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YHM 087 - Unlocking the Healing Power of Bowen Therapy with Dr. Rachel ND
72 Plays1 year ago
Join us in this enlightening episode as Dr. Rachel, ND, introduces the holistic world of Bowen Therapy, exploring its origins and the transformative results it can bring. Discover how this unique approach harnesses the body's innate healing abilities and learn about the science behind fascia and its role in promoting well-being. With real-life examples and patient experiences, this conversation reveals how Bowen Therapy can lead to significant improvements in pain management, stress relief, and overall health. Tune in to unlock the potential of this powerful therapy!
Follow Dr. Rach:
@dr.rachelsawires
@rootedsolutionstoronto
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Transcript
Introduction to Your Health Minute
00:00:09
aquaomega
Hello, everybody, and welcome to another episode of Your Health Minute, brought to you by Aqua Omega. I will be your host today, Calvin Morrow, and with me is Cameron. Hey, Cameron.
00:00:19
Cameron Cogswell
Yes, thanks for having me back. I love being here. Yeah, thanks. This is awesome.
00:00:24
aquaomega
Yeah.
00:00:24
Cameron Cogswell
I'm looking forward to this one.
00:00:25
aquaomega
I'm always happy when you're here co-hosting with me.
00:00:26
Cameron Cogswell
yeah
00:00:27
aquaomega
Absolutely. Uh, today's going to be a really interesting conversation.
Exploring Bowen Therapy with Dr. Rachel Sawires
00:00:30
aquaomega
We're going to be talking about Bowen therapy and with us to talk about Bowen therapy and what exactly it is and how it might be able to help you is Dr. Rachel Sawires.
00:00:41
aquaomega
Yeah, she's an ND.
00:00:41
Rachel Sawires
yes
00:00:42
aquaomega
Welcome to the show.
00:00:43
Cameron Cogswell
we We practiced that last name before this.
00:00:44
Rachel Sawires
you Yeah. the
00:00:47
aquaomega
Yes, I got really nervous about saying it.
Dr. Sawires' Journey into Naturopathic Medicine
00:00:49
aquaomega
So maybe if you want to introduce yourself, give all our listeners a little bit of a background about who you are, how you came into the health and wellness world, and maybe why you started learning more about bone therapy and how you integrate it into your practice.
00:01:01
Rachel Sawires
For sure.
00:01:02
Rachel Sawires
So I'm Dr. Rachel Saveras. I am, I'm recently licensed as a naturopath. This is my first year of practicing. um And also recently licensed as a bow and practitioner, also my first year of practicing that. um But I came into naturopathic medicine in university when my mother got sick and we we you know we had the option of doing chemo and radiation for her cancer and we decided to do more an natural alternatives.
00:01:36
Rachel Sawires
Um, and that's, I was really going to med school, but found that naturopathic medicine kind of more aligned and resonated with what I believe health is and how you can prevent and manage illness and disease. Um, and while I was in my program is when I learned about Bowen therapy, I walked into the naturopathic clinic right down the street from my house and the doctor there, she was a Bowen practitioner and I had no idea what it was, never heard of it before. Um, just happened to.
00:02:05
Rachel Sawires
you know, want to volunteer to get more information on naturopathic medicine and was just introduced to this wonderful other therapy that really touched a lot of people. um A lot of her patients, you know, they would walk in in chronic pain, like severely ill people. And I would just be at the reception and I would see them walk out like a new person.
00:02:26
Rachel Sawires
like they would be standing taller, they'd be smiling, you could just feel that they were at such more peace
The Synergy of Bowen Therapy and Holistic Healing
00:02:32
Rachel Sawires
and ease.
00:02:32
aquaomega
It
00:02:32
Rachel Sawires
And so I was like, what is this Bowen therapy? I need to learn it. I've never seen any other modality have these kind of results. And so I actually started going into Bowen College at that point.
00:02:43
Rachel Sawires
So I actually started Bowen College before naturopathic school, which is interesting.
00:02:48
aquaomega
is interesting, yeah.
00:02:49
Rachel Sawires
Yeah. And so my entire, you know, schooling of a naturopath, I was always practicing Bowen alongside. I do think it's a very wonderful complimentary modality to naturopathic medicine.
00:03:02
Rachel Sawires
And we can get into more detail about why that is.
00:03:06
aquaomega
I like that. That's great. I love how you just kind of happened upon it and and you saw the results from from these different people and you're like, okay, this is something I need to look into more.
00:03:09
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:03:14
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:03:14
aquaomega
and For our listeners who, sorry, go ahead, Cameron.
00:03:15
Cameron Cogswell
Those are, I was going to say, that's, that's like the best way isn't it like to fall into something and and your story about like your mom.
00:03:21
Rachel Sawires
Thank
00:03:22
Cameron Cogswell
And I know this podcast is more about the bone therapy, but like, how common is that? Right? That it's, it's us or a loved one who's suffering from something. And so we go into it, like we start doing research and then you go to school for, it and then you start, you know, uh, practicing that and doing that for
Personal Motivations and Experiences in Alternative Medicine
00:03:37
Cameron Cogswell
a living.
