Who's the boss?

Day 6. Sam wants to be the boss. Sam attempted to push us back when we became taller than him. While standing on a mounting block, Sam pushed us back, so we wouldn't be taller than him. He wanted to show us that he was going to be the leader. We just vamped up our energy, showing him that we would be the "lead horse." After a bit of a power struggle in this manner, he accepted, at least for now, that we were going to be the leader. I am sure more power struggles will ensue before our time is done. These are normal, it happens in nature, and with Sam being a true Mustang, he would have participated in many of these battles. The battles are the determining factors in setting the ranks of the herd. Despite the power struggle, Sam was still relatively respectful of us. This is nice, and not very common.

Besides this power struggle, Sam did some actual learning. We re-introduced the bareback pad to him with wonderful results. After a few minutes of rubbing the pad all over him, he accepted the fact that it would not hurt him. Sam then allowed us to set the bareback pad on top of his back for a few minutes. After the took a big sigh and started chewing, we removed the pad. The sigh and chewing are a sign that he has learned something new. These signs are an outward representation of the acceptance of something new.

Sam also got to learn a new game. The 'move your butt around and then your front' game. He is such a fast learner, he mastered this so quickly, it will be difficult to provide this amazing horse with something to challenge his mind. We like to use this "game" to draw their focus back to us, particularly if we are out someplace new or unfamiliar. 

Sam also further mastered a more challenging aspect of ground work. When we work them, we like to stand in one spot in the middle of the circle and face one direction. We do not move our feet to turn and look at the horse for the duration of the circle, when they go behind our backs, they know we can not see them. This is the opportunity they usually take advantage of by stopping or slowing down, but Sam did not do that today, he kept his pace all the way around the circle. Sam is great.

Sam, like most horses, is fearful of things with lots of energy being around him, so we jump up and down and try to keep the energy up until he accepts that we are not going to hurt him. At this point, he probably thinks we are crazy. Horses can also be timid when it comes to people leaning on them, Sam is no exception to this. He is now at the point in his training that he will need to adapt to these types of contact. Sam needs to acclimate himself to this type of contact, be cause the next step in his training his leaning over his back and applying a little weight.

The next post will be a detailed description of the therapies Sam has been enrolled in and a set of pictures, the results of week one. He is in color, crystal, aroma, and energy therapies. The aroma and energy therapy are utilized on an as needed bias.

Thank you Sam for being so accepting of all the strange things we are doing. Hopefully the next phase of your training will be more interesting to you.

Relaxation

Day 5. Sam got to relax on Day 5. We like to incorporate a day like this in after Sam has learned a fair amount of new information. This gives him time to reflect on and absorb everything he has learned in the last few days. We will like try to do this once a week, but it will be hard considering we only have three months to get him ready. If we push Sam to quickly he may burn out and not want to work with us, that is why these types of days are so important. He has done so well and been SO cooperative that he deserves a day of rest anyway.

Hi Sam. I hope you enjoyed your day off, I know you ate a lot, and probably slept a lot. Sorry, but vacation is over, its back to work for Day 6.

Sam's Fourth Day

Day 4. Sam had an easy day four, in a manner of speaking. He had a play session. Before we got Sam out to work with him, he seemed happy and enthusiastic, ready for a new day, a new lesson. We worked Sam at liberty. This means while he was in the round pen, he worked without a lead-line attached. he walked, trotted, and even loped in a circle for us, without a lead-line. He is SO inspiring, he trys and is so eager to learn new things. All Sam did when we asked him to lope was throw in a few bucks, mostly out of excitement to be going at speed.

Sam reminds me a an elementary student in his first week of school. The first day he was nervous and slightly hesitant, the second day he was still adjusting, but by the third say he starts to get comfortable. When day four finally approaches, he is excited about what is going to happen; he is eager to learn and experience!

Sam is afraid of fly spray. We didn't know he would be afraid of that, but it was a possibility. We thought he could be a bit hesitant, we were not quite ready for him to be deathly afraid. By the end of the fly spray ordeal, he would stand for a couple of drops being dribbled out of the bottle. We will work on this, and make sure Sam doesn't get bitten by too many bugs.

Despite this new information, Sam already has everything he has learned in the three previous days mastered. He was much more willing to pick up his feet for us to hold for a few seconds. Sam, you are ready for more. That is why we then introduced Sam to our favorite item in the barn, the bareback pad. It was good to see Sam was very curious about the pad. It looks just like any other pad to go under a saddle, but it is a bit grippier on top and has a girth that can be attached to it. We are hoping to see Sam allow us to set it on his back for a couple of minutes on Thursday(his day six). We will not try to attach the girth, because we do not want to scare him or rush into it. This could scare Sam very badly if we rush it. The bareback pad is the first step in getting Sam to allow us to saddle him.

