The symptoms seem to come out of nowhere. The day feels fine—normal even, if there is such a thing. And then your heart begins beating faster. Breaths are a little shorter. You look around for a chair or something to lean against because of lightheadedness. One symptom appears to trip another one, like a cruel game of dominos, and the most basic human functioning feels nearly impossible with these hurdles in the way.

This is life for someone with anxiety attacks. Occasionally, the triggers look obvious, but they are more often so subtle that the person suffering might question their own sanity, leading to greater overall anxiety.

A Starting Point

“Anxiety is an invisible ailment,” says Missy (not her real name), 18, a teenager who suffers from anxiety. “People think you are crazy or ‘difficult’ when all you want is the ability to just do normal things without this—this thing—following you around.”

For many people who suffer from generalized anxiety, depression, or even more severe forms of mental illness, horses have been therapists, of sorts. Equine-assisted mental health therapy is a growing field where, under the guidance of a licensed therapist, a patient works with a horse and uses equine-assisted therapy to develop mindfulness and feel more grounded in daily life.

“Horses give biofeedback,” says Mallory Wheeler, clinician and director of the Mustard Seed Ranch in Tennessee. “I’m not going to say that it’s unconditional love or nonjudgmental, but it’s honest. Horses pick up on our emotions. If a patient is disengaged or angry, the horse will tell you that. It creates better awareness for both them and for the clinician.”

Wheeler offers both residential and outpatient equine-assisted therapy for patients ages 12 and older.

“We focus on building relationships for our patients,” she says. “They have experienced trauma and rejection, so we start with building relationships with horses.”

Learning Communication

Many of these patients are children or teenagers who have been trafficked and have serious trust and boundary issues with others, unsure of what the concepts of reasonable and safe even look like.

“We’ll work on communication,” says Wheeler. “The patients might not know how they present or come off, but if they communicate in a passive way or an aggressive way with a horse, the horse will give them feedback; then we can have a discussion. ‘Is this how you communicate with your family or your peers?’ Then we work on changing the communication style with the horse so that it feels more connected. They feel that more profoundly than if we just talked about it—it resonates with them in their journey.”

Wheeler provides an example of a girl with “extreme anxiety,” who was able to lower her heart rate and shed some emotional baggage during her time riding. Both horse and rider stayed very calm during the entire ride.

For those with more intense therapeutic needs, horses still provide a refuge. Joanie C. is a mother to Sarah (not her real name), a girl she adopted as a toddler. The child had been in foster care after enduring emotional, physical and sexual abuse.

“Sarah had been hyper-vigilant about so many things, and her psychiatrist was a horse person. She suggested we try using horses to reach her,” Joanie says.

She describes going to a ranch run by the SaddleUp! Foundation in Elizabeth, Colo.

“A woman there told Sarah to stand close to the horse so she could feel his heart beating,” Joanie explains. “Sarah learned that just like her, this creature had feelings and could be calm or scared. This helped so much with empathy and compassion.”

Sarah learned to love horses and became involved with the Interscholastic Equestrian Association and Pony Club. Her story, however, is peppered with continued struggles as she frequently ran away from home and used drugs.

“She’d always run away to horses,” Joanie says. “That’s where she felt safe. She trusted the horses more than people.”

The dynamic between human and horse is different from the dynamic between humans and other animals. First of all, there is the size of the animal.

“If you can create a healthy boundary between yourself and a 1,200-pound animal, you can then think about how to develop boundaries with people,” says Wheeler.

Joanie also points out that being prey animals, horses provide another opportunity for empathy.

“These children have been preyed upon,” she says. “That is the tie-in. They understand that trust is not automatic.”

Working Through Life

Rebecca Sheriff runs horse centers in both Colorado and northern Wisconsin. Their mission is to work on emotional development in emerging adults and develop workplace readiness

“We want to help them become whole and effective people,” Sheriff explains. “I know how horses have helped me in my life, and I want to offer that to others.”

Her Deer Valley Ranch in Colorado offers camps that help young adults ages 18 to 25, as well as veterans.