00:03:37
Cameron Cogswell
Can I ask? um and Not to take it too far on a tangent, but how's your mother doing now? Was she totally, um did she leave allopathic care and just only do natural or was she at a combination of both?
00:03:43
Rachel Sawires
you.
00:03:48
Rachel Sawires
Well, we use allopathic care for our screening and for testing and diagnosing.
00:03:51
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:03:54
Rachel Sawires
and But our treatment and management is generally done naturopathically.
00:03:58
Cameron Cogswell
That's great.
00:03:59
Rachel Sawires
um She so her initial diagnosis, I think was in 2012, I want to say, and she was in remission for 12 years after that. So um She recently had another little bit of a scare, but we did a surgical removal and she's
Understanding Fascia and Its Healing Role
00:04:14
Rachel Sawires
good now.
00:04:14
Rachel Sawires
She's honestly healthier than she's ever been and she's pushing 70.
00:04:14
Cameron Cogswell
Good.
00:04:18
aquaomega
I'd love to hear that.
00:04:18
Cameron Cogswell
Good to hear. That's awesome.
00:04:19
aquaomega
Yeah, that is great.
00:04:19
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:04:19
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:04:20
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah. Yeah. So I didn't want to take you away from the whole Bowen thing, but I was just so, when you said that, I mean, it's just so common that that's how we we get into this. It's like, okay, we want to find something within ourselves or for a loved one.
00:04:31
Cameron Cogswell
And then we fall in love with the practice itself. So that's really nice.
00:04:33
Rachel Sawires
Yeah. Yeah. That's how most of my colleagues ended up in the program as well.
00:04:36
Cameron Cogswell
Everybody. Yeah.
00:04:39
aquaomega
Which is great. It's it's why NDs are so passionate, I find. you know
00:04:42
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
00:04:43
aquaomega
It is wonderful. um to To get back onto bone therapy and maybe for people who don't know what it is, maybe you can kind of give like a ah brief overview of of how the therapy works, what it looks like or feels like.
00:04:51
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, for sure.
00:04:54
aquaomega
We'll go from there.
00:04:55
Rachel Sawires
So Bowen was actually named after a gentleman in Australia named Thomas Bowen. He was the founder of this Bowen therapy. um And for, you know,
00:05:05
Rachel Sawires
physiological sense. It's more of a fascial stretch release therapy. That's really what Bowen is. We're working with the fascia, which is this connective tissue. It surrounds and encases our entire body from head to toe, covers all of our organs, our brain, our heart, all of our muscles.
00:05:21
Rachel Sawires
um And it there's tons of research coming out recently about how much of a role fascia plays. It's kind of been the ignored piece of anatomy up until more recently.
00:05:33
aquaomega
Mm-hmm interesting because it's everywhere and it connects everything in our body
00:05:36
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, exactly. You would think that something connects the entire body together and our nervous system as well, which is very important.
The Mechanisms and Effects of Bowen Therapy
00:05:43
Rachel Sawires
And we'll get into that later. But um you would think something that connects the entire body would be a big point of research. And I guess they didn't really connect how important it was. But the fascia regulates our autonomic nervous system, which now we know after polyvagal theory and um you know sympathetic versus parasympathetic states how important that is.
00:06:07
Rachel Sawires
um And so the nervous system that runs through the fascia really regulates whether you're in that sympathetic state or parasympathetic state. And we obviously are trying to push our body towards being more parasympathetic throughout the day so that our bodies can function optimally.
00:06:24
Rachel Sawires
um Often, we're not, we're in stress states, we're rushing to appointments, we're late for meetings, we have you know things going on that are causing us to really squirt us all and make us think that we're in that fight or flight response.
00:06:38
Rachel Sawires
But we really need to do a lot of work to kind of downregulate our nervous system, bring back our tone so that we can be in that parasympathetic state, which is known as rest, digest, and heal.
00:06:38
aquaomega
Mm hmm.
00:06:50
Rachel Sawires
I like to add that in there because healing is really the key of why we want to be in parasympathetic state.
00:06:55
aquaomega
Mm hmm.
00:06:57
Rachel Sawires
um And so Tom Bowen realized that through a series of very specific moves that are very gently done, because the fascia is just super, it's very superficial to the body, but just below the skin, um you can actually push the body into this parasympathetic state. um And I like to compare it to kind of like a computer. I don't know why this this makes a lot of sense to me, but When things are, you know, it's slow on your laptop and you have all these programs running and you see the the circle of doom go in for hours and you're just like, what is happening?
00:07:24
aquaomega
Mm hmm.
00:07:33
aquaomega
Mm hmm.
00:07:33
Rachel Sawires
You reboot your computer, you just shut it off, turn it back on and usually it's working a lot more efficiently and it's primed and the programs are, you know, um, virus free or whatever.
00:07:44
Rachel Sawires
Uh, I think that's what Bowen does. It just really shuts the body off. It allows it to kind of reset. And when a patient comes out of a Bowen session, they're almost feeling like, okay, like it takes that some time for them to like come back awake, like we really put them to sleep literally, like patients will be snoring and drooling on the table.
00:08:02
aquaomega
Okay, so it's a very relaxing therapy.
