Anxious horse? Here's where to begin

Do you have an anxious horse?

While fear happens in the presence of a real or perceived threat, anxiety is apprehensive anticipation about possible future threats. Horses can become anxious about any number of things, for example: loading in the trailer, seeing the vet, being bathed, riding in the arena, having a companion removed, and so on.

Anxiety can also develop after a horse has an unpleasant or scary experience. They may start to anticipate the same experience happening again, as the owner prepares to engage in the activity:

• The truck is hooked up to the trailer

• The vet's truck drives onto the property

• The horse is brought towards the wash rack

• The horse is caught to be groomed and saddled

• The companion horse's halter is pulled down off the hook

Picking up on clues that the unpleasant or scary thing is about to happen, the horse becomes anxious. Anxiety can be detrimental to a horse’s physical and mental health. It can reduce the horse's quality of life, affect the bond the horse has with its owner, and also impact performance and learning.

The first thing to know to resolve the problem

To better appreciate how to resolve anxiety it's important to understand where to begin. If you have experienced anxiety yourself about a particular future event, you likely know how soon in advance the anxiety starts. For example, if you're afraid of the dentist, the anxiety manifests long before you sit in the dentist's chair. It can begin miles away and weeks before, when you need to pick up the phone and book an appointment. Years of research into resolving anxiety in people has shown that the moment before the phone call needs to be made is the perfect starting point to begin addressing the anxiety. This same approach of identifying the starting point is used to help anxious horses overcome their anxiety. Once a starting point has been identified, anxiety in horses is best addressed using techniques such as systematic desensitization and counter-conditioning. These two powerful, proven techniques can change a horse's emotional response to the feared event. The result of using these techniques is that the horse can be exposed to the trigger (the trailer, the veterinarian, the wash rack, etc.) without being afraid. Unlike other approaches, this carries very little risk of making the anxiety worse or creating new problems. Additional pleasant side effects include improving the horse's quality of life and strengthening the bond between horse and human.

Getting help for an anxious horse

When choosing an equine professional, you need to do your homework: ask the trainer how they will identify your horses' starting point, and what techniques they will use to address your horse's anxiety. Horse training is an unregulated industry, and anyone can claim to be able to solve issues like anxiety in horses. But many popular techniques, such as punishment or flooding, can make the anxiety worse or create new problems. For example, if a therapist yelled at you to phone the dentist or forced you into the chair, your anxiety wouldn't get better, and it would likely increase. You may do what the therapist said, just because you feared them more, but you wouldn't overcome your anxiety this way. The same approaches are often seen in horse training - getting after the horse or aggressively moving the horse around when they are anxious, or forcing the horse to do the thing that frightens them. Horse behaviour professionals do not recommend such approaches, nor are they even necessary to resolve the issue. In light of this, I encourage horse owners to interview prospective professionals and ask how they will address the issue. You are your horse's champion. If you don't like the answers you receive, keep looking.

If you have an anxious horse and are looking for support and guidance, visit my Services page to see how I can help you both.

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