Client Experiences

Allison Benner allowed me to realize I did not have to live with the pain I had been enduring for more than 15 years. After countless sports injuries, a car accident, and working in front of a computer for 10 hours a day, I felt spent and depressed that the condition of my body and spirit would never change. The first time I met with Allison, the pain in my lower back was extremely intense, but had been with me for so long, that I did not realize how bad it had become. I no longer touched, leaned, or otherwise engaged my back and hips. My feet would go completely numb and my calves seized up when I went for a walk. This was because I was holding my posture and joints in such a tense state to mitigate the pain in other parts of my body. My shoulders were constantly sore from holding the same working position, creating a numb sensation in my neck and shoulder blade. I felt that this was simply the way my body worked, and that I had to accept it, which left my body and spirit feeling disconnected. After meeting with Allison for the first time, I realized that I did not have to live this way. The release I felt within my back was immediate and long lasting. Allison worked with me to regain my natural footfall and end the numbness in my calves and feet. She gave me stretches and exercises to do outside of our sessions, and encouraged me to get up from my computer hourly, do pilates, yoga, go for long walks, and dance. I had never even thought I could dance without pain. Now I try to dance at least once a week, hike with my daughter, take yoga classes when I can, and otherwise live my life feeling whole. I was able to have a natural birthing experience with my daughter, which I was once told by a doctor would be impossible given my injuries. Allison has not only helped my body to recover through her Rolfing technique, but has connected me to a network of natural health practitioners in Denver which I now consider part of my continuing healing process. I don't know where my mind and body would be without the thoughtful, caring, and experienced approach Allison Benner offers.

I’m a 64-year-old single male with some very traditional beliefs. 3-1/2 years ago, I mentioned to my chiropractor that I wanted to start exploring a more intensive journey and learn more about Yoga. My goal at the time was to increase my flexibility so I could expand my weight training.

Dr. Josh Vickers connected me to Allison Benner with this quote, “be open-minded, Allison will teach and help you with far more than just yoga.” I can confidently say he was so right!

Allison and I have spent an hour a week together online on zoom over the last 3-1/2 years not only working on expanding my Yoga experience/journey but so much more. The practice with Allison now spans from helping to navigate challenging life situations, relationship dynamics, day-to-day stress, injury recovery, and how all of this impacts our mind and body. I’ve gained awareness, the ability to manage very challenging life events, expanding physical and mental health, as well as emotional growth.

Recently, my youngest daughter left for college and we moved to a new home. While all pretty normal territory for most people, it was different for me. I raised my daughter as the primary care parent until she was 13 and then became a full-time parent. She was my purpose! I knew her going off to college was going to be harder for me than it was for her. The challenging role at work on top of everything else could have been very overwhelming and I risked missing some very positive awakening.

Through the work Allison and I have done, this event ended up being an amazing growth opportunity for both my daughter and I. I see, feel, and experience so much more of what life has to offer. I’m so very grateful for all Allison has done for me and look forward to continuing to explore, expand, and grow my practice with her.

Working with Allison has been a transformative experience. She has helped me to become more self-aware, action-oriented, and embodied. Allison creates a safe and supportive environment where I have felt able to fully engage and be free to address anything that comes up. She is a compassionate listener, always provides meaningful insight, and offers proactive tools that I can immediately integrate into my life.

In addition to the Somatic Experiencing work that we have done together, the attachment healing has been illuminating. Understanding attachment and the impact of my family of origin and how that plays out in my intimate relationships has allowed for differentiation, and a true, authentic connection, that’s secure.

Through our work together, I have been able to become more present and grounded in my daily life and I have noticed a significant improvement in my ability to manage stress and regulate my emotions. This has led to a greater sense of hope and overall well-being. I feel very lucky to have found Allison and this work.

