Imagine for a difficult moment that your young son, who is autistic, does not talk. His silence is so absolute that you begin to think he cannot talk, that this is a matter of inability, not choice.
Then a nice young woman asks you to hide behind a tree while your son is hoisted onto a horse for his weekly therapeutic riding session, and you do, because reality is already unusual enough, so why not?
Standing behind that tree, you hear your boy say to the horse, "Walk." Just like that, and more than once, and the horse does.
"The mom shrieked so loud she nearly spooked the horse," says Michelle Newman, who for the past eleven years has been a full-time instructor with Ahead With Horses, a Los Angeles-based riding program for children with multiple or severe disabilities - and in recent years, a growing percentage of children with autism.
Every Thursday, Michelle loads two horses into a trailer, makes the hour-long drive from Sun Valley to Will Rogers state park on the west side of Los Angeles, works with some of the almost 200 children who ride with Ahead With Horses, loads the horses back in the trailer and heads home, by which time it's rush hour, and the commute takes as much as two-and-a-half hours. Every other Tuesday she makes the same drive to a nearby canyon, and five days a week, riders come to the Sun Valley facility.
Progress is slow, and accomplishments, small, and yet Michelle is the latest in a string of paid and volunteer staff who have kept the program alive since its founder and current director, Liz Helms, created it forty-one years ago. Michelle has definite ideas on why a horse and a child with autism are such good partners. "First, it's fun," she says, "so it doesn't feel to the child like other kinds of therapy. Second, a lot of these children have trouble connecting with people, but it's easier to connect with an animal. And third, there are often attention issues - but you pay attention or you're off the horse."
Word has gotten out about these people who good-naturedly endure weekly traffic jams because a silent boy might speak, or who cogitate on just the right mix of routine and change - the same horse but a new exercise, a new horse but the same drill - to help an autistic child learn to better tolerate transitions. Hundreds of families sit on wait-lists for as long as two years, hoping that a rider will move on to other activities and vacate a slot, wishing that the program had the resources to expand.
"We take children twelve and under," says Michelle, "but once they're in the program we don't ever kick them out. Ever."
Like everyone else, Ahead With Horses is quaking with apprehension about funding cuts that could shrink their shoestring operation even further: Funding from the city of Los Angeles may dry up around Labor Day, and small donations have gotten even smaller; the program also depends for survival on its own annual fundraiser and on William Shatner's annual Hollywood Charity Horse Show each April, but if the cuts are too deep they will have to scale back.
They need all the help they can get. I'm in the odd position of having a horse in the family, and in the common position of wanting to help where I can, so I offered his services as a therapy horse, and he made his debut last week. A volunteer called to tell me about the big smile on the face of the four-year-old boy, his legs too short to curve around the horse's belly, as he rode circles in the ring, a spotter at his side, an instructor leading the horse on a rope.
If you share the urge for service but not the horse, this is still an easy one: Visit www.aheadwithhorses.org, but don't use the web email because it rarely works. Call 818 767-6373, but don't expect an answer because there's no money for a receptionist. Leave a message. They'll call you back when they're done working, and you can send a donation, however small, or volunteer, or ask about similar groups in other parts of the country.
Visit www.karenstabiner.com or reach Karen at guestbook@karenstabiner.com.
I like horses but I am not a proficient rider nor a physical therapist. I simply liked the idea of helping in this program. I am tall, so I could walk alongside and hold the child. You will not regret a minute of the time you give.
For those that cannot walk the motion of a walking horse exercises the lower back & hips, helping with atrophy.
The benefit to autisitc children is immense. There was a 6'5" teenage boy in our program with severe autism. We had never heard him speak, but throughout the 2 years that I worked with him he would humm to his big sweet draft horse. On Christmas week I was working with him & he began to sing Silent Night (not a simple song), every word of it! Absolutly breathtaking.
Many states offer different types of theraputic riding programs & they are a great option for volunteering if you are not afraid of horses. If you have no time they can all use your donations....
In the Seattle area:
www.equifriends.org
www.littlebit.org
Children with learning disabilities and are reached thorough kinetic methods, this is great. Like giving a child a pail of sand and having them learn their alphabet by tracing the letters in the sand, or tracing of letters cut from sandpaper and having the child trace the letter with their fingers (very fine sand paper).
That's not how it works. I remember my own child verbalizing more during motor or sensory therapies than she could at other times. It's not because she wouldn't, but because she couldn't. Now, it's a wonderful thing to see that language begin to emerge, and it should absolutely give the parent hope for future progress. But that doesn't mean that he "can" speak but is choosing otherwise. He may one day be able to speak in other settings, but now he cannot. And it's not a choice. Autism isn't in the business of giving children choices.
Also, I wish HuffPo would give as much press to some other diseases and health issues as it does to autism.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there should be LESS stories on autism...but frankly that is not the only disease out there. Yet the Living section has mutliple stories on autism EVERY WEEK. Why not give some other diseases and health conditions press time as well?
Again, I'm not knocking HuffPo for its coverage on autism or implying there should be LESS of it, I just don't understand why HuffPo doesn't give other health or behavioral issues anywhere near the press time...or any at all.
Maybe the Californians can model it after ours?
http://www.ctrcinc.org/
It's been a fine investment, though. It's not as dramatic as a nonverbal child speaking, as in the story here, but it has done a lot to improve her muscle tone, endurance, and stability, so she can make it through the day. Her riding program is run by an occupational therapist and has been at least as helpful, probably more so, than school-based OT. It also makes it possible for her to do the kind of thing other kids do, which wouldn't have been possible without understanding and support.
It is so refreshing to see an article on here about something that actually helps improve the lives of children with autism. Thank you so much for sharing, I will put this organization at the top of my list when I have a few extra dollars.