At Unbridled Way Forward, Amanda Graham provides a space for senior horses to be co-facilitators for herd meditations, equine assisted therapy, and workshops of the like. The money raised here goes to the care of these horses as they continue to offer care for everyone who takes part in these individual and group offerings.
I’m supporting Unbridled Way Forward because I have first hand experienced the profound effect this special place offers to the community Amanda Graham has built.
I was first introduced to equine assisted therapy when a beloved family member passed away unexpectedly. It was the first time as an adult that I was grieving someone who had passed. Sitting on a couch in my therapist’s office wasn’t providing me the proper space I needed to really enter into my grief; I had nowhere to put it or all of the emotions that grief inevitably gives permission to rise to the surface. A few folks recommended equine assisted therapy. I was living in New York at the time and found a local rescue and riding center that had an older gelding who could use some company once a week, and it turns out I needed the company, too. Over the next few months I would go and spend time with him, not realizing the bigger impact was that he was giving me his time, too.
In moving to North Carolina, I was told about Unbridled Way Forward, and found myself at a Herd Meditation, which allowed me the space and permission to continue to face and name some interpersonal work I was doing, but had felt stuck in. I have since been back for more Herd Meditations and a group workshop on grief. All of the work I have done here with Amanda and her herd have only been possible because of the safe space they all facilitate.
This program serves any clients that find their way to Unbridled Way Forward, whether they are seeking individual care or group workshops. The work of Amanda and this special herd makes healing possible in a way traditional talk therapy doesn’t always reach or have the capacity to hold.
These senior horses are the greatest gift givers. For the first part of life their labor and care takes its physical form in therapeutic riding, and in the golden years of their life their new form of care is in them holding space. Holding space for us to wander and wonder and grieve and process. What gifts they are to us, and how can we best give back to them, and the ones that care for them, in return? Funds raised will support the ongoing care that is involved with senior horses.