00:08:02
Rachel Sawires
and It is very relaxing. That's the idea. Like I said, all about parasympathetic state. So if you're sleeping, that's
Addressing Chronic Injuries and Stress with Bowen Therapy
00:08:11
Rachel Sawires
key. Like I'm happy when I see patients snoring, I'm like, Oh, yeah, they're going to get some good feeling from the session.
00:08:13
aquaomega
Okay, nice.
00:08:16
Rachel Sawires
um Everyone responds differently though, right? So some people, their sympathetic state is quite high. and It takes them a lot more to get into that relaxed state.
00:08:27
Rachel Sawires
um But yeah, it's it's it's an interesting therapy for sure.
00:08:31
Cameron Cogswell
It's really interesting. I mean, I might be asking very superficial questions, but I'm assuming the listeners probably don't know a lot about this either. theyre Like they're like me. So I'm going, I want, I'm convinced I want to go get bone therapy. I'm not going in saying, Hey, my leg hurts. It's not that kind of massage. It's You know, I guess that's why I'm almost sort of lost.
00:08:53
Cameron Cogswell
Like year china you're trying to tap into the parasympathetic system and relax them.
00:08:53
Rachel Sawires
Yeah. knowing
00:08:53
aquaomega
Who's the right candidate? Yeah.
00:08:55
Rachel Sawires
and
00:08:58
Cameron Cogswell
So is there just everyone gets the same treatment or is there different like therapies for each person?
00:09:03
Rachel Sawires
So great question. And I want to focus on what you just said. If your leg is injured and you want to go to, you know, resolve that injury, usually you're going to a physio, a Cairo, a doctor of some sort, and you're focusing on that joint.
00:09:13
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:09:15
Cameron Cogswell
Mm hmm.
00:09:15
Rachel Sawires
Let's just say, let's use the need for example here. And you're like, my ACL is torn. I need to reconstruct. the muscles around it, the ligaments around it to support that joint. With Bowen therapy, this concept does not work. We don't just focus on that joint because like I said, the fascia is attached from head to toe. If you have a problem or an issue in one area, let's say the knee, your fascia from the knee is attached to your hip, it's attached to the back of your head, it's attached to the heel.
00:09:42
Rachel Sawires
And so that condition can create issues elsewhere in the body. And you need to treat above and below the problem area in order to fully resolve the issue so that doesn't become a chronic injury. And oftentimes the issue with more allopathic concepts of breaking things down into parts doesn't resolve long-term sustainably the issue because there's other pieces of the body that go array when that one part of the body is in dysfunction. um And so people do come to me for chronic injuries. That's very common. It's usually they've tried physio for a long time or chiral or whatever, and nothing is working. And then they'll be like, okay, let me try this weird bow and thing that I read up online. um And it does work significantly well for that, because like I said, the fascia
00:10:34
Rachel Sawires
Um, it regulates our autonomic nervous system, but it also, it has, it retains the memory of the body. So if there's trauma in the body from an injury or from a physical, um, you know, blunt force to an area, even emotional trauma also sticks in the fascia, but you, um, you're releasing the fascist memory of that injury. So it's not sticking in there.
00:11:02
Rachel Sawires
And when you have injuries, the fascia becomes sticky and that they've seen this in in research. You'll see the network of the collagen fibers and the matrix that are in the fascia aligning differently so that they're not smooth and mobile and you don't have flexibility and ease to move all of your joints. And that's how injuries get really stuck in the body. So the fascia is very, very important to release any stickiness, any trauma, any injury.
00:11:28
Rachel Sawires
Um, and you do that by putting it in the para its so parasympathetic state. So it's not always solely focused on relaxing the body. It is releasing injury and trauma.
00:11:36
Cameron Cogswell
Oh, that's cool. yeah yep like you're You're really speaking to me, honestly, and I hope other listeners are, like because that's exactly, I think, a lot of people's experience.
00:11:39
Rachel Sawires
mean
00:11:47
Cameron Cogswell
For example, I hurt my neck, and this was a couple of years ago, um and it was really bad. you know Three of the discs were out, and I was in the hospital for a little while, and they did the um MRI, but all they cared about was, okay, as long as the discs were going back in, you're done, and they released me from care.
00:12:02
Cameron Cogswell
Do the physio, okay, your neck is fine, you're gone. And still to this day, there's other areas of my body that still don't function the same, but that's it. Your case is considered neck done.
00:12:12
Cameron Cogswell
Goodbye.
00:12:13
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:12:13
Cameron Cogswell
And and and then you're kind of left on your own thinking.
00:12:13
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:12:15
Cameron Cogswell
Okay. Well, the doctor said, I'm okay. So should I normalize this pain or should I, I mean, now now we have bow and hurt because I think this is for a lot of people, right? they They begin to normalize their pain or their healing as the doctor said, I'm okay.
00:12:26
Rachel Sawires
Sure.
00:12:27
Cameron Cogswell
So I am, but I mean, this is really speaking to me. That's really interesting.
00:12:31
Rachel Sawires
Yeah. And people compensate based off that. their Their muscles start to pull in different directions and bring your body out of alignment because it's protecting your neck.
00:12:38
aquaomega
Mm hmm.
00:12:40
Rachel Sawires
And so the other muscles are grouping together to be like, we need to protect the neck.
00:12:42
Cameron Cogswell
That's right.
