The Revelstoke Mountaineer welcomes a new series by Revelstoke Osteopathy Clinic‘s William Jarrige and Anouk Sanchez, who are both currently student osteopathic practitioners. William and Anouk are partners in life, in the practice of osteopathy, and in their new clinic, which is located at 111 Second Street East, Suite 204.
Anouk is originally from Quebec, and William is from the Paris area. They met in Fernie in 2010, drawn together by their interest in mountaineering and osteopathy.
Eventually they located to Calgary to study, but wanted back to the mountain lifestyle.
“We lived in Calgary for three years and every weekend we went travelling in the Rockies to enjoy the mountains,” William said. Soon, the question came: “Why don’t we just move somewhere we can have the lifestyle everyday.”
The outdoorsy, active pair now spend their weekends exploring our local mountains, and their weekdays treating patients of all kinds.
I’ve now met with Anouk and William a few times to talk about the practice of osteopathy, I’ve also been reading about osteopathy, and I’ve learned a lot. It’s my sense that people in B.C. haven’t had much exposure to the practice as elsewhere where osteopathy is more common, like in Europe and eastern Canada.
It’s common, for example, for top athletic teams in Europe to have an osteopathic practitioner to aid athletic performance.
I’ve learned that it’s a complete, manual medicine that treats the patient holistically. Their patients represent the full cycle of life — pregnant women, newborns, children, youth, adulthood to old age. They treat the human system holistically, exploring the function of organs, muscles, fascia, nervous system and much more. They work in concert with many kinds of health practitioners, from family doctors to other holistic health practitioners.
Anouk Sanchez says the holistic nature of osteopathy drew her to the practice. “I have always been someone who kind of believed in the mystery of nature, the force of nature in general. I’ve never believed that our body is simple. I always believed that there is a lot of things happening and it is easy to just explain one thing by a simple answer.”
[quote_right]I have always been someone who kind of believed in the mystery of nature, the force of nature in general. — Anouk Sanchez[/quote_right]
William started studying osteopathy right out of high school in France, and is still completing re-certification in Canada. In part, his personal experiences with health drew him to the practice: “What makes osteopathy strong is you are really looking at the entire body,” he said. “Osteopathy is holistic and when you are treating someone you are treating the entire body.”
They treat patients seeking to improve their health, and also those dealing with disease or pain issues. Osteopathy emphasizes the holistic study of an individual patient’s health, and treats through hands-on, manual therapeutic treatment, including muscle release, fascial unwinding, organ manipulation and flushing out of contained fluids.
In the coming weeks, a new Revelstoke Mountaineer column series by Revelstoke Osteopathy will explore the holistic healing practice. Welcome to Revelstoke Anouk and William!
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