“We talk about trying to navigate through life via horses,” says Sheriff. “Some people get a very spiritual experience, and other people just want to be outdoors. After a year of being locked up from the pandemic and only connecting to people over devices, people want to connect to nature again.”

She says that their feedback is mostly qualitative. People talk about the relationship they have with their horse, and they often want to continue riding.

“The horse world can seem inaccessible,” Sheriff says. “But this is a way in.”
Joanie points out that they had to lease horses for years for their daughter before purchasing one.

“It made our lives so much better,” she says. “Horses have been the best therapists for her.”

This article about equine-assisted therapy originally appeared in the August 2021 issue of Horse Illustrated magazine. Click here to subscribe!

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Last winter, the International Modern Pentathlon Union (Union Internationale de Pentathlon Moderne, or UIPM) decided to remove equestrian show jumping from its slate of five sports. Without directly referring to the controversy that occurred during the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games last summer where a German coach was seen striking a horse, the committee determined that “critical reforms” were necessary for the maintenance of the sport.

The changes are to take place after the 2024 Paris Olympics, meaning that equestrian show jumping remains a part of the sport until then. The UIPM has not yet chosen a new sport to replace show jumping but issued a statement saying it “has opened a consultation process to identify a suitable replacement for riding.” The statement underscored that it wishes for the new sport to be “attractive and relevant to global youth” while being low cost and gender equitable. Cycling and skateboarding have been offered as possible replacements.

The reaction has been mixed. While Australia’s modern pentathlon governing body has supported the decision, many of the sports’ elite athletes have denounced it. Britain’s Joe Choong, the current men’s Olympic gold medalist for the sport, has been particularly vocal about the decision, saying that not only were current athletes not a part of the decision to remove show jumping, but they also only learned about it from reading the news reports the day after the UIPM met.

Choong states that there had been no discussion about removing show jumping prior to the meeting and claims that the voting took place in secret. UIPM board members claim pressure from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to make the sport more appealing to young people. Modern pentathlon has been a core Olympic sport since 1912. However, with growing pressure to include sports with greater accessibility, modern pentathlon’s future in the Olympic Games might be threatened because, as the IOC puts it, “riding limits participation.”

Choong believes that the UIPM’s governing board is out of touch with what their athletes believe. Prior to the vote, a UIPM Athletes Committee survey revealed that more than 75 percent of pentathletes wanted to keep show jumping as a part of their sport. However, according to Choong, during the vote, a 60-year-old board member and former athlete stated that his voice represented those of the pentathletes, an idea Choong found ludicrous.

Choong is not oblivious to the issues within his sport. In an opinion piece he wrote for InsideTheGames.biz, he believes that more attention ought to be paid to the horses’ welfare. “I would welcome communications with riding authorities like the International Equestrian Federation, who I know are interested in helping and discuss how to change the current riding format to put horse-and-athlete welfare at the forefront of changes,” he wrote.

Choong also knows that public opinion is against them, thanks in part to the viral video of German Olympian Annika Schleu crying atop her assigned horse at the Tokyo Olympic Games. However, he states that the current UIPM president has held his position for 28 years and has not addressed any of the concerns about animal welfare. He states that the way to solve the problems with show jumping isn’t to remove it, “but to face up to (the problems) and discuss them, together, to save pentathlon and save the horses.”

Modern pentathlon began as a showcase for necessary skills an elite cavalry officer would need if trapped behind enemy lines, or to deliver a message during a battle. As a sport rife with tradition, Choong and many other pentathletes believe that eliminating riding would turn it into a “weird mix of five different events.”

Changing the internal structure of the sport might also change its status as a core Olympic sport to one that only appears in rotation, as wrestling and squash were recently designated. The IOC has not yet determined its core sports for the 2028 Summer Games.

The post International Modern Pentathlon Committee Removes Show Jumping appeared first on Horse Illustrated Magazine.

Editor’s note: Since this article’s original publish date, Caitlin Gooch no longer co-hosts the Young Black Equestrians podcast.

In the opening seconds, you instantly feel the vibe. The percussive beats that mark the baseline, punctuated by different voices saying “I am…,” tell you that this is not going to be your average equestrian podcast.