00:12:43
Rachel Sawires
So how can we come out of our alignment in order to protect this
Historical and Emotional Dimensions of Bowen Therapy
00:12:47
Rachel Sawires
area? And with Bowen, we want to release all of that so everything can come back into balance.
00:12:50
Cameron Cogswell
Wow. Oh yeah, very interesting.
00:12:53
aquaomega
Interesting, yeah.
00:12:54
Cameron Cogswell
That's cool.
00:12:55
aquaomega
I know I'm finding it for myself too. I had like a knee injury and so my right leg is like way more dominant than my left leg.
00:13:00
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah, yeah.
00:13:01
Rachel Sawires
Great.
00:13:01
aquaomega
um I can't even bend my left leg past like 100 degrees. So I'm like listening to you talk, I'm like, oh, now this is probably something I need i need to try.
00:13:06
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:13:08
Rachel Sawires
i
00:13:09
aquaomega
I am curious, when did bow and therapy kind of really start to to grow or or when did them but when did it start?
00:13:13
Rachel Sawires
Yes. So Tom Bowen was, um I believe he was an osteopath or a Cairo. I can't actually remember what he was, but he was a practitioner of some sort.
00:13:24
Rachel Sawires
And he um he just started touching people in in ways where the fascia was a predominant and you know method of what he was trying to implement mechanism of action on.
00:13:36
Rachel Sawires
And um he started in the 70s. So it's really recent.
00:13:39
aquaomega
Okay, so it's it's pretty new. Yeah.
00:13:40
Rachel Sawires
It is, you know, yeah.
00:13:42
aquaomega
I'm wondering, like, I feel like we need to be doing more research on this. Is there any research out there currently that kind of follows people who who have been taking advantage of the volunteer therapy?
00:13:50
Rachel Sawires
For sure. I would say the research is more into the fascia now. The fascia has become ah an incredible point of research and there's lots of information like on the National Institute of Health.
00:13:57
aquaomega
Okay.
00:14:00
Rachel Sawires
They they talk about you know the fascia and how it holds memories. um And it's interesting that that comes up in research because in my first like few months of practicing Bowen, patients would tell me about memories that would come up for them in the session and I wouldn't think anything of it.
00:14:16
Rachel Sawires
I was like, okay, they were relaxed so you know they were able to
00:14:16
Cameron Cogswell
well
00:14:16
aquaomega
What the hell?
00:14:19
Rachel Sawires
get deep into their conscious, maybe that's what it was. But now that the research is showing that any kind of emotional, imprintable, sticky memories that stuck with you, like, you know, we have memories from childhood where you were bullied and they you remember it like yesterday, those type of memories actually stick in our fascia.
00:14:38
Rachel Sawires
And when we're when we're doing Bowen, I will have patients come to me and be like,
00:14:39
aquaomega
That's unreal.
00:14:39
Cameron Cogswell
Wow. Wow.
00:14:45
Rachel Sawires
whoa, like I just had a very vivid image of all the girls that used to bully me in elementary school. And I was like, I felt how sad I used to be. And like they would actually be in tears, like replaying it to me because their body's releasing that.
00:14:58
Rachel Sawires
Like as a child, you you don't really know how to process your emotions. You're still, you know, we were not taught to really like breathe and like release the feelings that we're feeling as a kid.
00:15:01
Cameron Cogswell
wow
00:15:08
Rachel Sawires
And So as adults, those things are still sticking in you and they're coming out a lot of the time in my bone sessions. and
00:15:15
aquaomega
So this like mind body connection kind of plays a ah role in the healing process.
00:15:17
Cameron Cogswell
That's crazy.
00:15:18
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, totally. It's very, no.
00:15:21
Cameron Cogswell
So was this, was this intended? but Like, okay, when you go to, yeah, that's what I'm saying. Like, so, so could someone come to you and say, Hey, I want to release this memory.
00:15:26
Rachel Sawires
It's not intended at all.
00:15:30
Cameron Cogswell
Is that possible? Is that kind of secondary?
00:15:31
Rachel Sawires
No. No, so the the way that Bowen works is like it honestly is a modality where it goes to what the body knows. The body guides the therapy.
00:15:41
Cameron Cogswell
Hmm.
00:15:42
Rachel Sawires
So um if there're if the body knows that you need to recover from this old injury or this bad memory first before it can release the shoulder pain that you came to talk to me about, that will be the primary thing for Bowen to go to.
00:15:58
Rachel Sawires
So it will be like, You know, you came to me for chronic shoulder pain, but in the session, you're crying to me about, you know, some really poor memory you had while you were a child.
00:16:09
Rachel Sawires
Not intentional, just the Bowen decided that that needed to be released.
00:16:10
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:16:13
Rachel Sawires
And then we can go in and focus on the specific parts that we're working with.
00:16:17
Cameron Cogswell
Wow. You must have some really cool storie stories that this is different.
00:16:20
Rachel Sawires
Very, very cool.
Patient Experiences and Expectations in Bowen Therapy
00:16:22
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, I love it.
00:16:22
aquaomega
yeah
00:16:22
Cameron Cogswell
Wow.
00:16:23
Rachel Sawires
That's why I love doing Bowen because it's like every day you don't know what's going to come out of the patient. You don't know what reaction is going to happen.
