| Special Equestrians, Inc. October, 2011 |
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Upcoming Events
| October 25, 2011, 6:30pm
SE Annual Meeting at
Gulf Coast Church of Christ
February 11, 2012
21st Annual Ride-A-Thon
at Babcock Ranch
March 4, 2012
Taste of Love 9 at
The Design Studio
by Raymond
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| Greetings! |
This fall has been a busy time for us at Special Equestrians. Of course, we have had to work around the wet conditions at our facility, but it has not dampened our spirits. With many new riders added and a slew of new volunteers, we have had a high level of activity at our place on Staley Road. Thanks to a great press release by Christi Pritchett Sarlo, we had a wonderful response to our recent call for volunteers. Now we are busy getting them all trained and working in our program. Our new volunteer coordinator, Priscilla Kovalsky, has been a busy lady! This past summer, we formed a task force to formulate plans for Outreach with Equines for Special Equestrians. The task force with David Lincoln (chair), Justin Parchem, April Tennesen, Freda Jones, Kelly Headle, Jan Fifer and Amy Goss has made great progress in their efforts. In order to prepare well for this new program, six persons from Special Equestrians have taken the Pet Partners Team Training Course, which is part of the Delta Society. We thank volunteers Lin Hartnett, Sherry Gilbert, Justin Parchem, Kelly Headle, Amy Goss and Jan Fifer for spending a weekend of their time, com pleting the course. The volunteers must now be evaluated with some of Special Equestrians horses, in the coming months, in order to develop actual Pet Partner teams to be used for Outreach. Stay tuned for new developments with this exciting new program at Special Equestrians. Our website has had countless updates over the past few months. Thank you to our patient and hard working webmaster, Kim Boone, for doing such a beautiful job. More updates will be coming, but we have really made some necessary additions and changes. Please be sure to check out the new bios and photos of our class instructors: Dee Hollander, Eileen Coe, Justin Parchem and Amy Goss. You might learn some things you never knew about them! Here is a quick link to that page - Instructors. |
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Gilberto's Story
By Olga Torres
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 Hi! My name is Olga and I'm Gilberto's Mom. Gilberto started riding horses as a therapy in the middle of 2008. Personally, before he started this amazing program, he was on conventional therapies: speech and occupational, for several years, without any remarkable improvement. Thanks to a co-worker from my job then, I knew this program.
Gilberto is a child with Autism, and one of the typical things in Autism, among so many symptoms is that they do not make any eye contact with people. After a couple of sessions and some changes in his diet, Gilberto started to look at me. A couple of months later, he started to improve his motor skills and be more independent in some basic things like dressing himself, putting his shoes on or grabbing the pen in the right way, to learn to write his name, to mention some of his progress.
On his emotional aspect, Gilberto has better understanding and he enjoys riding horses and interacting with the volunteers in Special Equestrians. Interaction is a very important part in the learning way in a child with Autism.
I would love for Gilberto to have more than one session per week. Riders really enjoy this therapy, and it has so many benefits, physically and emotionally to their health. I've seen it in my son and I'm planning to continue this kind of therapy. This therapy is really worth it as the people who are involved in it, their patience, love and kindness "make miracles possible."
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Lacey, the Newest Addition to our Herd
Thank you, Natasha Larson! | 
For the past three months, I am sure that anyone who has visited Special Equestrians has noticed the gorgeous Haflinger, Lacey, who has been spending time with us, while being evaluated as a potential therapeutic riding horse.
Lacey is a youthful twelve year old mare, with the most amazing flowing flaxen forelock, mane and tail we have seen in quite a while. She has a quiet and calm nature about her, as we have seen every time she comes out of the barn and into the riding arena. We have thrown every test in the book at her and she has passed with flying colors.
One of her favorite things to do is to pull a carriage and we look forward to seeing those skills in the future. We have also identified Lacey as a potential horse to use in our Outreach Program. There is a bright and big future at Special Equestrians, for this charming young lady.
We thank Natasha Larson from the bottom of our hearts, for sharing Lacey with us. She is calm enough and short enough to carry a child. On the other hoof, she is sturdy enough to carry an adult!
Our Stable Committee spends a lot of time evaluating a potential horse for our program and the three month process usually reveals the horse within. In Lacey's case, the horse within was a perfect match for our riders. We are thrilled to tell everyone that Lacey is going to be a part of our therapeutic horseback program, with her acceptance and donation being finalized this month.
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We encourage you to forward this newsletter! You can help Special Equestrians' newsletter reach more people and spread the word about our therapeutic riding program which is "Making Miracles Happen."
Sincerely,  |
Jan Fifer  Special Equestrians, Inc. PO Box 61528 Fort Myers, FL 33906-1528
239-226-1221 (o)
239-226-1279 (f)
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Special Equestrians' mission is to provide therapeutic horseback riding and equine assisted activities to children and adults with physical and mental challenges. We serve individuals from Lee, Charlotte, Hendry and Glades Counties in Southwest Florida.
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