For starters, there is a definite hip element, even though trendiness or edginess are not markers of the horse world, which tends to revere 19th century fox hunting and cowboy iconography. It’s clear that this is for an audience that appreciates a few modern touches. Secondly, and far more importantly, there is the announcement that it’s a podcast for and about Black equestrians.

Highlighting Black Equestrians

The equestrian world is blessed with an enormous array of breeds and disciplines, but its sense of diversity generally ends there. It is a startlingly white place without much representation from racial minorities. This can make the horse world feel insular, and regardless of intention, it can even feel unwelcoming to people of color.

This is an uncomfortable truth that many people in various equine niches are unsure of how to rectify. However, Caitlin Gooch and Abriana Johnson, the vibrant hosts of the Young Black Equestrians podcast, aspire to do just that. With each episode, they endeavor to spotlight significant Black people who live and work in assorted areas of the equine world. Whether it’s a veterinarian, a Grand Prix competitor or a barrel racer, Gooch and Johnson want to have a long conversation—quite often filled with both thoughtfulness and humor—as they learn about how their podcast guests found their place in the equestrian world.

Getting Started

Johnson says that when she and Gooch began the Young Black Equestrians podcast, their goal was simply to highlight these voices and show that there were a variety of disciplines inclusive of Black people.

“I don’t know what we expected when we started,” she says. “We just sort of jumped in.”

They began locating interview subjects through social media, Google alerts, and searches in various disciplines’ Halls of Fame. Once their podcast gained traction, people started contacting them about getting spots on their show. This led them to interview an impressively varied list of horse people: endurance rider Michelle Rosemond, polo player Brandon Rease, cutting horse champion Raven Benjamin, Olympic hopeful Ranee James, and Compton Cowboy Randy Savvy, just to name a few.

“It’s really fun to learn about others’ stories, and we’re trying to show many aspects of this industry,” says Johnson. “To us, the word ‘equestrian’ isn’t just about English riding. It’s anyone who is involved with horses.”

Meet Your Hosts of the Young Black Equestrians Podcast

Both women are young themselves at 27. Each began riding horses as children. Gooch grew up on a farm in Wendell, N.C., and developed a love of trail riding with her father. They became involved with Black saddle clubs that held trail riding events throughout the South.

“I never knew a Black woman who showed,” says Gooch. “I only knew trail riders. I’m interested in learning much more.”

Balancing Gooch’s calm demeanor, the outgoing Johnson emits a serious ants-in-the-pants sensibility. A vet tech in Zebulon, N.C., she gets straight to the point.

While Johnson began riding at age 7, she didn’t discover trail riding until high school. This is when her paradigm shifted as she attended trail rides with “literally hundreds of Black cowboys.”

Johnson’s riding life has been dominated by her love of Tennessee Walking Horses. Coco, her first horse, is still around and kicking at age 26. But trail rides can be arduous, so for those, she enlists her other Walking Horse named Maestro, a gelding she trained “from the ground up.”

Gooch, on the other hand, prefers Arabians. She still has a gray mare named Goat whom she rode as a child.

“I could never, ever leave her,” she says.

She loves trail riding, but as a busy mother with an infant and two young children, she is short on time. Her older children love riding and are busy with 4-H, so while she’s pulled in different directions, horses are still involved.

Giving Back

As a mother, Gooch has been dedicated to increasing access to the equestrian world for children. She developed the non-profit organization Saddle Up and Read, which aims to achieve two things: increase literacy rates among Black and minority children and expose these children to the joy of horses.

“I’d been wondering, ‘What can I do to give back?’” she says. “And then I stayed up late one night after a news segment about the gap in literacy rates. I went on the internet to learn more about how these children fall behind. That’s when I decided to use horses to motivate these children, and I called a local librarian.”

With her program, children check out books and have a competition to see who can read the most. Five winners are then given the opportunity to visit her farm to learn about horses.

“Many kids have never seen a horse,” Gooch says. “Many parents have never seen a horse! I’m passionate about opening that door.” Johnson, like Gooch, has also created projects to help children discover horses with her book series, Cowgirl Camryn, which she wrote and illustrated, and then self-published. The two books follow the adventures of a young Black cowgirl as she works with her herd of Miniature Horses. Johnson says more books are still to come.

