Born in Korea to parents Sa Op and Robert Kocher, Dr. Elizabeth Kocher-Bentz has built a life and career upon many of the Eastern philosophies from her native land.
“Having been born in Korea, and growing up there, feeds into how I live now. Eastern approaches compared to Western are completely different. My father was in the army and met my mom while in Korea. I was born and lived there for five years, learning how to speak Korean. We moved to the US, and lived in a few different places; first Texas, and then St. Clair in Schuylkill County, where my father was from. I attended school in Palo Alto, the next town over from St. Clair, and attended the public school there for kindergarten, first and second grade. My mother was Buddhist, and made a switch to Catholicism. I then started attending Catholic school at St. Stephan’s Nativity BVM through high school.”
Elizabeth had a natural inclination to help others but was not sure what area to pursue after high school graduation. “My guidance counselor suggested social work, so I went from Nativity to Alvernia to earn my degree in social work. I worked as a social worker for five years.”
After five years Elizabeth realized that she did not want to continue the health care work involved in working in a nursing home facility.
“I wanted to be able to do more, so I went to pursue my master’s degree at Misericordia in Dallas, Pa. on the weekends for three years. I graduated with a Master of Science as an Occupational Therapist, registered and licensed. When I got my master’s there were a lot of changes in insurance policies, and there were not a lot of jobs available. People were being laid off left and right, and PPS businesses were not being reimbursed. I began working at a different facility, a behavioral health/psychiatric inpatient center, covering for a rehab director, working in rehab with Reading Hospital, and covering for a bunch of therapists experienced in Occupational Therapy. With a minor in Gerontology, I had an understanding of how to work with the elderly, which was my passion. I had a lot of experience working with the elderly population during graduate school. I experienced a lot of people passing away, and it was very sad. I needed a different setting. When the opportunity to work with a large school district presented itself, with the responsibility of covering up to 19 schools, I was drawn to the challenge. I worked with a team of assistants to help manage the case load, attended meetings, completed evaluations, wrote reports, and traveled to people’s homes as the OT program manager. I worked at that job for 18 years and loved it. By that time I had a lot of experience, and I wanted to share that experience with OT students.”
Elizabeth began to plan the next steps in her career journey.
“I told my doctor that I was going to have my children during the summer, so I could stay on top of my job. I figured that’s how that works. I had planned for my older daughter to be born in May or June in order to make it all work. During that time I felt a calling to teach. Alvernia had a spot open for a part-time adjunct position. I began teaching part-time while working at the schools. I was encouraged to pursue a doctorate, and began teaching with the blackboard system as well as learning on the same system. I was juggling a lot, and everything was ramping up. I started getting chest pains and ignoring them. Every time the administration changed, the expectations changed, and I had to pivot and work with my team, and work with them to change. It was becoming overwhelming, but I refused to leave my job.”
Everything came to an abrupt halt when Elizabeth landed in the ER with heavy chest pains. Dressed up and ready to go to meetings, she suddenly found herself in the emergency room sitting with her laptop and medical personnel asking her why she was there.
“These were stressed out healthcare workers taking care of stressed-out people in healthcare. Nobody could help me. They took me on the gurney and left me in the hallway. I’m thinking, if they don’t come get me, I’m calling the front desk. I’m sitting in the hallway when they concluded that it was all related to stress and everything was normal. It was an “ah-hah” moment; my body was telling me, ‘I had to make you uncomfortable, I had to make you move’. After a year of struggling and a tug of war, I realized that I had to take care of my own health, because we are not built to maintain ourselves under such stressful conditions.”
Major changes needed to be made in her life in order to remove the debilitating stress that intervened. “I was working on finishing my doctorate, and working at Alvernia, so I had to let go of my full-time job. I trust the universe, and I trust God. I was having a spiritual career crisis; I had to tell my team that I had to go, but how could I leave a job that I love? I knew that the job expectations were getting to be too much, but I kept pushing and pushing, the more I kept holding onto my job.”
The job change was inevitable, but what happened next was something unexpected. “Out of nowhere, I thought I would look into becoming a yoga teacher. I had seen videos about how the eastern approaches have helped people stay healthy outside of traditional medicine. I found a yoga instructor named Sue Siegrist, at Tula Yoga, in the Restorative Center in Exeter. She invited me to come, in rolling registration, for a year-long training. During this time I learned about the parasympathic system. I learned what the path of yoga is; a whole philosophy on how to approach life. A revelation that I now teach students is how to breath, breathing from the chest, breathing out the tightness. I created a course at Alvernia on how to use breathing techniques to keep the body calm and allow it to heal.”
The universe indeed delivered a whole new path for Elizabeth to follow. “In the master’s program at Alvernia, I created and taught an elective in Integrative Rehabilitation for health care students in Occupational Therapy. I am working with a professor from Ithaca College in New York, and another from Thomas Jefferson in Virginia. We are participating in research, which we hope to have published within the next two years. I wanted to prove that all programs should have this course, available to the students and the patients that they see. I left Alvernia full-time and continued part time in 2025. I then had the time to work on developing my own business and help take care of my mom.”
Today Dr. Elizabeth Kocher-Bentz lives a balanced and healthy life. “I returned to teach yoga classes, and also teach yoga courses at Alvernia and Penn State throughout the year. I did my research on animal-assisted OT therapy and received certification in Tai Chi Rehabilitation while completing my doctorate. I have a private practice to create more awareness, and more people are reaching out. It is private pay; you can learn more at www.otherapyoga.com. Come visit and see what may be able to help you.”
Dr. Elizabeth Kocher-Bentz is married to David Bentz, a career police officer, volunteer fireman, and Fire Chief. The couple has two daughters. Faith graduated from Alvernia and is a mechanical engineer. Bryanna is graduating from Penn State with a mechanical engineering degree, and will be employed by Worley Engineering. The family lives in Shillington, where Elizabeth has been involved in civic service as a Borough Council member for the past 16 years.
