The therapeutic value for deeply troubled and disabled people in working with horses is becoming increasingly recognised. Therapists working with survivors of emotional, physical and sexual abuse have discovered that working with the right sort of horses can have a genuinely helpful and calming effect, enabling fixations on past and painful events to be overcome and evoking positive experiences.
There have been horses at Crag House farm for centuries, and at Caring For Life we see them not just as work animals but believe they can help in mending and healing the lives of some of the people we care for. Just being around horses and stroking them reduces stress levels and increases ones sense of wellbeing. People who struggle to cope with relationships can engage on a non-verbal level with a horse, this is very therapeutic. Horses are non-judgmental, they have no motives or expectations and they give back the love and affection they receive. Working alongside them can be a wonderful confidence building experience.
Caring For Life’s Equestrian project is proving to be highly successful in providing a vital therapy for those with emotional and mental health issues. Similarly, now that we have equipped our horses with disabled accessible carts, we are now able to offer a disabled riding facility, which is enabling those in our care who have a physical disability to achieve a huge sense of accomplishment and fulfillment as well as a sense of responsibility in caring for the horses themselves.
Our four current Equestrian project Leaders are all highly qualified individuals each having their own fields of specialization and expertise. Together they form a formidable team of riding and driving experience. Reuben and Carla are both RDA qualified driving instructors and the Equestrian Project at Caring For Life is now registered with the RDA and recognised as an approved RDA establishment. Reuben comes from a farming background in Cumbria, where he and his family have been sheep farmers.
Reuben’s has had over 25 years experience of handling and driving horses, in particular the huge Shire horses, so popular in Yorkshire, where Reuben worked as a professional driver of heavy horses, serving as head of the driving team at Samuel Smith’s breweries for over 25 years. He is a greatly respected and experienced gentleman in training and handling Shire horses. He has brought a unique dimension to the training hand handling of our horses for driving, and has trained not only the Shires but also the smaller but marvelous and amazingly strong Dales Ponies.
Carla began riding at the age of 5, and continued throughout her childhood in South Africa. On returning to Britain she did her BHS stages 1 to 4 at Brinsbury College in West Sussex. She then followed this with a Masters degree in Equine Science at Imperial College London. After that she rode and trained horses professionally in several different types of yards, including polo, dressage and competition. Carla is a very competent horse woman, and is experienced in the methods of horse training, called ‘Join Up’ that we have adopted at Caring For Life, as developed by the famous Monty Roberts.
Graham began his life-long relationship with horses in the army where he served as Lance Corporal of horse in Knightsbridge Mounted Regiment, then Armagh NI and Detmold Germany, moving on into the police as a mounted officer in West Hampstead then Great Scotland Yard them on to Imber Court Mounted Branch Training Establishment, on retiring from the Police Graham took up a post working for Her Majesty the Queen in caring for the breeding mares and young stock at the Royal Paddocks at Hampton Court. Like Reuben, Graham brings a lifetime of experience of working with horses and training people to Caring For Life.
Caring For Life is greatly privileged to have such an extraordinarily diverse, well qualified, experienced and competent equestrian staff team, who complement each other perfectly in developing our Equestrian Project.
There are many elements in the care of horses, all of which are important and have enormous value, each making its own unique contribution to the equestrian project. The time spent in riding or driving is often perceived as the most exciting and rewarding. It has obvious benefits in terms of confidence building, enjoyment and achievement.
However, equally important with regard to the therapeutic value of working with the horse are handling, grooming and daily stable routines, and of course groundwork, all of which are essential in building relationships between horse and carer. Crucially of course, the recipients of our care at Caring For Life become the ‘carers’ in their relationship with the horses.
In learning to care for animals, project participants learn the importance of regular and consistent care. A sense of responsibility is thus created within people who have only ever felt neglected and insignificant. Participants are given the opportunity to enjoy and develop a breadth of experience in stable management tasks.
Project Beneficiaries
Each day this project has 6 full time project beneficiaries with 15 others currently attending on a weekly basis including four who are wheelchair users. We are currently working towards expanding the project to include up to 8 full time project beneficiaries and up to 40 others attending on a weekly basis.
