Horse Hugs
My journey into horse therapy started in 1999 when I bought my first Miniature horses . I loved how sweet their personalities were and how happy they made people feel . Having been recently diagnosed with MS , and dealing with the pain and fatigue that MS brings , I knew what a calming effect they could have on people .
In the beginning we visited hospitals , Cancer Centers , Ronald McDonald Houses , all types of senior facilities , worked with Autistic children and even went to a prison . We enjoyed all these visits but later decided to concentrate mostly on visiting seniors and hospital and hospice patients .
Our main goal is to visit the same places over and over . We feel that to visit once is nice but to continually go back to the same places , gives patients something to look forward to . It also helps to facilitate family visits . Children and grandchildren love to come and see the horses also , so it ’ s a win for everyone . When we visit memory care facilities we take photos of anyone who would like one and print them to give them as a gift . A photo will help them relive the experience and allow them to show their families that they did “ indeed ” have a horse in their room !
Horse Hugs is always looking for volunteers to help with our program . Check us out at - http :// www . horsehugs . net or on Facebook- https :// www . facebook . com / horsehugs .
We have three trained therapy horses in our program , Sid , Carmen and Teddy . They are all familiar with going in elevators , up and down stairs , and in and out of hospital rooms . All three will lift up their right front leg and “ shake ” on command which delights everyone we visit . Our big news for 2016 is we have a new foal who will be joining us at the end of the summer . He is only a week old but already has the perfect therapy horse personality .
We are hoping to make some big changes to Horse Hugs this year . It has become harder for me to load and pull a trailer so we are hoping to do some fundraising and buy a van . This will make it easier for any volunteer to drive and also allow us to continue visits in the summer when the horse trailer is too hot for our little horses . We are a 501c3 charity , an all volunteer group based in North Carolina .
JUNE / JULY 2016 Miniature Horse World 25