00:16:27
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:16:29
Rachel Sawires
And I've had, I can't tell you like the number of different reactions I've had from patients.
00:16:29
aquaomega
Yeah.
00:16:34
Rachel Sawires
It's, it's very magical. Interesting.
00:16:36
aquaomega
it sounds like they need to like combine you know a therapist with a bow and therapy you know and almost have two people in the room yeah we'll add in the description if we
00:16:41
Rachel Sawires
the Yeah. So my mentor actually was working with, um, I was name is gonna lose me now, but very famous psychologist that everyone loves.
00:16:55
Rachel Sawires
ah Okay, anyways, we'll come to me later, but she was. um i care um and And they did found like it was significantly propelling their work ah with the trauma patients when they were doing bone sessions in conjunction.
00:17:11
Cameron Cogswell
Wow.
00:17:12
Rachel Sawires
So she was doing a little bit of research with that gentleman. That's gonna bother me. but
00:17:17
aquaomega
That's cool. I love how we're still unlocking kind of like new techniques to heal each other.
00:17:20
Cameron Cogswell
Right?
00:17:22
Rachel Sawires
Yeah. and
00:17:22
Cameron Cogswell
ahll be Honestly, I hadn't heard of this. So people that are coming to you, Dr. Rachel, how are they finding you? Are they interested in bone or are they just interested in healing and you offer this?
00:17:33
Rachel Sawires
I'll be honest, I'd say like, 2% of people I know know what Bowen is.
00:17:38
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:17:39
Rachel Sawires
Like it's very, nobody knows what it is. And so oftentimes people are coming to me for, um, you know, they're like, I want to get acupuncture. I really hurt my knee and I'll just tell them about Bowen and I'll say, listen, I can do acupuncture for you.
00:17:51
Rachel Sawires
No problem. But I'll need four to six sessions weekly, maybe biweekly in order for you to get some real results. Whereas I can do this Bowen thing and i explain to them what it is and, um, how, you know, it, it,
00:18:04
Rachel Sawires
find I find it a lot more effective in terms of the amount of sessions you need and how much ah progress I can get. I find Bowen propels you a lot further than if I were to use my other modalities.
00:18:15
Rachel Sawires
So I just honestly tell my patients about it right there and then. Most of them are very open to it.
00:18:19
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:18:21
Rachel Sawires
um and
00:18:22
Cameron Cogswell
It sounds like I would be. im I mean, I want to book a session now. um Can you tell us a little bit about what a session would look like?
00:18:32
Rachel Sawires
For sure. So I always tell I preface my patients to before the session because it is not like a lymphatic massage or a deep tissue massage where you're getting a lot of contact, a lot of bodywork, deep penetration. It almost feels like I'm not touching you at all. Actually, because the fascia is so superficial, you need to use very gentle pressure. And because there's so many neurons running through the fascia, if you use harder pressure, it actually can be quite painful.
00:19:00
Rachel Sawires
Especially for someone who has an injury or has any type of, you know, fibromyalgia or you know chronic muscle pain, you have to be super super gentle. um And so you'll start the the first session is the same for everyone. Same input, no matter what.
00:19:15
Rachel Sawires
yeah It's kind of giving the body the code to just get into that parasympathetic state. And then second session, you can go in and focus on specific target movements. But that first session, you're starting face down for a majority of the treatment because we're working up the base of the spine, we're grounding lower body, working up the torso. um And then you'll turn the patient over for the last 15 minutes. And you finish off with the back of the head and kind of like you're working up the body from lower to upper.
00:19:46
Rachel Sawires
And in between each session, in between, sorry, each move that I do. So I'll do a couple of moves, very gentle, just with my thumbs and my fingers on very specific points of the body. um And my other naturopath friends
Therapeutic Process and Patient Self-Monitoring
00:19:59
Rachel Sawires
can understand the anatomy of it because where we're doing moves often align with the Chinese meridian. So where you would be putting acupuncture needles in. So these are very kind of, you know, energetic powerhouse points of the body.
00:20:12
aquaomega
Mm hmm.
00:20:13
Rachel Sawires
Um, and after I'm doing a move, there's something called an integration period. So that's where I leave the patient alone in the room by themselves for about 60 to 90 seconds. Um, and that's really for them to kind of feel into the shifting of the body. There's going to be tingling. There's going to be, you know, memories that are surfacing. There's all these things that are kind of coming to them during that period. And I leave them so that they can not be distracted by me being in the room and they can solely focus on their body and their consciousness and what they're feeling into.
00:20:43
Rachel Sawires
Um, and yeah, and most of the time people just fall asleep a lot of the time and that no, I'd say it takes like the first, you know, three or four moves to really get them into it.
00:20:49
aquaomega
In that like 90 seconds, they they'll fall asleep.
00:20:56
Rachel Sawires
And and again, everyone's different. So if you're like a very high, strong, very nervous, you know, on the bridge of panic attacks all the time, those patients, they don't necessarily fall asleep right away.
00:21:06
aquaomega
Okay, how long is a session?
00:21:07
Rachel Sawires
Um, they may take a little bit more time, even more sessions sometimes.