Representation

Representation in the horse industry is paramount to both of them. The heart of Black Lives Matter lies in asserting that Black lives matter as much as anyone else’s life. Nobody is preaching superiority; certainly nobody is saying that only Black lives matter. What Gooch and Johnson want is the ability to carve out a space for themselves and other people of color in the equine world.

“We need to address visual aspects in the media,” she says. “Let’s look at catalogues: the models are almost always all white. Look at interviews with other professions in the industry, and you don’t see Black people. We need to normalize the idea of Black people with horses.”

“From the comments we get, people will ask ‘Why do you have to make it known that you’re Black?’” Johnson said on a recent podcast. “‘Why does it have to be Young BLACK Equestrians?’ And I’m like, ‘OK, Mr. All Lives Matter, you have no issue using that descriptor, Black, when you have a problem. So if I want to embrace that descriptor, I’m gonna be like, I am Black, and you’re going to see how much I can ride!’”

Gooch agreed. “And if we aren’t going to advocate for ourselves, then who is going to do it?”

The Future

Their goals for Young Black Equestrians include eventually creating a franchise. They dream of meet-ups and retreats where minority equestrians can network and learn from one another. They also want to continue working with children, hopefully taking kids to Grand Prix events to meet Olympic hopefuls.

“Without diversity, the horse industry will grow smaller,” says Gooch. “Who will carry on then? There has to be a push for more inclusion.”

This article about Abriana Johnson and Caitlin Gooch, hosts of the Young Black Equestrians podcast appeared in the October 2020 issue of Horse Illustrated magazine. Click here to subscribe!

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Riding can be a solitary activity. For some of us, admittedly, that’s why we love it. We welcome the opportunity to leave the office, social media, and unnecessary drama behind when we tack up and go on a hack. But the barn is a part of our life, too—not just an escape from it. Building a community can improve our experiences with our horses and deepen our sense of belonging. From teen barn rats to retired careerists, bonding at the barn and having friends and acquaintances who support you in a sport you’re all passionate about can make that riding time even more meaningful.

For many riders, bonding at the barn actually occurs at competitions. While there is nothing like the buzz of excitement from hearing your fellow barn members cheer you on or the camaraderie that follows when they cheer you up, many more opportunities exist to forge connections.

Whether your stable is a big operation or has just a few boarders, here are a few ideas to consider for bonding at the barn.

Potluck Fridays

Bring people together once every week or two to share stories of fellow horses. Break bread with the person who owns the horse that lives in the stall next to yours. “This is where we build community,” says Cornelia Gordon of Bellaire Farms in Milton, Wisc.

Learn about one another’s kids, jobs, and backgrounds, or just talk about how both of your horses spook at the same tree branch, even though you’ve taken pains to point out that it isn’t a monster. Set up picnic tables in a field or
meet at somebody’s home—there are plenty of options!

Pilates/Yoga for Equestrians

Lest we forget that we engage in a sport in which we’re pushed, pulled, bruised, stepped on, dropped, and/or thrown, this option can not only help us with social connections, but can also mitigate pain.

Middle-agers love to joke that we know we’ve lost our youth when we repeatedly discuss our physical ailments with friends. We can’t set the clock back, but we can ease the inflammation.

Developing an equestrian-focused pilates or yoga program can help you grow stronger and more confident in the saddle. There may even be a yoga or Pilates instructor at your riding club who’s willing to lead classes. You’ll find that your conversations evolve from “Oof, my back,” to “I’ve never felt better!”

Jessie Sommers of Cottonwood Riding Club in Littleton, Colo., stresses that these are very supportive environments. “These are non-judgemental situations and everyone knows what others have gone through. Everyone in these groups are people I count as friends.”

Book Club/Movie Nights

There are so many good horse books and movies available that it’s a shame to experience them alone.

Read about Seabiscuit and Secretariat. Perhaps someone in your group had a connection to these horses way back when. The same goes for movies. Host your barn buddies with big bowls of popcorn and watch documentaries such as
Buck or Harry and Snowman.

