EFT calms an injured horse and its handler

By Cynthia Elliott

Dear Gary,

In the past three years I have used EFT on myself and, as a practitioner, on a very wide range of circumstances and challenges.  One of the most gratifying for me is using it with animals, particularly horses.  I have read many inspiring articles on your website and I would like to submit the following in hopes it is helpful to others, two legged and four.

This is about my experience of using EFT on a horse with a deep cut on one of his hind legs and his fear and resistance about letting anyone near his injury.

The vet had been out to see him the previous day to check and clean the cut.  Her assistant was holding “Buddy's” left front foot off the ground in an attempt to prevent him from moving freely, but he continued kick and jump during the process.

I knew this was an opportunity to face my fears of being injured while handling his rear leg injury myself.  

In my experience, rapport and trust are as essential to healing with our animal companions as they are to healing within any relationship.  So, I planned to start with some massage, which was familiar and very much appreciated by this 29 year old horse. I learn a lot about how he is feeling as I quietly observe and massage him.

Then after he relaxes and I see his head drop and his eyes soften, I would use EFT, also familiar to him, and tremendously helpful in the past with a variety of challenges.

Before I drove to the pasture where I would find Buddy and the other two geldings, I did several rounds of EFT on my own feelings and concerns:

Even though I feel fearful, worried that I could get hurt after seeing this big horse leap around yesterday I deeply and completely accept all of my feelings about it

Even though I feel sad about having to do this alone when I wish I had help…

After a minute or so of tapping and focusing on my feelings and challenges, I ended with a couple of positive rounds including, I choose to release this tension and feel relaxed and calm … I choose to let it be easy …I choose to move through this gently and calmly.

I found some interesting and unexpected things bubbling up. I tapped through several rounds according to what was released in my consciousness about my fears and resistance.  I took a deep easy breath and checked in to my own energy.  I felt lighter, more open, slightly tingly, like I had moved some blocks and fears in my system.  I felt energized and subtly uplifted.  I felt the delicious and inspiring feelings of Hope and Possibility.

I closed my eyes and finished with some intentional tapping, seeing myself as relaxed yet focused, confident yet sensitive.  I finished packing up and headed for the pasture.

Buddy acknowledged me and then welcomed me into his comfort zone.  We exchanged greetings, a little gossip about the other horses, and I chatted about the beautiful morning.  I massaged him with wide slow strokes down his neck and across his back and hips.  I moved to his left fore leg and foot, taking my time, I began tapping on the Ting points; a series of  points found evenly spaced around the horses coronet band which is located immediately above the hoof wall. The set up phrases addressed his fear of the pain he might experience when I cleaned his cut.

I then began tapping with the palm of my hands or with all 4 fingers of each hand, firmly patting up and down each of his legs, and then around his chest.  He stood very still and seemed to be noticing a shifting of the energy flow or something; he was relaxing.

I then gently tapped along his spine as he stood still and calm, head slightly lowered and eyes soft.  As I tapped and silently asked him what he felt, I sensed feelings of sadness and feeling "undeserving" and other emotional issues.  I tapped on what I guessed he would express about situations in his life that I was aware of, and about which he may have felt sad, hurt, or frightened.

For health reasons he had to be separated from his loving owner.  She lives in another state where he had grown up and for many years been an award winning jumper, and his owner’s dear companion and friend.  It was emotionally very difficult for him and his owner who had to move him out of the warm climate he had been living in, to a cooler climate to live out his remaining days as comfortably as possible.

I tapped on the Ting points again, staying on each hoof for a round or two of EFT, saying whatever was coming into my head that I was imagining he would express about his physical or emotional distress.

Gently rubbing his chest, I addressed the continued steady healing of the area of the healing abscess on his left front foot, and the healthy regeneration of his front hooves from the coffin bone to the walls.

Even though veterinary medicine hasn’t seen much like this before, I am willing to try it anyway.

Even though it seems impossible, and most would say it is, I am willing to give it a go.

When I came around to where the injury was on his right rear leg, he stood calmly and let me first clean the area below the tear and I was able to irrigate the wound area, cleansing it well.  At one point when I first began rinsing the area he started to slowly tense up.  I tapped on myself as a surrogate for any sensations or experiences that were new, or odd, and therefore stressful or confusing.  He immediately relaxed, lowered his head and allowed me to flush and irrigate the wound. I took my time and he was very settled and calm.

I continued to cleanse and check the wound daily without any fuss whatsoever from Buddy.  The wound healed remarkably rapidly.

Buddy has since grown out a new hoof, replacing the flattened paddle shaped hoof he had for years with a more upright version.  Although horses in the wild do this when needed, I believe EFT hastened the process considerably, as does our totally amazed barefoot farrier.

In Gratitude,

Cynthia Elliott