Meltdowns: Bringing Your Horse Back from the Brink

Ride On with Julie Goodnight

Has your horse had an emotional meltdown at a show, on a new trail, when he's away from his herd, or other new situations? It's important to understand that horses, as both prey and herd animals, tend to adopt the emotions of the animals around them. Horses have the same basic emotions that humans do, and they reflect the emotions you are feeling when you are with them—nervousness, anxiousness, fear, etc. When a horse becomes overwhelmed by these emotions and reactive, it tends to escalate if we don't take active measures to get the horse out of that downward spiral of emotions. Any horse is susceptible to an emotional meltdown given the wrong situation. So in this episode, we're going to talk about what's happening when your horse's emotions build up to the breaking point, and what you can do to bring him back from the brink.