Smile Pony Therapies have been visiting The Archer Project since April this year thanks to funding from Changing Futures and DACT, distributed by SYHA.
Rescue ponies Harry and Leo help to reduce stress and anxiety, encourage enthusiasm and communication, and improve wellbeing.
We've had fantastic feedback about the therapy sessions; these ponies may be small but the positive impact they've had on the people we support has been huge.
Just to sit there and be able to pet them, you forget other things in your mind and what’s going on around you. They make you feel calm cause they’re so calm. You look in their big brown eyes, you can feel the love coming off them. – Andrea Fowler, Just Clean & Printed by Us Staff
Our Comms Officer, Talya sat down with Stability Manager, Alicia to find out more...
T: What has been the biggest benefit of having these sessions?
A: I think it’s the engagement from people who wouldn't normally get involved in this kind of stuff. Having ponies has brought the people from the far corners, the people who are in crisis, who are harder to reach just because things are so chaotic for them. It's just really balanced them and provided them with a zen. And people have really absorbed the calm atmosphere, the wellbeing side of it, and enjoyed talking to Kath and Lynn (Smile Pony Therapies), learning about what they do.
T: When they took them out to the grass outside Sheffield Cathedral that was really wonderful. Some of the beneficiaries who’d spent time with the ponies were introducing them to passers by and explaining how they’d been rescued and why they were there to help The Project.
A: Exactly, the sessions have been so free flowing! Everyone can just do little bits, there's no pressure to stay, it’s easy to come in and out and that suits people – especially the people we're working with who can't necessarily commit or find it hard to sit for a while.
T: It was quite a nice, natural way for staff and beneficiaries to be engaged together as well, I sat with people I'd not necessarily met before.
A: It's definitely enabled more mixing together of everyone.
Horse behaviouralist, Kathy Whitham told us: "When we first came here we felt at home. We miss it when we're not at The Project and we'll absolutely be back in the future. You're part of the Smile family now!"
Before the ponies I was very depressed, but the ponies helped bring me up. – David Myers, Beneficiary
Smile Pony Therapies are a Sheffield based non-profit, using pony power to help humans. To see more photos of the ponies visiting The Archer Project, take a look on our social media.
This article is from our latest edition of The Nest newsletter, which you can find at: https://issuu.com/archerproject/docs/ready_for_flipbook_digital_copy_newsletter_ed.40_2
