Extract: Daily Mail, Good Health, Tuesday April 24, 2007.

To the outside world, the adventurer Bear Grylls epitomises supreme fitness.

Yet despite appearances, Bear has been plagued with back pain for over ten years for which he only recently found an effective treatment.

Twelve years ago, aged 21, he broke his back after his parachute failed to inflate at 16,000 feet. Landing on his parachute he fractured three vertebrae.

“I had come so close to severing my spinal cord but because of my age and my fitness, they decided I could avoid surgery and instead underwent ten hours a day of physiotherapy, swimming, stretching and ultrasound treatment. “I had nightmares for months and ever since I have suffered twinges and pains.”

A year ago his wife suggested he see a Bowen therapist. The Bowen technique, developed in the 1950s, involves using gentle rolling movements over muscles, ligaments and tendons and it is said to trigger the body’s own healing system. Many professional football clubs maintain a Bowen therapist as it has been shown to be very effective in realigning the skeletal structure.

“I was sceptical, but wanted to keep an open mind,” says Bear. More importantly, after my back accident, my spine and pelvis has lost alignment, so I felt unbalanced.’ Most fans of Bear’s Born Survivor series will not have noticed anything wrong, yet a subtle misalignment – visible only to the expert eye – can impact on total health.

Bear describes himself as now ‘hooked’ and has treatment every month.

See the full Daily Mail Article