I first saw Allison Benner at the suggestion of a friend to help me with some chronic pain issues. I had already sought help with my pain from several more conventional health providers to no avail and was growing desperate to find a more effective treatment. As it happens, at the time, I had recently retired from an unsatisfying and at times very stressful career as an attorney and was unable to find the fulfillment that I had expected upon leaving my work life. After a session or two, Allison was able to see how years of stress and confounding circumstances were contributing to my discomfort. She suggested that to properly heal my “pain” I needed to get to its source and to do that, treatment with a technique that dealt more with the relationship between body and mind with a neurological perspective might be the best way to proceed. Having already gained my trust, I agreed to try Somatic Experiencing. Her analysis was spot on and, with her expertise and wisdom along with her knowledge of ayurvedic medicine, yoga and mindfulness I came through the process not only rid of the pain for which I initially sought her help, but also as a happier and healthier person far more aware of the keen relationship between body and mind and therefore more adept at knowing myself and at dealing with the “pain” that is an inevitable part of living . Her approach to the treatment was forceful and effective and at the same time gentle and compassionate. Only someone as talented as Allison Benner can merge those qualities successfully. Allison Benner is the most empathetic person I have ever known. She is a genuine healer in every sense, and I will always be indebted to her for all she helped me accomplish.

I came to work with Allison on my meandering journey to heal and build my system back up from a state of total burnout. In many ways my life has always tended to head towards burnout, but with two young children when the pandemic hit my ways of coping with stress were either unavailable or no longer enough. The cracks already present in my system were blown wide open…I was exhausted and completely disconnected from my ability to regulate in what felt like endless moments of overwhelm. For myself and my family it became increasingly clear I needed help finding my way back and I have spent the better part of the last two years trying to build myself back up.

I began my journey with traditional talk therapy which helped my mind, but didn’t get deep into my body. I then journeyed down the path of learning about the nervous system and how to more appropriately nourish myself through how I ate, moved, and structured my life. All these things helped, but it wasn’t until I began the Somatic Experiencing work with Allison that all the pieces really started to come together. It has been through my sessions with Allison that I have been able to radically change how I experience moments in my life, especially the moments that are full of overwhelm and intense emotions. She has helped me begin to repair my traumas, from the separation my daughter and I experienced after her birth, to my own attachment wounds that are being exposed as I parent my own children. In our time together, I have softened with myself and begun to learn how to differentiate whether I am embodying an experience of the present moment or an experience from my past.

In our sessions we don’t go searching for things to “fix.”  What needs to heal or repair has its own way of coming to the surface when ready. It’s been striking to me how much the work we do in each session weaves into my life. Experiences (including total shit-show breakdowns with my 5 year old, surprising relevant yoga classes, and eerily on-point podcasts and writings) keep showing up taking me deeper into it all.

In one of our early sessions, I shared with Allison that I had gone up in my closet and kicked a plastic box to smithereens after experiencing a really difficult interaction. I was worried it was wrong to have this kind of anger in me. Allison asked me, “What if kicking that box until you were done, breaking it into pieces, was nothing more than just that? Your body was following an urge until it was complete. What if it says nothing about you? Nothing is wrong with you; you are a woman who had an urge and you followed it. That is it.”  This blew my mind. For days since the incident of destroying the box I had done nothing but wonder aloud and in my head, “What is wrong with me? Why can’t I keep it together?” For the first time that narrative shifted and now said, “There is absolutely nothing wrong with me. I experienced a really challenging moment and had a lot of energy built up in my body. I let it out and it’s done. No one was hurt. I felt better. I got what I needed in that moment. We can move on.” And what I believe to be the most powerful part: every thread of my being believes this new narrative; my body believes this message from my brain and is settled by it. My body was not settled by the narrative my mind was previously playing on a loop about that moment. I have realized your mind can tell you stories but it’s your body that allows you to gauge if the story is true and informs you of your needs, past and present. This is what Allison has helped, and continues to help, me find. I will forever be grateful for our work together.

