Dianne asked me this question.
In May I purchased a cobxtrotter 5 year gelding. aged 4 he was in an accident on the road in driving trap. This has obviously left him very traumatised and he was turned away in a field for six months although he had an injury to his muscles in his groin (which were not dealt with at the time but he has now been treated by a horse sports therapy lady as he was one-tenth lame so he is not now in pain and sound and beginning gradual straight line work. He was backed to ride in Jan 2009 by the lady I bought him from. He is friendly, likes people and is good to hack alone, company, no problem to mount up and not nervous of rider in the saddle. He had two panic attacks with me on him, started off by noises behind him. He bolted and bucked until I came off on both occasions. He has panic attacks. Can you advise if he can get over this traumatic experience.
When I get horses it to retrain after traffic accidents or that are terrified of certain things like tractors ,then we go about it by reversing the pressure. The panic/flight mode which is deeply instilled in any horse comes to the fore at momments of fright or perceived fear. All horses will instinctively turn and run away from the noise, image or imagined threat. If your horse lacks self confidence in any way then even the armour-plated,Teradactyl type sparrow may cause an unexpected shy or threat to bolt. This inturn can frighten the rider, who will most probably react badly themselves…..usually by grabbing the reins(causing an afirmation for the fear)… this is usually an instinctive reaction from the rider too. Can you start to see a pattern imerge? No one is at fault here. The rider has to do whatever they can to gain control back.
We work our horses through the natural system ground work to gain their respect and their trust. Next we start to set up scenario`s which will potentially cause the flight response. We get the horse to face the fear and take 1 step towards it…at the same time the “fear” itself will move away. The more the horse gains confidence towards the object or noise, the more it moves away. The horse ends up feeling empowered because it has faced the fear and pushed or chased it away! We then build on this over the days to real life situations. Always praising the horse for making the right decisions. This method anyone can do at home but please feel free to ring me for advise before you attempt this at home.
This blog was posted on Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
July 10th, 2010 at 5:08 am
The phobia of driving a vehicle is an horrible affliction – virtually self-feeding. Athough the avoidance of being behind the wheel supplies the sufferer a sense of safety, a positive sensation, if you will, which nurtures the anxiety. And of course, the ultimate result is often times remoteness from signficant relationships – face it, we reside in an downtown sprawl modern society and it will take some sort of vehicles to physically get in touch. Thankfully, you will find treatments that can help folks escape. Thanks very much for taking time to write you blog as this is a very important topic!