00:21:12
Rachel Sawires
So the first one's about 45 to an hour.
00:21:16
aquaomega
Okay.
00:21:16
Rachel Sawires
Um, I always leave a little bit of extra time because like I said, you never know what's going to surface for a patient. And, uh, obviously when we're working with time, patients have back to back schedules.
00:21:22
aquaomega
Right.
00:21:27
Rachel Sawires
I always leave a little bit of time just because, um, I've seen some people just, you know, they, they have memories that they've never even knew happened to them before. And a lot of the time,
00:21:36
aquaomega
Okay. And then do you encourage them to to talk about them or if they're comfortable?
00:21:36
Rachel Sawires
can
00:21:39
Rachel Sawires
absolutely.
00:21:40
aquaomega
Yeah. Okay.
00:21:41
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, really, that's the big piece of it, I think. And then that also helps me connect where the body wants to be addressed, because what emotions surface for them can specifically target certain organs, you know, so if it's like, they're really upset about a ah ah passing in their family that they don't never fully processed, like grief is held by our lungs, there's a move for the diaphragm I can do with bow and that will release that, that unsuppressed grief.
00:22:06
aquaomega
Oh, that's very interesting.
00:22:06
Cameron Cogswell
Okay, so so it is like almost like a an anatomy chart. if If they bring up certain emotions, they're like, okay, now I need to to go there.
00:22:14
Rachel Sawires
Right.
00:22:15
Cameron Cogswell
Wow.
00:22:15
Rachel Sawires
Yeah. Yeah. And so I actually asked my patients after the first session because Bowen's done on the table, but it's still active for three to five days after you leave my office.
00:22:17
Cameron Cogswell
That's really cool.
00:22:26
Rachel Sawires
Um, and during that three to five days, again, you'll feel stuff shifting. You might feel an old injury kind of flare up and then it will leave. You'll feel some emotions surfacing for you.
Benefits and Integration of Bowen Therapy in Treatment
00:22:36
Rachel Sawires
Um, I always ask my patients to keep a journal and like write down anything weird and abnormal that came up for them.
00:22:42
Rachel Sawires
So then in their second session, I'm like, okay, so the body wants me to go here. And this is where it's kind of like a detective, like putting the pieces together of like, what is the fascia asking for? Where does it where is it stuck? um And yeah, I asked them to la write it down for me so we can chat about it prior to our next session.
00:22:58
aquaomega
Okay. And would sessions be like a week apart or how does that, and then
00:23:01
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, so you don't want to do because it's active for five days after you don't want to do going again within less than five days. And I usually just gap it out a week to give it that full
00:23:12
Cameron Cogswell
Mm hmm.
00:23:12
Rachel Sawires
kind of extra, you know, room. But yeah, you would never do Bowen, like back to back, you just do it that one time, wait a week, see what the body responds, and then you can do it again. um And it's usually three to five sessions, depending on how chronic the condition is to really resolve whatever it is the patient came to me for. And then after that, I tell them, you know, come back to me for maintenance, like if something happens that there's like,
00:23:39
Rachel Sawires
you know, a new injury or a new stressor in life, come back to me and we'll just do a bow in as a maintenance thing. But it's not one of those things that you need, you know, regular consistent treatments forever.
00:23:49
aquaomega
To do forever, yeah.
00:23:51
Cameron Cogswell
Right.
00:23:52
Rachel Sawires
That's why I love it.
00:23:52
Cameron Cogswell
you that's so interesting All of this is very interesting. but you know I used to get a lot of massage done, and um you know I used to be like in the bodybuilding world, and a lot of them do it, but they're doing like, fascial stretching has become really popular.
00:23:55
aquaomega
It is.
00:24:04
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, totally.
00:24:05
Cameron Cogswell
Is there any way that this is like, because now I'm listening to you, and and you're you know it's it's interesting, like I said, But it sounds like, again, like you're saying, it's soft or it's a gentler input.
00:24:16
Cameron Cogswell
Is there any damage that they can do by by going at it so hard? Because I remember getting like my IT band stretched and stuff and it's so painful, but this sounds a lot like a more gentle approach.
00:24:25
Rachel Sawires
yeah
00:24:28
Cameron Cogswell
Is there damage that they're doing by going at it like that?
00:24:28
Rachel Sawires
it's It's that's a good question. It's definitely painful because like I said, there's a lot of neurons that are in the fascia. And if you're like just going like full, full blown on that nervous system, it's gonna feel you're gonna feel pain, especially if there's adhesions and stickiness there.
00:24:39
Cameron Cogswell
Mm-hmm.
00:24:44
Rachel Sawires
Um, the, the fascia is not mobile and nicely smoothing underneath.
00:24:46
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:24:47
Rachel Sawires
So that's why you're feeling that pain in terms of damage that can be done. Um, I'm not a hundred percent sure, to be honest.
00:24:55
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:24:55
Rachel Sawires
I don't know.
00:24:56
Cameron Cogswell
It just came to my mind. Like, I'm so curious now because it sounds like everything you're saying is so wonderful. Now I see these bodies going so hard. I'm like, I wonder if that's good anymore, you know?
00:25:04
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:25:07
Rachel Sawires
yeah It depends what you're you're targeting. If you're going hard like that, you're usually getting to the muscles beneath the fascia.
