me with her assistant for over two hours, helping me understand the correlation between and inseparability of my battered emotions and my lung issues. She explained that without healing the emotional body, the physical problems could not possibly heal.
Patiently, Dr. Manon peeled through my emotional layers until she got to the bottom of my complex issues, and then, following up after a few days of reflection, she prescribed one tiny pellet of a remedy that she believed would bring my energies back into balance. She also did some extensive Bowen treatments on me that were truly euphoric I would walk out of her office in a timeless daze after each session. I had 4 sessions all together. Her secretary Linda assured me that that would be plenty, and that I would get better.
Following my visit to Vancouver, Dr. Manon kept up phone consultations with me for several months. At one point this last January 2013, I got hit with that terrible flu/influenza virus that was going around, and ended up having a CAT scan in the middle of the bronchial flu. My doctor had preciously scheduled me for this, and said that even though I was sick I should still go. My lungs were a mess.
A week later the doctor called me in to tell me that my lungs had seriously deteriorated, that I would need a bronchoscopy and that this would be followed up with 18 months of antibiotics. I sat speechless and stunned. He was so cold and uncaring. How could that be? I thought I was getting better.
I called Dr Manon in a panic. She said, “Joanne, don’t listen to that doctor, you will get better, I know this will happen”. I had taken one more of her remedy pellets about a week before.
When I got off the phone I decided to do another check on the benefits of nebulizing colloidal silver for COPD. I stumbled on a treatise written by Dr. Christopher et al, regarding the synchronicity of taking cayenne pepper along with nebulizing colloidal silver. Both are anti-microbial, anti-bacterial, anti-viral, but the protocol of taking them together seemed to be very important for success.
The article said to take ¼ t cayenne pepper in a small cup of warm water, wait about 10 minutes, cough up any mucus loosened by the cayenne, and then follow that with nebulizing with the colloidal silver. Cayenne, I discovered, clears mucus from the lungs unlike anything else I had ever tried. The theory is that nebulizing colloidal silver alone isn’t as effective as it is with synchronizing it with the cayenne, because taken alone the silver cannot reach the bacteria hidden under the mucus in the lungs. The cayenne removes the mucus immediately in the lungs, thus allowing the colloidal silver then to penetrate all areas of the lungs.
I rushed out to buy the 90,000 heat units of organic cayenne at our local health-food store. Once home I mixed the cayenne pepper in the water, held a mouthful for 30 seconds as per the instructions from Dr. Christopher, then swallowed it. Like clockwork my lung began to clear within 10 minutes, and I then nebulized with the colloidal silver for about 5 minutes.
This is where the story ends. I never coughed up any mucus again! While I still do the cayenne-colloidal silver protocol as a preventative measure, it has been over 4 weeks now and I still pinch myself in disbelief. I have my full life back. I can do everything again, but still am a little hesitant, as I just can’t quite believe the healing finally took place. Dr. Manon’s work with my emotional body and physical energies then allowed for the second part with the cayenne protocol to have an effect, for the healing to finally take place.
I am so profoundly grateful to Dr. Manon for her generous help and care. I hope that others will be inspired by my story to work with her to clear their emotions, and to heal on the most profound energetic levels. I truly understand now how this process works, and that without addressing both aspects, emotions and physiology, healing simply cannot take place.
This is the missing link in allopathic medicine, the link that Dr. Manon is providing us all with her profound wisdom and hands-on practice. Thank you Dr. Manon from the bottom of my heart. I now have my life back with a brand new set of lungs. I challenge anybody to find anything wrong with them now!
~Joanne Hollander