Well Sam, you are doing SO well and you are SO cooperative. Thank you for being so great. You will have day five off, because we have to go to a meeting, and you could probably use a day to process all the great new stuff you have learned or experienced.

Those Little Accomplishments

Day 3. Sam is so amazing! He has already learned to trust while going through his stall gate. He walked through his gate beautifully, without fear. He is going to move along extremely quickly in his training.

Sam even went over his agility jump in both directions! Going left and right, his gates were easier and more natural. Sam took his jump going to the left wonderfully. To the right, however, Sam took his jump out of his natural flight response. The subsequent jumps to the right were much easier, he was still unsure, but he trusted us enough not to run off after he jumped. Wow. In just one day Sam has moved from "No, I'd really rather not do that!" to "Well, if you want me to, I'll try." on things that require great amounts of trust.

Sam's previous foster home said he didn't cooperate very well with the farrier. Taking this into consideration, we started work with his feet. We try to pick up his feet and hold onto them for a bit, just to make our farrier's job easier when he comes. We figure if he will let us hold them for a while, he might let the farrier too. Sam allowed us to pick up his front feet and hold each of them for a few seconds. In situations like this, it is crucial to remember: these animals do not have to let us do anything, but they allow us to, so we need to treat them with respect.

The Scars. These are a (figuratively) touchy place for him. Though he allows us to physically touch the scars, he has a lot of emotional baggage attached to them. Through reiki and other forms of energy work, we are trying to let him release this baggage. It seems to be working. Even though it is only a little bit at a time, he is releasing  his emotional baggage, and it is lightening up his eyes and face, but most importantly, his soul. We will keep working with him to release as many of the emotions tied to the scars as possible, but it will take time for him to be ready to release them. Sam has to be ready to rid himself of those emotions before we can do anything to help with that. We can help get him ready by proving a safe and loving home to nurture his soul.

Sam, you are so gentle and have such a beautiful, gentle, and loving soul. Thank you for opening up to us.

'Wonderful Work' or 'Work in Progress'?

I guess now would be a good time to address the title of this blog. 'Wonderful Work in Progress' actually has multiple meanings.

'Wonderful Work' in Progress. This meaning refers to the type of work my mother does with the holistic healing of horses, and occasionally other animals. She practices nutrition balancing, reiki, crystals, energy work, aroma therapy, and equine acupressure with laser light therapy. Sam will be receiving all of these I am sure, just as every other horse that lives/visits with us. The horses' bodies tend to respond very well to these treatments, usually much better than to the methods of traditional veterinarian practices.

The other meaning is: Wonderful 'Work in Progress.' This meaning is the most representative of our mission. Sam is a 'work in progress' and he is SO wonderful. He will only become more so as time passes on.

Now you can see why I titled this blog as I did, if it was not clear before. Thank you Sam for opening up my eyes and inspiring me.

Sam's Second Day

Oh Sam! You are full of surprises!

A good question came up in the comments, about how we communicate with the animals. Before I go on to Sam's Day 2 I will address this.
First of all "we" is my mother and I. After one of our most precious horses became ill and would not heal, we started our still continuing journey of learning the holistic healing. In the years since, my mother took/takes classes and has certifications in various holistic healing ventures and passes on her knowledge to me. We were always just ordinary people, no special gifts really- at least concerning this- other than just being observant when it comes to horses. My mother has always loved the horses more than anything else, but I am more connected to the canines. I have always had a special connection with all animals and the holistic healing path has certainly been easier for me to grasp, especially when working with the energies. However, my mother was/is very diligent in her learning and has mastered the communication pretty well. She was even able to help locate a missing cat she had never even seen.
I am telling you this to prove anyone can do it, it does not take being born "special" to do these things. All that is required is the desire to communicate with your animals and the openness to believing YOU CAN communicate with your animals. Here is a link with everything you need to communicate with your animals: http://www.pet-health-advisor.com/howtocommunicatewithanimals.html.

http://www.pet-health-advisor.com will give you other information on the holistic healing process and the many methods that can be used or combined to help your animals, whether they be horses or anything else.
Now, on to Sam. We started  ground work and he is an amazingly quick learner. He already, in only about an hour or so, will walk and trot on the line in both directions. He respects the circle fairly well and seems to try at anything we ask him to do. We asked him to go between the fence and a pole, while jumping over a small jump. We use this small jump to help build up the muscles he has lost, particularly those in his butt and legs, it is not meant to make him jump anything high, just an agility exercise. Anyway, he jumps just fine, going one direction. In the other direction, he presents a bit of refusal, not so much out of fear, but uncomfort. Sam is not sure, yet, that he will be safe in the tight space. But, given that he would go through the same space and jump in the other direction, I am led to wonder whether something happened to him while he had that side of his body facing people, or if his eyesight may not be quite as good on that side of his body. He hesitated a little but not too much on the other direction. We will get this worked out, he is not being exceptionally fearful, just pretty unsure, as his trust grows in us, we can grow with him as people and we will be able to 'jump' every hurdle thrown our way.