00:25:12
Cameron Cogswell
Sure, sure.
00:25:12
Rachel Sawires
You're not you're actually completely missing the fascia.
00:25:13
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah. Yeah.
00:25:15
Rachel Sawires
but
00:25:16
aquaomega
For those who are, sorry, I was just going to ask like, for those who are considering bone therapy, are there kind of like specific health issues or conditions where you would like highly recommend it as part of their healing journey?
00:25:19
Cameron Cogswell
and
00:25:26
Rachel Sawires
Totally. um So interesting enough, I actually use it more so for my patients that have anxiety, insomnia, um Just because when a patient comes into your office and they have, like I said, their nervous system's completely dysregulated, no matter what I give you, it's not going to stick. It's not going to work because you're you're just, you're not in a and a place for your body to be able to break things down and digest things and process things and heal. Like you're in fight or flight, body's focused on running away from the tiger or whatever stressor. They, it thinks it's imminent danger.
00:26:02
Rachel Sawires
Um, and so I usually use it for that purpose, although it, and I work in a really wonderful collaborative clinic. So we have kyros and physios and acupuncturists for more of the chronic injury things.
00:26:11
aquaomega
Oh, that's great.
00:26:13
Rachel Sawires
Um, but they do pass me ah on those patients that just are not, it's not working with, you know, their their shoulder, their knee, their hip. It's not working with whatever, um, treatment that they're doing. Those patients will come to me and, um, I will treat chronic injuries in, in sometimes, but that's not my main focus with Bowen.
00:26:32
Rachel Sawires
That's usually what it's mainly used for, though. It's mainly used for chronic injuries or physical, you know, more sticky joints and ailments in that sense. My intention with using it is more so regulating the nervous system, allowing people to sleep better, allowing them to have deeper breaths throughout the day, allowing them to feel more peaceful and at ease, um just so that the other things I'm doing naturopathically can actually work.
Becoming a Bowen Practitioner and Finding Qualified Therapists
00:26:58
aquaomega
Okay. So it it sounds like it's something that can kind of compliment other treatments like acupuncture or chiropractor care. and it And it sounds like you're at a great place where where that's available to to a lot of the people who will come into the clinic.
00:27:08
Rachel Sawires
yeah What do you have to lose by trying?
00:27:11
aquaomega
And it's great. So what would you say to someone who is maybe like skeptical about alternative therapies like Bowen and how they can help patients patients better understand the benefits?
00:27:23
aquaomega
I like that. yeah I do like that.
00:27:25
Rachel Sawires
It's very gentle, it's non-invasive, it will never hurt you.
00:27:30
aquaomega
Mhm.
00:27:30
Rachel Sawires
Um, and I, like, as a professional who has all of these modalities that can do anything else for you. Like, it's not like I don't have access to do acupuncture or massage or a spinal adjustment.
00:27:38
aquaomega
Yeah.
00:27:44
Rachel Sawires
I just seen, you know, over time and over experience, the effect that Bowen has, it works a lot more, um, efficiently than I would.
00:27:53
aquaomega
I like that. I like that because you are so, you know, you have access to all the different modalities. You're suggesting it because you're like, Hey, I want something that's going to help you.
00:28:02
Rachel Sawires
exactly
00:28:02
aquaomega
Right. Which, which is great.
00:28:03
Rachel Sawires
yeah
00:28:04
aquaomega
You know, so coming from someone like, like you, um, where you are well-practiced, it really does kind of hold more weight. Uh, I'm totally interested in bone therapy.
00:28:11
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah, yeah.
00:28:11
aquaomega
I want to do it.
00:28:12
Cameron Cogswell
it's in Are most of the practitioners like yourself, like they already do acupuncture, they already do other things, or are there people who who solely do ah Bowen? Because it sounds to me like it is complementary, obviously.
00:28:24
Rachel Sawires
Exactly.
00:28:24
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, I find that a lot of the people I was in the Bowen program with were a practitioner of a different sort. They were either massage therapists or they were acupuncturists.
00:28:34
Rachel Sawires
Lots of them were naturopaths and they're learning it to as a complimentary, but you can learn it just as like, you don't have to be a health practitioner to learn learn Bowen.
00:28:44
Cameron Cogswell
Mm hmm.
00:28:46
Rachel Sawires
You would just have to do a little bit more of the accreditation, the anatomy and like the the background prerequisite kind of coursing, but you can, anyone can learn Bowen and I highly recommend everyone too.
00:28:51
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah. Where did you learn? how What did you do? Where'd you go through?
00:29:01
Rachel Sawires
So the naturopath that I, the clinic that I walked into near my house when I was wanting to volunteer, she actually owned Bowen College.
00:29:10
Cameron Cogswell
oh
00:29:10
Rachel Sawires
So she, she was an ND and and eventually retired. after to just solely focus on training people in Bowen. And so I learned directly through her, I actually got very lucky.
00:29:21
Rachel Sawires
I don't know how I literally walked into the clinic.
00:29:22
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah, I was gonna say you walked right into it.
00:29:23
aquaomega
Yeah.
00:29:24
Rachel Sawires
It was just like, God sent for me to learn about Bowen and work directly with a mentor who owns the college who teaches everyone in Canada, essentially.
