Steady Strides provides equine-assisted therapy to

children, adolescents, and Young Adults

About Equine-Assisted Therapy

Equine therapeutic sessions provide an environment in which therapist, horse, and client work together to achieve treatment goals. The unique, movement-based, experiential nature of equine-assisted therapy can be especially helpful for clients who feel uncomfortable with or do not respond to traditional talk therapy.

Equine-assisted psychotherapy is beneficial for people who are struggling with:

Socially, horses are a lot like humans. Unlike other types of animals, horses interact and respond socially in a manner that is remarkably similar to people. In a therapy session, the same unhealthy patterns that occur in the client’s human relationships will quickly emerge between client and horse. Because they are so sensitive to our non-verbal cues, horses respond to us in a similar manner to the way people do. Equine-assisted psychotherapy provides the opportunity for clients to work through relationship issues with the horse in a non-judgmental, non-threatening environment. Instead of starting with an already volatile relationship, the client starts with an animal who is completely honest, won’t hide emotions, and doesn’t have any particular motive or desired outcome. Environmental input is reduced and there is no emotional threat to the client.  Therefore, the client is able to work through personal obstacles and relationship issues at his/her own pace in real time and with the help of the therapist.  The client then learns to apply new skills and healthier ways of interacting to his/her human relationships. 

Horses are herd animals. They seek positive, confident leadership and they are (by nature and much like people) experts at testing and pushing boundaries.  Horses are large animals, and the client feels the necessity of learning to assertively set and enforce healthy boundaries with the therapy horse. Through this process, the client realizes that horses understand, respect, and feel safe when they are given structure and consistent boundaries.  The client experiences what it feels like to be a positive leader in the relationship with the horse.  With the help of the therapist, the client is able to transfer this ability to assertively set, maintain, and respect personal boundaries to human relationships. 

Self-reflection and Self-management

Horses are highly sensitive to our emotions, energy, and body language. They react not to our words, but to our feelings and nonverbal cues. In other words, we cannot “fake” anything around a horse. We can look completely calm on the outside, but if we are angry, anxious, or insecure, the horse will react outwardly to this. The horse acts as a mirror. The horse’s response to the client allows the therapist and client both to gain insight into a person’s true emotional process. The horse is an especially helpful therapeutic tool for people who tend to hide their feelings, say what they think the therapist wants to hear, or who are resistant to talking about their emotions.  The natural ability of a horse to mirror a person’s inner state is useful for teaching self-regulation strategies (such as managing anxiety, fear, anger, or hyperactivity).  As the client achieves genuine inward self-regulation, the horse acts as a form of immediate biofeedback and responds by calming outwardly.  

Frustration Tolerance and Self-Control

Horses are valuable tools for teaching frustration tolerance and self-control. Horses are living beings with minds of their own. Similar to people, they do not always do what we ask or what we want them to do. In equine-assisted therapy sessions, clients are given tasks that require them to work cooperatively with the horse (either from the ground or on horseback). This process is similar to working with another human being who has their own opinions and agenda; it can trigger frustration and emotional outbursts like those seen at home or school. The therapist uses these experiences to help the client work through frustration and establish a cooperative relationship in an emotionally safe, controlled environment.  Rather than simply talking about, “Next time you feel frustrated, try…” the client is able to practice the self-regulation skill right in the moment with the therapist alongside helping. It’s therapy in “real-time.”  This initiates learning opportunities for managing frustration in a novel, more self-controlled way.   Working with a large animal also provides opportunities for clients to learn how to self-advocate, communicate assertively, and approach a situation with self-confidence.

Trauma, Trust and Healing

Some of our therapy horses come with traumatic stories of abuse, neglect, loss, and frightening experiences. Some have been moved around from one place to the next, being repeatedly taken from the familiarity of their surroundings and herd.  Even though people have hurt them severely in the past, they are healing and learning to trust. This is encouraging to clients and can give them a sense of hope. Clients who have experienced trauma often develop a sense of mutual understanding with one of these horses on a deep emotional level; they can relate to one another. People who are afraid to trust another human may start with trusting and forming an attachment with a horse. This provides a beautiful opportunity for horse and human to heal together.

Horses are prey animals. This means they are always wary, skeptical, and hypervigilant. Their primary focus in life is self-preservation. They expect danger, and their fight or flight system can be activated by benign stimuli. Like a traumatized person, horses can move from a state of calm to a state of panic/terror in just a few seconds.  Clients suffering from the effects of trauma relate to the horse and feel that at last they are understood. For clients who have endured trauma, simple interactions with the horse provide a sense of normalcy, comfort, and grounding. There is a deep, inexplicable healing that occurs when an animal that is so much larger and more powerful chooses to be gentle and trusting and forms a partnership bond with the client.

Riding a horse is a somatosensory experience. Horses can provide rhythmic, repetitive movement that, over time and combined with other interventions, helps regulate the stress response system in clients with early trauma by re-organizing neural systems in the brainstem. 

Psychological Safety

Equine-assisted therapy can be beneficial for clients struggling with depression and suicidal thought patterns. During therapy sessions, clients develop a relationship with the horse and come to realize that they have something important to offer one another. Between sessions, they may look forward to seeing their therapy horse again soon. This relationship adds a powerful protective factor. Equine-assisted therapy can provide the client with motivation to implement coping strategies because they have something positive to focus on. Clients suffering from poor self-esteem gain confidence as they experience success navigating through challenging tasks with their horses. Clients struggling through grief and loss have a safe place to express their feelings; they find comfort in letting the horse share their burden.

Social skills

When working with horses, every action by the client results in a reaction or consequence (positive or negative) from the horse. This pattern is helpful for people in learning social thinking skills and understanding cause-effect concepts. During therapy, clients learn to identify that their actions have an effect on another being (the horse). This immediately affects the way the horse treats the client and thus influences their ability to accomplish the desired task. The client learns to take ownership for behavior because the horse holds the client accountable. The client learns that by changing their actions and attitude, they can change the way the horse responds. If the relationship with the horse is damaged by poor choices, the client learns to mend it and move forward.  When working with such a large animal, the client has a natural opportunity to learn and practice boundaries, self-awareness, personal space, and respect. The client experiences the horse responding to positive leadership. The client learns to work with the horse as a partner and practices all the same aspects of cooperation that are essential to human social interactions.