The next new bit of knowledge we learned was that Sam's tight spaces issue applies to gates as well. We were hoping he was just extra nervous on his first day, but this seems to not be the case. Sam speeds through gates, but not disrespectfully- he trys not to run us over- but he is scared. I think this may not only stem from his cruelty case, but maybe even when he was ripped from his home on the free range. The Bureau of Land Management took many free Mustangs off of the land, so he may still associate unfamiliar gates with that traumatic experience. Regretfully, we may never be able to change his thought process toward unfamiliar gates, although we will try out best. What we can do, is associate new places with positive experiences, so gates just lead to something new, which will then likely lead to something good. Sam has a thriving sense of curiosity, which makes  him a joy to work with! I believe Sam will try most things at least once, even if it requires a bit of coaxing.

Speaking of trying new things, we learned, Sam will most likely hate bath time. Filling up his water bucket, we noticed he could not stand the water splashing him, but, unfortunately, it was not an annoyance, but a hint of fear. We are unaware of whether or not this is due to his cruelty case or lack of bathing at the hands of a human. The latter seems more likely to me, because Sam still seemed curious about the water.
Bath time. The five other horses that live with us have differing opinions on this matter. A couple of them usually enjoy bath time, but the others are indifferent- though they do not appreciate their faces being washed or wiped off. We have decided Sam will get a sponge bath the first time, so we won't scare him before he gets the chance to get used to us and watch the others get bathed. Sam will get the opportunity to learn by watching on most everything we try to teach him, so he can see how the other horses handle it, what he is supposed to do, and that it does not harm the other horses. We have trained many horses by having them observe others first, just like people training for a new job often do. In fact, we had sent a horse out to a trick trainer, who used this method to train him to sit on a bean bag chair. After we brought this horse( Gizmo) home, we had him sit down many times and one horse(Short Stop) in particular would always watch, without us even asking him to. One day Gizmo was getting attention from a group of people for sitting, so Short Stop decided he would go sit down too. At the time, Short Stop had never sat before and we did not know what he was doing, but he sat down and surprised us all. So, Sam I hope you will be curious and observe what we do with the others. I know you have seen them and I hope you realize they will be your support crew, and that they are watching you too, they want to help most of the time. If you need some help just let them know. Below is a picture from his groundwork training on Day 2. Everybody was watching!

Right to Left: Gizmo, Lincoln, Short Stop, Buddy, and Sunny.








And Sam, just for your information, don't try to flirt with the only girl (Sunny), because Gizmo and Buddy are kind of protective and don't make fun of Gizmo's height, but other than that, you should get along okay with everybody.
Oh Sam, I think this is going to work out well, as long as you keep trying, we will do everything in our power to help find you a great, new, loving, and permanent, home.

Donatello's First Day

Wow. What a horse! Donatello came home(well to his new home) today.

Whats in a name? He was called Trigger at his previous foster home, because 'Donatello' does not fit him well. However, I do not believe 'Trigger' fits him either. We have decided we should allow Donatello/Trigger to pick out his own name.

You might be wondering how we can let him do this. Well, we will try to contact him through a sort of telepathy. What it really is, is more complicated. As part of the natural healing process we attempt to connect our psyche with his. Through this process we found out that he does have a name preference.
                                         He wants to be referred to as 'Sam.'

When we arrived at the foster home, it had just rained so the ground was soft and he was(and still is) very dirty. He was perfectly sane and just let us put the halter over his head like no big deal. He led on out and let us touch and pet him all over. However, we met some resistance when it came to loading. Ten or so minutes after he first saw the trailer, he was confident enough to get within a few feet of it. Before another half hour passed, he had gotten in the trailer just fine. The only hiccup was on our part, we thought the trailer door was tied back enough, but it was not. The door slowly hit his butt right after he had finally loaded.

We took some extra time to make him semi-comfortable again and closed the door, said our goodbyes and headed home with our new friend.

I am posting some pictures of him now. It was really challenging getting any with his head up. He had it glued to the grass as soon as he stepped out of the trailer. Most pictures are just him, I do not have one yet of his BLM(Bureau of Land Management) Mustang tattoo, I will get one as soon as possible. He really was taken off of free range and adopted by cruel people. He has the scars to prove it. I am posting a picture of just some of the scars in his neck from where a rope, with knots tied it in, was tied and left around his neck for years.

Well Sam, I hope you like it here as much as I think you do. Don't worry, you will get to get out and play with the others just as soon as you get acquainted!