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ABOUT
DAVID
BENNETT
I find the stillness within Osteopathic treatment to be so enormously rewarding - since it is a doorway to the Health that resides deep within us all.
Our bodies remember every traumatic event that diverted us from our originally intended path, and greatest potential. A healing process is initiated, when our body begins to remember and move towards this original Health.
My great great grandfather was a priest in the early years of the Western Australia colony, who traveled for his work on horseback between Toodyay and Albany. Several generations later, a practical spirituality comes very easily to me. In different circumstances, the priesthood would have been very comfortably vocation for me - but it turns out that Osteopathy provides opportunities for a similar connection and fulfilment, without the baggage of a religious organisation. Over the decades I have travelled the world to received treatment from Osteopaths and others who have a deep spirituality - which it turns out is a very rare quality to find in this busy modern world.
Most often it is the challenges experienced in one's own life, that determine the unique skills bought to the treatment table. In my case it was extreme birth trauma and surgery immediately after birth that shaped my life’s trajectory. Naturally, I have a heart-felt compassion for helping people during the periods of preconception, pregnancy, mothers/babies, and for adults wishing to rediscover their original health within.
Finally, I has a natural sensitivity that lends itself to instinctive affinity for animals. This capacity spills over into my practice of Osteopathy, since human beings also have a deep instinctive nature - that communicates through feeling, imagery and symbolism rather than the rational thinking mind. This part of human nature is so much closer to the health, and so greatly assists therapeutic change.
My Osteopathic journey began at the Busselton Osteopathic Clinic alongside Dr Yvan Ducat - having spent countless hours observing at his clinic from 1995 onwards, and starting work there after graduation in 1998. I then moved on the work in a 100% Cranial Osteopathic Clinic in New Zealand.
​My greatest influence has been in pursuing international (USA) training in Biodynamic and Paediatric Cranial Osteopathy with the late Dr James Jealous (Retired Osteopathic Physician and Obstetrician); a method of treatment that is ideally suited to treatment of babies and during pregnancy. This field of work has offered me the greatest possible fulfilment and healing.
To seek treatment during the early period of life (before pregnancy, during and after birth) offers an opportunity to retain a natural expression of Health, that becomes progressively obscured with life's unexpected stresses and trauma. The treatment of mothers and babies, brings great clarity for the treatment of adults also - since it is this capacity for original health that each and every adult is striving to rediscover.
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Osteopathic Medicine embraces the importance of listening to Nature - in this case using hands to listen. Treatments aim to restore homeostatic equilibrium - so that self-healing becomes possible.
Outside of Osteopathy, David spends time with family, nature walks, gardening, fishing, and hobbies that include nature sound recordings and therapeutic product design.
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Bachelor of Economics (UWA) 1993
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Bachelor of Applied Science (Clinical) (RMIT) 1999
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Bachelor of Osteopathic Science (RMIT) 1999
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Associate: Busselton Osteopathic Clinic 1998-2000
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40 hour Foundational Osteopathy in the Cranial Field: Sutherland Cranial Teaching Foundation (SCTF), Australia 1999.
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3 month Intensive Training Apprenticeship with SCTF faculty member: New Zealand 2000
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40 hour Foundational Osteopathy in the Cranial Field: SCTF, New Zealand 2000
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Associate: Still Sutherland Centre for Osteopathic Medicine: New Zealand 2000-04
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Phase I Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: International Biodynamic Faculty (IBF), Australia 2005
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WA President/Director of Australian Osteopathic Association: 2006-07
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Phase II Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: IBF, Australia 2006
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Phase I Biodynamic Treatment of Children: IBF, Australia 2007
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Phase III Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: IBF, New Zealand 2007
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Phase II Biodynamic Treatment of Children: IBF, Australia 2008
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Phase IV Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: Dr J. Jealous, USA 2008
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Phase V Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: Dr J. Jealous, USA 2008
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Phase VI Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: Dr J. Jealous, USA 2009
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Phase VIII Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: Dr J. Jealous, Australia 2009 (attended twice)
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2 weeks attending the John of God Healing Centre, Brasil 2011
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Phase VII Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: Dr J. Jealous, USA 2011
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Phase II Biodynamic Treatment of Children: Dr J. Jealous, USA 2011
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Phase VI Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: Dr J. Jealous, USA 2012
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2 weeks attending the John of God Healing Centre, Brasil 2013
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Phase VIII Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: Dr J. Jealous, USA 2013
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4 weeks attending the John of God Healing Centre, Brasil 2014
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Phase IV Biodynamic Cranial Osteopathy: Dr J. Jealous, USA 2015
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2 weeks attending the John of God Healing Centre, Brasil 2015
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Ongoing monthly Zoom Biodynamic Osteopathy lectures with Dr. Stephen Kisiel, USA
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​David’s unique approach for treating arises from his own experiences of a long and very traumatic forceps delivery, surgery immediately after birth due to a brain haemorrhage, and then a lifetime of sensory processing challenges and learning difficulties. Whilst eternally grateful for the benefits of life saving surgical intervention, the longer-term effects of birth and related traumas where not addressed. David has great empathy and first-hand experience of life being affected by unresolved trauma, and how Osteopathic treatment can significantly help (even decades after the fact).
“There is always meaning and purpose to be found in life’s adversity
​~ to heal oneself by helping others experience a better life”.
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Being an Osteopath, of course I use the physical body as my primary point of reference - it is always in the present (not lost in the past, or projecting into the future as the rational thinking mind tends to be), and can always be trusted to bring things to the surface at the right time. My essential skill as an Osteopath is found in my own life history - and the deep empathy that comes from this. With this comes the ability to journey deeply into each person's life history and help them find their Health within.
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"The objective of the doctor is to find health, anyone can find disease"
~ Dr Andrew Still MD (Founder of Osteopathy) 1876
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Just prior to Dr. Still "discovering" Osteopathy, he lost all 4 of his children to viral meningitis. There is something that happens when life no longer "works", and an ego death occurs. The veil of the rational thinking mind lifts, and one perceives a deeper reality. Dr. Still's life story, makes the above quote all the more significant - that is that the health within is always bigger than any problems one might have.