EAP Examples
For individual therapy sessions, the client is presented with challenges that involve working with the horse(s) on the ground. The challenges are designed to help the client address and discuss specific issues that they are also working on during traditional therapy sessions. Examples include:
- A teenage girl with treatment goals of improved assertion skills and communication of personal boundaries is asked to move a group of horses from one end of the arena to the other without touching them. Discussion revolves around methods the client used, how the horses responded, how the client perceives their own level of success, and if the activity reminds them of any situations they've experienced in life.
- A young man working to control his anger and frustration while identifying his own strengths is challenged to back a horse (labeled with his strengths) around a set of cones (each labeled with areas of his life he has identified as obstacles to success). Discussion centers on how the client used his/her strengths to surpass each obstacle, how the horse responded, how the client perceives their own level of success, and if the activity can translate to handling real life situations.
However, Take Flight Farms also designs EAP sessions to address the needs of a group of clients. For example:
- Residents of a substance abuse treatment facility are challenged to work together to lead a horse through an "alley of temptation". Buckets of grain and carrots are labeled as the clients' "drugs of choice" and the clients choose their own consequences for the horse eating the "drugs" or leaving the alley. Discussion focuses on how the group worked together, how the power of their "drugs" impacted their performance, how they perceived their own level of success, and how they can use this activity to combat temptations in life.
- Youth in an emergency shelter are told that it is "Moving Day" and their task is to move all of "their stuff (buckets, ropes, sawhorses, cones, etc.) from end of the arena to the other, along with at least one horse. Discussion involves what they chose to move and how, how the horses responded or if they represented anyone or anything to them, and how the clients think they handled the task.