Equine Therapy

Therapies

Equine Therapy

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Burning Tree Ranch conducts a 6-person, 6-week equine therapy course for our clients. While participants do not physically ride the horses, they do engage with, tend to, and interact with these intuitive and perceptive animals.

EQUINE THERAPY FOR THE CHRONIC RELAPSER

Equine Therapy is used in a variety of ways to assist the chronic relapser on their path to recovery. At Burning Tree Ranch, our clients begin engaging in Equine therapy around 60-90 days into their treatment episode. Their experience at Equine Therapy assists them in gaining self-awareness, growing distress tolerance, practicing honesty, and building trust.

Primarily, it helps our clients engage in healthy and honest relationship building. Horses will not comfort you like dogs or other pets, horses function as a mirror. This fosters an environment for authenticity and healthy risk-taking in which clients can thrive and learn skills they can take into other areas of life.

Meghan Bohlman, Clinical Director
“The benefits of Equine Therapy are vast. For our clients particularly, it helps assist with symptoms of trauma. Other benefits are improved communication skills, adaptability, and distress tolerance.”
Meghan Bohlman, LPC, LCDC, EMDR-Trained, Clinical Director

BENEFITS OF EQUINE-ASSISTED THERAPY

Led by our clinical director, Meghan Bohlman, LPC, LCDC, equine therapy provides our clients an opportunity to experience themselves through the lens of an unbiased and non-judgmental creature, the horse.

Horses are highly social animals. Each one has its own character traits, its own personality and demeanor. Similar to humans, horses require that we earn their trust, respect, and attention. Developing a good relationship with the horse demands effort.

During Equine Therapy, our clients get to find out what they are willing to bring to the relationship with the horse, and what they want in return. This exercise helps the chronic relapser look more deeply at what they want their human relationships to look like.

Brook McKenzie, COO
“We encourage clients to observe what the horse might be communicating to us as it observes our own behavior. In contrast, what does our behavior communicate to our families, our peers, and ourselves that we might not be conscious of? Equine therapy helps our clients grow in their self-awareness.”
Brook McKenzie, LCDCI, Chief Operating Officer

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