Watch some fiction and laugh when the non-horsey actors pretend they know what they’re doing, or better yet, watch real horse movies where the horses act like horses and the people in the film respect that: The Black Stallion, International Velvet, or War Horse come to mind.

Field Days

Prepare to have loads of silly fun with your horses while you engage in low-stress equestrian games.

Compete to see who can complete an obstacle course with tasks thrown in for good measure. Walk around the ring with a glass of water balanced on your horse’s hindquarters. Trot over poles while balancing a cup of tea (or a martini) in one hand. Complete in a puissance in costume. Bob for apples while in the saddle.

Consider letting some kids who only ride lesson horses try your horse out for an event, such as fastest mane and tail braiding. They’ll get to know you and your horse, and may stop by his stall to give him extra love and attention afterwards.

Heather Wallace recently moved her horse Ferrous to a new barn in New Jersey and found it difficult to make friends at first. Fortunately for her, the new barn offers opportunities for boarders to interact socially.

“The new facility holds regular barbecues and equestrian games. For someone introverted like myself, this offers a great way for me to interact with new people without a lot of pressure to perform. It’s just fun and games.”

Spending time with other horse people can open up new worlds for us. New friendships can give us the boost we need when we fi nally complete a jumping course without refusals, as well as support us through rough times that are inevitable.

These social connections can turn a barn from just a business into a tightly-knit group of horse-lovers. Providing your fellow riders with the chance to get to know one another is a crucial step in making a boarding operation a special place for everyone.

This article on bonding at the barn originally appeared in the September 2019 issue of Horse Illustrated magazine. Click here to subscribe!

The post Bonding at the Barn: Ideas for Making Horse Friends appeared first on Horse Illustrated Magazine.

Conflict is a very real part of growing up. Learning to navigate this territory can be both confusing and frustrating, but ignoring it altogether can lead to repressed anger. When it happens at the barn, the very place that is supposed to bring you joy, the situation can worsen.

So what is a barn kid to do with the drama?

1. Stay calm.

If your conflict involves you and another person, don’t escalate matters. This person might make you angry, but blowing up will only make the situation worse. Believe it or not, mouthing off or raising your voice will not make you feel better. In fact, it has the opposite effect. Studies show that these reactions can actually make you feel even more stressed. Consider talking to the person face-to-face to clear the air and move on. Bring in a third person to mediate if necessary, perhaps an adult or someone who can honestly stay neutral.

2. Tell an adult if there is bullying.

If you believe that you are the target of malicious gossip, alienation, or any sort of physical intimidation, tell your parents or a trusted grownup. They can alert the trainers and other parents. Nobody should have to face any sort of bullying, and the adults should say that type of behavior is completely unacceptable.

For your own well-being, don’t dwell on revenge or self-pity. If you begin to believe that you deserved the bullying, your self-esteem takes a major hit. Talk to somebody about this—perhaps a school counselor—and know that you deserve respect as much as everyone else.

3. If it’s not about you, stay out of it.

If there is drama between other barn kids, leave it alone. Some folks love lurking around other people’s drama. Those people don’t offer genuine solutions—they’re only there to stir the pot. Don’t be a nosy drama-tourist.

Instead, be the person who can sincerely listen to a friend who needs help solving a problem. Unless someone else’s conflict begins to affect you directly, let them work it out while you enjoy riding your horse.

4. You can be friends with everyone.

In times of conflict, friends might feel pressured to take sides. This is unfair. If a conflict doesn’t involve you, then there’s no reason you can’t say, “I like both of you and I refuse to choose between you.” This will happen more often than you may realize in your life. You don’t have to avoid certain people due to their feuds with somebody else.

5. Avoid pettiness.

Be honest with yourself: how many conflicts arise over really silly things? Somebody might have looked at you funny. Somebody else wore the same riding outfit as you. These are things you can laugh off. In a week’s time, you will have completely forgotten about them. Time at the barn is too precious to waste on something that doesn’t really matter.

