Horses Are For Riding
November 3, 2008 by Kristina Chew, PhD
Filed under Health
The West Side News reports on the benefits of hipportherapy for disabled children; a friend’s daughter started this sport some months ago and has been enjoying it:
….[hipportherapy's] techniques involve more than just putting a child in saddle and walking him around a riding ring.
Participants ride forward, backwards, and sideways in an effort to strengthen different muscle groups and experience the horse’s movements differently.
Something tells me you can horseback ride on a Wii, or not?
I work for a rehab hospital (The Elks) and this was one of several programs available for kids as well as adults.
[This is separate from work.] My nephew who has Williams Syndrome, we thought he wouldn’t take to this – the hugeness of horses, my nephew’s lack of depth perception (sitting on the horses), but nope! He loves riding. We have two ‘programs’ locally and one stable who is located more rurally. Actually all three are rural, but the third is a considerable distance from Boise while two are “in the valley.”
Therapeutic horseback riding is fabulous! I am a neurologist, and rider (and thus admittedly biased
), and I have a number of young patients on the autistic spectrum who have done wonderfully with riding. Many aspects of it are beneficial, from the sensory stimulation of the horse’s movements to the emotional rewards that come from taking care of the horse. Plus, you feel like the Queen (or King) of the World when you are up on a horse, regardless of your age or neurologic status. I have known kids to really come alive when on the horse, such they they were open to learning in ways that they hadn’t been in other environments. It is great for self-confidence, too.
The one caveat is that the hippotherapist know what he/she is doing. Someone who is either a physical therapist or is involved with NARHA (North American Riding for the Handicapped Association, or something like that) is preferable.
It’s a blast
Indeed, horse riding can be great therapy for people with autism.
The main hurdle (if you pardon the pun) to face here is to avoid treating horse riding by a person with autism as automatically therapy.
Sometimes it’s good to see it as something done for enjoyment, rather than something done to tick boxes and raise AMPS scores.
We’ve thought about horseback riding for Charlie before but, indeed, for enjoyment first and foremost.
Isn’t enjoyment therapeutic?
What the previous commenters have said.
Riding wii style — nope. Not equivalent.
Having met Charlie his own self — I don’t know if he would take to it or not. Given his love for bicycling, he may.
Here’s something about riding horses — it is a rhythmic activity. Horses have gaits — patterns of foot placement. The horse’s walk is a 4-beat pattern, trot in a 2-beat pattern, and canter is a 3 beat motion. If you are sitting on the horse and following the horse’s motion, your pelvis is moving in a way it doesn’t if you are just walking.
Some breeds of horse popular in hippotherapy have one or two additional gaits. Icelandic horses “tolt” and Peruvian Pasos have 2 speeds of a lateral gait.
Peer-reviewed reseach on the benefits of hippotherapy mostly have to do with cerebral palsy (increasing mobility and so forth).
Were Charlie to take up horseback riding for fun, pleasure, and a bit of therapy, I’d imagine he’d eventually be expected to be in full control of his (well-trained) mount, just as he is his bicycle.
Charlie is a man of few words. So are horses. It might be a good fit.
We’re actually leaving for hippotherapy in a couple hours. Kayla’s been doing hippo for 1 1/2 years now. Since Kayla also has Down syndrome in addition to autism, most of the positive effects we’ve seen has been in the gross motor skills area.
“Isn’t enjoyment therapeutic?”
Indeed, but therapy isn’t always enjoyable. At least if its not done right.
Doing something for a couple of hours a week because you enjoy it is a lot better than doing it because you’ve been told to.
As long as you keep the same focus you have now, you’ll get on well.
I’ve personally found riding very helpful at getting me out of the house and making me feel great for a while after. It’s at RDA so the American equivalence would be NARHA possibly. I went today and got to ride without been lead for the first time in a sand area.