Take The Reins - Occupational Therapy

17/02/2026

We’re on the lookout for enthusiastic Horse Handlers to join our team!

If you have horse experience and want to make a real impact, this is your moment. Share your passion while empowering people with disabilities and diverse abilities through meaningful, confidence‑building connections with our incredible equine team.

🐴 Do you have one or more of the following?
• Pony Club K Certificate
• TAFE equine management course
• Racing‑industry experience
• OR many years of hands‑on horse know‑how backed by a solid resume

If so, we’d love to hear from you! Express your interest MembershipsHills@horsepower.org.au

✨ Why become a Horse Handler with us?
You’ll enjoy exciting yearly training opportunities designed to grow your skills and deepen your horsemanship. This includes:
• Training days with expert equine guest speakers
• Pony enrichment days
• Learning alongside our experienced horse handlers

You’ll feel great knowing your skills help facilitate positive, empowering relationships between our horses and people with disabilities and diverse abilities.

07/02/2026

Occupational therapists (OTs) focus on supporting people to participate in everyday activities that are meaningful to them — and, in some practices, animals may be thoughtfully incorporated to support this goal.

When used ethically and within scope, animals can help OTs support outcomes such as emotional regulation, sensory processing, motivation, social participation, routines, and skill development. Interactions with animals may be embedded into functional activities like grooming, feeding, walking, observation, or structured tasks aligned with a client’s therapy goals.

In occupational therapy, animals may support:
• Sensory regulation and calming
• Engagement and motivation in therapy activities
• Development of routines, responsibility, and independence
• Social interaction and communication
• Participation in meaningful occupations

Occupational therapists who include animals do so with clear therapeutic intent, informed consent, appropriate training, robust risk management, and a strong focus on both client safety and animal welfare.

Animals are never a replacement for professional skill — they are a carefully integrated support within evidence-based OT practice.

AnimalTherapiesLtd

04/02/2026

Fully insured practitioners who incorporate animals into their work do so within clear professional, ethical, and safety frameworks.

Animals are intentionally integrated to support learning, therapy, or wellbeing goals — never as a substitute for professional expertise, but as a complementary support.

Practitioners carefully consider the needs of the client, the suitability and welfare of the animal, and the environment in which services are delivered.

This approach typically includes:
• Working within the practitioner’s existing scope of practice
• Including animals purposefully to support defined outcomes
• Ensuring appropriate training, handling, and welfare standards for animals
• Holding relevant professional indemnity and public liability insurance
• Applying robust risk management, consent, and safeguarding processes

When delivered by qualified, insured professionals, animal-assisted services can enhance engagement, emotional regulation, learning and connection — while maintaining the highest standards of care for both people and animals.

29/12/2025

🐇✨ "13 Rabbits" — but for Humans ✨🐇
Inspired by Warwick Schiller

What if every "big reaction" you’ve had…
Every outburst, every freeze, every time you shut down or couldn't explain your emotions —
Wasn’t you being “too sensitive” or “overreacting”...
But instead… the 13th Rabbit?

Let me explain.
When Warwick Schiller spoke about horses, he used the idea of 13 invisible rabbits.
The horse doesn’t react on Rabbit #1, or even Rabbit #5…
But Rabbit #13? That’s when it bolts.
The thing you see isn't the cause. It’s the final straw.

🐴✨ Now let's talk humans.
You snap at your partner.
You cry over spilled coffee.
You freeze when asked a question in a meeting.
You feel “too much” and shame yourself for it.

But what if…
That wasn’t “overreacting”?
What if it was your nervous system finally saying,
“I can’t carry all these rabbits anymore.”

🧠 We don’t see the 12 rabbits.
The childhood wounds.
The hypervigilance.
The grief you haven’t had time to feel.
The trauma responses that kept you safe, not “broken”.
The everyday micro-stressors.
The years of “being strong”.
The masking.
The pretending.
The silence.

The 13th rabbit isn’t the problem.
It’s the signal.
The symptom.
The moment your system finally tells the truth you’ve had to bury.

💬 At Equimotional, we don’t punish the 13th rabbit.
We listen.
We slow down.
We ask what happened to you? not what’s wrong with you?
We make space for the hidden herd of rabbits — and help you let them go one by one.

Because humans, like horses, are doing their best with the load they carry.

📣 So next time you react, pause.
It might not be just about now.
It might be Rabbit #13.

🖤 Be kind to yourself.
You weren’t made to carry it all.

24/12/2025

Wishing everyone a happy and joyful holiday, and all the best for a wonderful year ahead!

10/12/2025

Clients continue to report that NDIS planners insist animal assisted therapy is not funded.
Check out the current info sheet from the “would we fund it” page for the criteria that includes animal assisted therapy.