6. Remember why you are at the barn in the first place.

You may have a great community at the barn, but remember that you’re there because you love horses. Whether you have your own pony or are riding lesson horses, you have a wonderful opportunity to bond with a beautiful animal who trusts you. You are learning horsemanship and responsibility as well. This is no place for riffs or tiffs!

This article originally appeared in the May/June 2019 issue of Young Rider magazine. Click here to subscribe!

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Trainer Relationship: Teaching Styles

For their part, trainers understand this experience all too well. Do they push us past our comfort zones or keep us in a safe space?

“It depends on the rider,” says Tara Gandomcar-Hieb, trainer and owner of Cottonwood Riding Club in Littleton, Colo. “Trust gets tested all the time. You have to ask yourself, ‘Is this a rider who can pull up her big girl pants, or will she break if I push her?’” As a hunter/jumper trainer for 24 years, Hieb has introduced young children to their first horses and coached riders at top Grand Prix shows. “Honestly, I’ve always believed that trainers should be studying psychology.”

Developing trust is not limited to jumping over fences. Saddle seat trainer Kris Martalock of Bellaire Farms in Milton, Wisc., agrees with Hieb’s belief about studying a rider’s mental agility.

“Being a trainer is more about being a therapist and learning your rider,” she says. “Teaching is more of a mental game than anything. Horses are the easy part.”

This means that the ways we are first introduced to horses matters intensely. Reading the rider’s body language, sensing any apprehension, as well as noting how the horse responds to the rider all fall under the list of training duties. “Once you learn your rider, you learn what kind of horse you can put them on,” says Martalock.

Hieb acknowledges that adults can be harder to train than children. “Kids have less baggage and are more trusting,” she says. “This can be a super scary sport. People fall off, and the rider has to trust the trainer to choose the appropriate horse.

Hieb points out that adults may have a reason for needing a new trainer. “Maybe a bad fall happened, maybe they were doing bigger jumps than they were ready for. Or maybe they just took time off from riding. But they bring baggage with them.”

Trainer Relationship: Varying Confidence

Heather Wallace, writer of both the best-selling book and the blog The Timid Rider believes that a rider’s confidence is directly tied to their trainer.

“The rider-trainer relationship can make or break your confidence in the saddle,” she says. “A trainer that you feel comfortable with who understands how you think is just as important as your partnership with the horse.”

Martalock, however, feels that kids can bring their own baggage. “Some kids want the drama, and sometimes there are entitlement issues,” she says. “I have some kids who cry at just about anything. Even the good riders. One girl, who can ride well, cried when someone else fell off during a lesson. Then she cried when she lost a stirrup. When she had a show this summer, I told her, ‘All I want you to do is not cry.’ She ended up winning her class.”

Whitney Brandhorst of White Blaze Equestrian in Castle Rock, Colo., has spent five years working with both adults and children. “You have to simplify what you’re doing,” she says of working with kids. “I take a slower approach with them until I can add a bit more.”

Big Shows

Working with amateur riders at an advanced level still requires that special balance of psychology and tough-trainer. Every year, Martalock takes many of her top riders to the Kentucky State Fair, the world championship show for American Saddlebreds. The atmosphere at the show buzzes to life with the excitement, but it can also bring high stress for the competitors.

“I tell them that it’s just another show, and that they’re there because they deserve to be in the arena. But the first time riders go, they often let the event take control of them. It’s so big and it gets crazy and loud in there.”

Competitions can spur our anxieties, as many of us know from firsthand experience. Sometimes the arena can feel overwhelming, and we feel that we need to ride harder or at a different pace than normal. This is where our trainer has to calm us down rather than size up the other riders.

“I tell students, ‘Don’t get so nervous that your brain shuts off, and don’t think you have to do more than you need to—just get your gaits and pretend it’s a regular show,’” says Martalock.

We may not realize all of the different hats our trainer wears, from surrogate parent and coach to bad guy and shrink. We love them, and on occasion, hate them. But without their combination of compassion and toughness, we would not have as strong a connection to the sport that sustains us.

This article originally appeared in the February 2019 issue of Horse Illustrated magazine. Click here to subscribe!

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