Teens face anger with horse therapy

11:12 PM CST on Friday, February 27, 2004

By JIM DOUGLAS / WFAA-TV

Nashville singer-songwriter Templeton Thompson spent much of her girlhood in Glen Rose in tears and alone, except for horses. "When I was a kid, my safety and comfort came from my horses," she said.

Her childhood troubles yielded to deeper problems and addiction. She credits overcoming her troubles to an uncommon combination of psychotherapy and horses. It has nothing to do with riding, and everything to do with change.

Some area school districts are applying what worked for Thompson on a larger scale. At Rocky Top Ranch, they call it Equine-Assisted Therapy, or EAP.

Many teens suffer through uncontrollable anger, shattered bonds with parents, failing grades. But for junior high students in Keller schools, there is an alternative. Each year, Keller buses more than 200 struggling students to Rocky Top ranch for 12 sessions of EAP.

"I was loud in class. I would yell at people. If they moved my pencil off my desk, I would yell at them," one student described.

After therapy with the horses, "I don't yell at people that much anymore. I don't yell at them as much."

Keller counselor Janie Casey thinks it works because "horses ... they so mirror the behavior of the children." Casey is the district's head counselor. The 12-session Rocky Top experience is part of the curriculum. "It is an expectation that they go back a changed child," she said.

Using horses in psychotherapy is not new, but the sudden upsurge in interest is. Much of that is due to the Keller district's success at turning kids around.

"Decatur, Weatherford, Mansfield, Katie, Lubbock. We have a number who have called and want to know what we're seeing," Casey said.

Dozens of therapists from across the country want to know, too. They met in Georgetown recently for training. Trainer Lynne Thomas said the program pairs licensed therapists with horse experts. They work together teaching clients to control tons of headstrong horseflesh without using ropes or even touch.

Former client Templeton Thompson is among those learning to provide therapy.

It might look a little silly at times, but those who've been through it say it teaches patience, cooperation and respect. There are lots of fancy scientific terms for how it works, but the students simply say, "It's a good idea, because it does help. It helps a whole bunch."

Equine-assisted therapy has been used with teens and adults, in the juvenile justice system and on gang members.