00:29:32
Cameron Cogswell
Wow.
00:29:32
aquaomega
Okay, so if if I'm listening and I'm not in your area or region, who would I like call in my small town to to ask for bone therapy? Would it be an ND or?
00:29:42
Rachel Sawires
No, I would think you would have to look up a bow in a licensed bow and practitioner in your area. and And like I said, it's a new it's very limited.
00:29:48
aquaomega
Okay.
00:29:53
Rachel Sawires
I don't think there's many people that do it in a small town, I'd say luck. But pretty
00:29:59
aquaomega
So my best bet would probably be come to the GTA where you are. Do maybe you want to tell our listeners how they could get in touch with you or or how they could visit you and and where you're located?
00:30:03
Rachel Sawires
good.
00:30:05
Cameron Cogswell
Mm-hmm.
00:30:07
Rachel Sawires
um Yeah, for sure. So I'm located downtown Toronto. I have a few locations that I work out of. My home clinic is at Lawrence Bedina. And then I work collaboratively in that complimentary clinic at Queen and Spadina and then in Leslieville at Queen and Leslie. um But I would say, where do you live?
00:30:29
aquaomega
i live I live in Cornwall, so it's just in between like Montreal and Ottawa.
00:30:29
Cameron Cogswell
No worry.
00:30:32
Rachel Sawires
and Yeah, ah i I can look if there's someone in your area for you.
00:30:37
Cameron Cogswell
is there ah So if you go to like the college website, can you look up a practitioner so you know you're going to a licensed person?
00:30:37
aquaomega
Absolutely, yeah.
00:30:39
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:30:43
Cameron Cogswell
Do they have um like a directory like that?
00:30:45
Rachel Sawires
I, they they should. Um,
00:30:47
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
Conclusion and Contact Information
00:30:48
Rachel Sawires
I actually just asked my mentor because I personally, so I love getting Bowen done on myself as well.
00:30:48
Cameron Cogswell
Usually they...
00:30:54
Rachel Sawires
And so I was looking for someone in Toronto and I just went on registry. I looked up Bowen and I went to a random person, never heard of them, but they online said that they did Bowen and I went there and it wasn't Bowen at all.
00:31:01
Cameron Cogswell
No.
00:31:05
Rachel Sawires
I don't know what they were doing, to be honest.
00:31:07
aquaomega
Oh, interesting.
00:31:08
Rachel Sawires
ah
00:31:08
aquaomega
They're trying to cash in on the movement.
00:31:09
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, so I usually just go to my mentor and I'm like, who did you train?
00:31:09
Cameron Cogswell
Oh, wow.
00:31:14
Rachel Sawires
Because right there's other people out there trying to claim that they do Bowen, which wasn't, it really wasn't.
00:31:15
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:31:16
aquaomega
OK,
00:31:18
Cameron Cogswell
Oh, wow.
00:31:21
Rachel Sawires
So yeah, you have to be a little bit careful in that sense.
00:31:22
Cameron Cogswell
Jeez.
00:31:23
aquaomega
okay yes, I appreciate that little warning. So that way someone doesn't just go and like some random person is like, yeah, I can do that.
00:31:25
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah.
00:31:25
Rachel Sawires
Yeah,
00:31:28
aquaomega
And then they don't get that.
00:31:28
Rachel Sawires
yeah and you're like, what was that thing she was talking about for an hour to not do anything?
00:31:29
Cameron Cogswell
yeah Oh, no. Yeah.
00:31:32
aquaomega
Yeah, she made it sound awesome. This was not awesome.
00:31:35
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:31:36
aquaomega
Oh, that's great. um Dr. Rachel, I want to thank you so much for being on the show. It has been great having you and for all our listeners. um Like I said, you can you can reach out um to our clinic if this is something you you are interested in in.
00:31:49
aquaomega
Do you want to share your social handle too? Would they be able to like send you a message if that's okay?
00:31:51
Rachel Sawires
Yeah, absolutely. So my Instagram is dr.rachelsoiris. And we also have a private practice rooted solutions Toronto is our Instagram page for that.
00:32:06
Rachel Sawires
um And I'd be happy to explore Bowen with anybody interested because it's quite an experience and highly, highly recommend getting it.
00:32:14
aquaomega
Absolutely.
00:32:15
Cameron Cogswell
so Yeah, I'm interested.
00:32:15
Rachel Sawires
Yeah.
00:32:16
aquaomega
I know a lot of our listeners are in the g GTA. um So I, you know, I feel like Dr. Rachel should be the person you go to for bone therapy. Absolutely. After having you on the show and for all our listeners, if you're still here and you like the show, be sure to like the show and share it with your friends and family.
00:32:30
aquaomega
Help us grow. I want to thank you again, Dr. Rachel and Cameron too, for, for doing this podcast with me.
00:32:32
Rachel Sawires
Thanks,
00:32:34
Cameron Cogswell
Yeah, thank you.
00:32:35
aquaomega
It's been, it's been awesome.
00:32:36
Cameron Cogswell
Absolutely. Yeah.
00:32:38
Rachel Sawires
guys.
00:32:38
aquaomega
Thanks guys.