I was diagnosed with idiopathic scoliosis 37 years ago when I was thirty years old. The ever increasing pain I experienced made it difficult to continue my active lifestyle and even daily activities like standing and walking. The surgeon I consulted told me I would be a “crippled little old lady” if I didn’t have a spinal fusion so deciding out of fear, I had three back surgeries and a hip replacement (because one “fix” caused the next problem). PTs and new docs and pain meds were of little help and then I found Allison. I now am able to walk without pain. Because of the radical changes I’ve experienced so far, I am confident that soon I’ll be hiking and snowshoeing again! Because I have more energy and I’m feeling so much better I am now able to, fairly consistently, focus on self-care in all dimensions of my life. Allison is an amazing woman; wise beyond her years. Her healing gifts provide the foundation of her work and she is continually pursuing additional knowledge and training in order to provide her clients the most current healing treatments. She is gentle, very intuitive, curious and very funny! Her positive attitude and perspective are inspiring.

Working with Allison has been incredible! I spent 7+ years in talk therapy and I felt that this was an important part of my journey to be able to have a space to be able to express myself and be self reflective. However, I always felt like there was a missing piece to my struggle with anxiety and depression. Being able to work with the body and also with my attachment patterns has changed everything for me.

I have worked with Allison for less than a year and instead of having to cope with my anxiety and depression and stressors in relationships, I have noticed a shift towards my body finding a new reality. Relationships and situations that typically are incredibly stressful for me are starting to become more easeful and even enjoyable; it isn't because I am convincing myself with my mind to be different, but because my body has found more safety and in turn more expansiveness in all parts of my life. I have even seen relationships with family that have been a challenge for my entire life begin to move towards more safety and health. I couldn't recommend Allison enough!

I found Somatic Experiencing with Allison at a time when anxiety had reached an all-time high for me. It was disorienting, I felt panicked much of the time, I was so afraid of the anxiety, and yet, I existed in it all of the time. I had been to therapy at other times in my life, dabbled in all kinds of body work, and even worked as a therapist myself. And yet, working with Somatic Experiencing with Allison felt wildly different than any other approach I had ever taken or been trained in. We started by actually not  focusing on the anxiety. I remember being taken aback the first time Allison redirected me towards the regulation that actually did already exist in my body. I noticed how strong the pull was to keep focusing on the anxiety, and then I noticed something new- that there was actually access to just neutrality. Allison worked really slowly with me to relearn how to feel safe & calm in my body, something that I didn't even realize I hadn't felt in a long, long time. I learned how to address the chronic stress in my life, slow down, and got to explore unprocessed trauma from years before. In all my experience in talk- therapy and training as a therapist myself, SE with Allison was the most effective approach to actually rewiring my nervous system and changing my life

Ten years prior to discovering Rolfing I had a herniated disk in my back(L4-L5), a ruptured disk (L5-S1) and had surgery to repair the damage. That "repair" lasted for about three years before the pain started coming back. The pain became part of my daily life. Everyday was painful, some days severely, but I managed to continue on. After seeing me hobbling around the office a coworker told me about Rolfing and how it had helped his back problem. I was ready to try anything so I called the Rolf Institute and that's how I met Allison. Allison was very patient, understanding and was able to sense my pain. She was always making sure that nothing we did caused me further pain. Allison's professionalism really showed when my hip/back 'locked up' on the table and I couldn't even sit up. She very calmly rolled me over and started working on my sacrum and hips. It was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. I didn't feel anything distinct occur, like the crack of a chiropractic adjustment, but my body knew something drastic had changed. It was very emotional. After that session my back pain was greatly reduced. Since completing the full 10 session series I've had very little, short term, back pain. Perhaps one day a month do I even think about my back. Working with Allison and going through the Rolfing series has changed my life. I used to spend many nights laying on the floor in agony, desperately trying to crack my back to relieve the pain. Now, I am able to enjoy life again. My wife has noticed the improvement in my attitude and general disposition, as have I. And my climbing has improved as well.