Some key points for your planning meeting;
- You are seeking occupational therapy support to address your functional goals
- the clinical decision to include the horse in therapy is not a consideration
- you can not ask for additional therapy hours, it is your choice to use your therapy budget for equine assisted OT, if this will be the most effective treatment option for you

For further information, please do not hesitate to reach out 🦄

09/12/2025

Ever reacted in a way that surprised you… and then realised it wasn’t actually about the moment at all?

Most of us have. And the HALT model explains why.

✨ H.A.L.T. is one of the simplest emotional check-ins we have, yet most adults forget it exists.

H – Hungry 🍽️
Your body cannot regulate emotions on an empty tank. Even horses lose patience when their guts are empty.

A – Angry 🔥
Not rage. Sometimes it’s the low-level irritation you’ve been carrying without noticing.

L – Lonely 🤍
Connection is a biological need, not a luxury. We’re herd animals pretending we’re not.

T – Tired 😴
Fatigue turns tiny challenges into mountains. Nothing works properly when you’re running on fumes.

HALT isn’t about dismissing your feelings.
It’s about understanding them before you judge yourself.

If everything feels a bit too much today, pause.
Check the basics.
Offer yourself the same compassion you’d offer your horse.

Which one catches you out the most — H, A, L or T?
I’m always intrigued by what shows up across this community.

05/12/2025

𝗪𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗯𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮𝗱𝗱𝗶𝗰𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝘂𝗿𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁.

Spend an hour watching a herd and something uncomfortable becomes obvious.

They are not slow.
We are frantic.

We have normalised a pace of life that is biologically unsustainable.
Instant replies. Same-day delivery. Tescos 𝘞𝘩𝘰𝘰𝘴𝘩. The obsession with immediacey.

The constant low-level vibration of what’s next?

Our nervous systems are stuck in a permanent high-frequency buzz.

Then you walk into the stable.

A horse does not live in “Clock Time” (Chronos).
They live in “Deep Time” (Kairos).

They do not know it is Tuesday.
They do not know you are late.
They only know Now.

When you enter their space, you hit a wall of stillness.

And if we are honest, at first it’s annoying.
You want to rush the process. Hurry up and catch. Hurry up and groom. Hurry up and get the job done.

You arrive carrying the momentum of your entire workday.

But the horse refuses to hurry.

𝗧𝗵𝗲𝘆 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗿.
𝗬𝗼𝘂 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝗺 🌧

This is where the science of entrainment kicks in.

Physics tells us that when two oscillating systems meet, they eventually sync.
The stronger rhythm pulls the weaker one into line.

A horse’s heart rate is slower.
Their breathing is deeper.
Their electromagnetic field is larger.

They are the stronger rhythm.

They drag you out of the speed of wifi and drop you back into the speed of blood.
The speed of breath.
The speed of the earth turning 🌎

You think you are waiting for them to react.
But really, they are waiting for you to arrive.

Because until you slow down, you are not truly there.
You are just a body vibrating with tomorrow’s to-do list.

By the time you leave the yard, you haven’t completed a task.
You have stepped out of the rat race and remembered you are a mammal. 🐴

Slow down.
The email will still be there tomorrow.
This breath won’t. 🫁

10/11/2025

I’ve seen a few posts doing the rounds lately, criticising “gentle parenting.”

Now I always feel like a little bit of an imposter , not having kids myself when I talk on a subject like this but......

Usually they go something like:

“The world won’t care about your child’s feelings.”
or
“Teachers can’t spend 45 minutes validating emotions.”

But that’s not gentle parenting.
That’s permissive parenting — and they’re not the same thing.

Gentle parenting isn’t about saying yes to everything or avoiding discipline.
It’s about holding boundaries without shame or fear.

It’s saying, “I can see you’re angry, but I won’t let you hit,” rather than “Stop that or you’ll be punished.”
It’s still structure, still rules — just taught through respect, not intimidation.

Permissive parenting says, “I don’t want to upset you, so I’ll drop the boundary.”
Gentle parenting says, “I love you enough to hold the boundary, even if it upsets you right now.”

Compassion doesn’t mean there are no consequences.
It means the consequence is about learning, not humiliation.

And when kids grow up in that kind of environment — where emotions are accepted and limits are clear — they actually cope better in the real world.
Because they’ve learnt to regulate, not repress.
They’ve learnt that love can still mean no.

You can be soft and still strong.
Kind and still consistent.
That’s the balance — and it’s not weakness.
It’s the hardest, most important kind of strength.

05/11/2025

Happy 21st birthday Coco 🎂

05/11/2025

Coco’s 21st birthday was celebrated with the assistance of two fans, making healthy horse treats as part of our equine assisted OT activities.
A fun way to work on collaboration, planning, compromise, sequencing, time management, fine motor skills, problem solving, safety awareness…

01/11/2025