It’s hard enough teaching young, able-bodied and able-minded students to ride horses, and it’s a whole different ballgame altogether teaching disabled students to ride. Fortunately, I’m not necessarily responsible for teaching the students I assist when I volunteer at Pegasus Farms on Monday nights. But I am working with them one on one and am [...]

Posted in Jackie's Thoughts, Therapeutic Riding 4 Comments »

Many of the students who ride at Pegasus Farm, a therapeutic horseback riding facility in northeast Ohio, are autistic. They are also some of our most challenging students. Actually, the handful of students I work with on a regular basis when I’m volunteering are autistic. Because of the nature of their disability, I think they [...]

Posted in Making a Difference, Therapeutic Riding 11 Comments »

T is quickly becoming one of my favorite — albeit challenging — students at the Pegasus therapeutic horseback riding farm where I volunteer every Monday night. I’ve chronicled her progress for a while.

A November lesson
 January and February - an overview of T

March - continued improvement

For those of you who’ve been following T, Micah, and me, [...]

Posted in Therapeutic Riding 3 Comments »

It was a pretty successful week for several of the students at the Pegasus Farm therapeutic riding facility where I volunteer every Monday.  The week started off with the rider/volunteer appreciation banquet on Sunday night. I discovered that several of our Monday night riders have been students at Pegasus for over 20 years! And this [...]

Posted in Making a Difference, Therapeutic Riding 4 Comments »

Monday was another cold night for volunteering at Pegasus Farms, a therapeutic horseback riding facility in northeast Ohio. We were short on volunteers, and had barely enough to cover classes. Typically, we have enough people that a few can stay behind and do barn work while the rest are in class. This week, we were [...]

Posted in Jackie's Thoughts, Therapeutic Riding 7 Comments »

T is one of our most difficult students in the Monday night therapeutic riding groups at Pegasus Farms. I talked about working with her a while ago in the Therapeutic Riding Chronicles.
T is an adult student who has been riding at Pegasus for years. Randy, the Monday night instructor, told me that ages ago T [...]

Posted in Jackie's Thoughts, Making a Difference, Therapeutic Riding 5 Comments »

In my years of work with horses both as a riding instructor and therapeutic riding volunteer, I’ve been privileged to meet and work with children and adults suffering from cerebral palsy. Their brains don’t function well enough to entirely control their bodies, but they have big hearts, beautiful smiles, and caring personalities. They also have [...]

Posted in Therapeutic Riding 6 Comments »