THREE STORIES ABOUT HORSES
by Joseph Freeman
This article explores the process that horses go through when they receive a Structural Integration series as well as the perceptions that guided the practitioner’s progress. The paper explores the experience of working on beings who cannot verbalize the results but whose progress can be measured by structural assessment and movement gains before and after the series. Included are assessments of and responses to the work by the horses’ owners who provided descriptions of their progress.
THE THREE HORSES
* Dat Hickory, four year old stud colt. 16 hands (5′ 4” at top of spine), bay quarter horse who sustained multiple injuries to his hind end at one and two years of age.
* Nick, ten year old gelding, 17 hands, bay thoroughbred racehorse being retrained as an eventing horse. He possessed structural holding patterns that limited his performance.
* Q, four year old gelding. 17 hands, pinto warmblood who suffered a devastating injury at age three.
Writing case studies on horses is challenging. Case studies seek to generate relevant quantifiable data for evaluation with the intent to prove or disprove a hypothesis. I spent some time trying to contrive the means to quantify the efficacy of equine SI work. I thought about comparing scores earned by horses in competition, comparing pre SI scores to post SI scores, but the overabundance of variables during competition makes this unrealistic.
I thought about measuring Range of Motion (ROM) and rejected this because, while it is quantifiable, it’s also subjective. Horses can be nervous creatures and they don’t always respond to new activities with alacrity. In fact they often balk and that would affect the beginning measurements and probably falsely improve the measurements post SI.
Finally I asked myself how I presently measure the effectiveness of the work. That led me to ask the following questions:
Does the series result in greater ROM for the horses?
Do horses demonstrate greater athleticism and confidence after a series?
Do their competition scores go up?
All this is true, yet is it measurable in an objective manner? That last question was the one most challenging. In fact, I’m not sure it’s even important in the context of the measure of satisfaction they bring to the life of the client who provides the means for the sessions. Client satisfaction is filled with variables, completely subjective, yet is of utmost importance. With that said, I’d like to discuss my experience with three representative horses who’ve had the Structural Integration series.
During the series I am aware of shifts in tissue as we progress. Equally importantly, I watch and feel them sensing me as I work. As a prey animal, they have to tender their trust quite far to let me into their tissue as far as I need to work. The SI work is sometimes difficult at the outset as they assess what I am doing with them, yet it is also sincere and must also be gentle enough for 1 them to accept. I come away from this pairing intimately knowing the stories of their lives and often adding a chapter to my own.
This work also nurtures connection, often making horses more open and responsive to people, creating something the owner didn’t know was possible. The horse and I both end the series knowing each other very well.