An increasing number of people are coming to us with a variety of disabilities, many of whom are asking to become more involved with our equestrian project.
Recognising the need to address mobility issues and exploring ways of enabling greater access to our equestrian project, we contacted the RDA who put us in touch with a local RDA establishment. They have been extraordinarily helpful and as we have previously indicated, we at Caring For Life have now launched into an entirely new area of ministry, expanding our facilities to include riding and driving for disabled people.
We have recently purchased a wheelchair accessible minibus to transport those wishing to come to this and other projects at Caring For Life. This service has proved to be vital in enabling people to access our RDA facilities. The vehicle can carry up to 6 wheelchairs and 6 able bodied passengers at any time or 2 wheelchairs and of course more able bodied passengers as needs demand on a day to day basis.
We have a four-wheeled cart, fully accessible to wheel chair users as both passengers and drivers. It has been designed by the manufacturer in the closest cooperation with us, and is ideally suited to the requirements of our present group of wheel chair users.
The Equestrian Project has seen new developments over the past year and we are thrilled to have a team of good-natured horses. In the past we have noted how a horse will come with quirks to its nature, developed earlier in life, which means that handling is not always straightforward. Rather like the people who have come to 
Caring For Life for help and care, who have not had a loving start in life, it takes time and patience to enable them to believe that they are in a safe place where they can begin again.
Caring For Life’s Equestrian project is proving to be highly successful in providing a vital therapy for those with emotional and mental health issues. Similarly, we hope to enable those in our care who have a physical disability, to achieve a sense of responsibility, achievement and fulfillment. We have already seen how this can be and indeed has been a ‘life changing’ experience for participants in the project.
One of our major problems is the restriction that weather conditions have had on the project. We have had to cancel beneficiaries coming in on many occasions, and in 2010 we had to cancel on no less than 97 days out of the 250 days that he project was open to beneficiaries, that is a loss of nearly 40% of our potential project time.
It has become clear that a covered school is essential if we are going to maximise both the financial value and efficiency of the project, but much more important is the impact on the therapeutic and emotional value of the project to the participants. Moreover, we have discovered that when cancelling the activity for someone who is confined to a wheelchair, the effects can be very much more distressing than for an able bodied person. On occasions individuals have lost up to 5 consecutive weeks activities at a time, and that has been deeply distressing for them, this being the highlight of their week.
The building of a suitable arena for riding and driving is essential.
Caring For life is therefore trying to raise sufficient funds to build an arena that will accommodate driving and riding for able bodied and disabled riders and drivers. That will enable us to extend our facilities by 40% and also to offer evening sessions as well.
The indoor school will have to be large enough to house both riding but also driving, and driving of our ponies but also our Shire horses.
The horses at Crag House Farm on the Caring For life Equestrian Project.
At present we have ten horses on the farm: four Shire mares, three Dales ponies and one Section A and one Section D Welsh Mountain pony and one lone gelding. Our horses are chosen for their calm temperament and quiet disposition.
Two of our Shires, Minnie and Tilly, are bay and they are half-sisters, so it is important to us that we keep them together.
At present they are being trained to long-rein, harrow and drive as a pair.
Due to years of neglect Minnies hind legs are still difficult to lift but there is gradual improvement. Tilly has come full circle from only just allowing us to shoe her to being one of the quietest horses we have to shoe.
These two horses are both truly ‘gentle giants’ and Minnie also loves to be ridden. She nearly always has her ears forward and is very safe and quiet to ride. Both horses love being groomed and are very affectionate with everyone.
Grace, our youngest Black Shire mare has been with us since she was a yearling. Now five, she has been trained to ride and drive, and is very gentle and willing.
May, our other black Shire and the tallest of the horses, had a filly foal on the 1st of July last year. The delivery was difficult but thanks to Reuben and his experience the end result was successful and the foal is called ‘Ruby’ after our man (Reuben) who made a success of a very difficult situation..
May has now returned to work and she is gradually becoming fitter, she is an experienced driving horse who is also schooled to ride.
