Yesterday saw just a small group of horse owners attend for the Craniosacral Introductory Day for Horse Owners with Jean Whitebred.  Jean had some interesting ways to help us in the classroom part of the course to tune into “Feel”. She had us feeling for our cardiac rhythm and respiratory rhythm.  Then she had us try an experiment with a 20 pence piece which ways 6g. We had to hold it in our hand until we had forgotten about it and it had almost melded into our palm.  Craniosacral therapy requires the lightest touch of no more than 5g so this gave us an insight as to the degree of pressure to apply during hand holds. We practiced using just 5g of pressure on each other then lighten it.  The use of a balloon helped us feel the expansion and contraction very gently when pressure was applied to it by our partner to give us an idea of what it would be like to feel the cranial wave.  These exercises helped us to slow down into the present moment and listen to our bodies rhythms.

We then practiced on ourselves for a bit to see if we could feel the cranialsacral wave.  After going out to meet the horses, each of whom has some ongoing issue that initially I kept quiet about so that students could assess the horses first for posture, movement, conformational and facial asymmetries etc.  Once notes were taken I would then fill in the history of each horse which filled in the dots or threw some further insights.  For Example Wraheems recent foot abscess, Dotty’s tooth anomalies and facial bone infection, Ryaaz liver damage and Ronnie who has teeth issues and clearly quite a marked asymmetry from one side of his face to the other due to a possible trauma many years ago before his existing owner bought him.

Jean then showed us some hand positions and we took in turns to work on the horses with their permission of course.  They each showed a great deal of relaxation and yawning indicating good release of tension.  The horses all showed a degree of postural change by the end of the sessions.  Their strides had lengthened, the body’s looked softer and elongated through the top line with lower neck carriage.  I swear Wraheem’s coat looked shinier from all the gentle unwinding that had taken place.  There were lots of deep sighs from the horses, snorting and blowing, head lowering, eyes blinking gently and closing.  It was clear they enjoyed the experience and were more comfortable after.

We were all very impressed with Jeans delivery of information. It was a small friendly group and enjoyable to meet everyone and discuss horsey issues over lunch.  The hand outs Jean provided were really well presented too.  I look forward to welcoming Jean back in the future to repeat this workshop so please do register your interest so that I can keep you informed of a further date hopefully this year.