Temperament is hugely important to us at Caring For Life, and the great thing about breeding our own horses, is that we can ensure from the start that they are treated with kindness and gentleness, which enables a good bond of trust between horse and rider, driver, groom or trainer, but treated with firmness so that they are not spoilt and are not allowed to develop bad habits such as nipping and biting or indiscipline.
Our young Dales pony Midnight had an accident to her offside hind leg late in 2010 and after a few nights at the vet and a lot of TLC, she is making a full recovery and we have recently started work with her again. She is making amazing progress with our experienced driving Dales pony Holly. Both ponies are very gentle and affectionate and Midnight, (the taller of the pair) has now been broken in to ride and is enjoying learning lots of new things.
We also have a little white Welsh Section ‘A’ pony mare, Vanity. She was a show pony in her earlier days. Vanny’ , as she is affectionately named, has perfect manners, is very sweet tempered and has paces like an angel. She is safe to e handled by anyone of any age, and enjoys lots and lots of cuddles from those in our care.
Everyone loves her because she’s not an intimidating size and is such a character. Reuben calls her Donkey because she reminds him of the donkey off Shrek! Especially when she climbs up the stable door to see over the top, very cute! She is too small to be ridden by any one in our care, but does drive as well as ride.
A new addition to the family last summer was Starlight, more often known as ‘Star.’ She is a bright bay in summer and her winter coat is a lovely deep colour bay. She was very nervous in her first weeks here but she has settled down really well and has become one of our quietest horses. She has fantastic paces and often appears to be floating along, she’s absolutely beautiful, and a real ‘lady’! She loves being around people, and enjoys being groomed and hugged.
Another recent addition to our family is Maisie who at only 13 hands is our smallest Dales mare. She was very kindly donated to us, having had some leg problems as a youngster, she has now been backed and broken in, and is proving to be ideal for the sort of work we need her to do. She is very affectionate and loves being groomed and handled.
We have to keep safety as a top priority here at Caring For Life, and even some good horses would no be suitable for our needs, especially as we have now moved into the sphere of caring for disabled people on this project.
When horses move from a familiar surrounding to an unfamiliar one it takes time for them to settle, and the personality portrayed in the first few weeks or months is not necessarily a fair representation of what the horses can become when they properly settle into a quiet routine.
The latest horse to join us at Caring For Life is Ypres. A magnificent gelding, who on retirement for he Metropolitan Police Service at Imber Court, was brought to us. He is a horse with a very distinguished career, having served in many areas and even won a most prestigious award for this courage. He was on duty at the Queen Mother’s funeral, and has impeccable manners, being trained to an incredibly high standard. His complete trustworthiness and advanced schooling makes him a perfect gentlemen for people with any disabilities to ride. The 9 mares he has joined have all ‘fallen in love with him’ and he is enjoying what must be the perfect retirement for an old gentleman horse. Loved by all and admired by mares and riders alike!
Our daily routine varies according to the time of year and the weather as the horses live outside at night. We try to bring all of the horses in most days to the stables to be fed, groomed, checked over and then handled or worked with by the staff and people we care for. Some people need more assistance with tasks than others, so we are always grateful for or looking out for volunteers to be “Buddies” which would help us extend the project and offer places to more people.
Caring for, and working with horses offers all sorts of rewards, we have already been amazed by the therapeutic outcome in the lives of some of the very damaged people we are trying to help and we are sure that as this project develops further we will see more and more people benefit from this marvellous therapeutic project.
The major targets for the equestrian project are going to be the provision of a new stabling block incorporating facilities for all our horses, the provision of an exerciser to enable horses to be kept indoors in inclement weather but still exercised and the provision of a round exercise pen, and also finally the provision of an indoor school, to enable the project to run for 52 weeks of the year in all weather conditions. This would make a huge difference to the service that we can offer. It is simply unacceptable for people with severe mobility issues to make the effort to come to Caring For Life and then for their long and excitedly awaited morning of driving or riding to be cancelled because of weather conditions. In 2010 we lost 115 days to inclement weather. So our arena is an absolute priority.
