Rupert Isaacson: Welcome to Equine Assisted World.
I'm your host, Rupert Isaacson, New York Times best selling
author of The Horse Boy, The Long Ride Home, and The Healing Land.
Before I jump in with today's guest, I just want to say a huge
thank you to you, our audience, for helping to make this happen.
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It really helps us get this work done.
As you might know from my books, I'm an autism dad.
And over the last 20 years, we've developed several
equine assisted, neuroscience backed certification programs.
If you'd like to find out more about them, go to newtrailslearning.
com.
So without further ado, let's meet today's guest.
Welcome back.
I've got Lucy Dillon.
Lucy Dillon, I've known for some time, and she runs the equine
unit at Child Vision in Dublin.
And when I say in Dublin, I don't mean outside Dublin, I mean right in the
middle of Dublin place called Drum Condra.
So she's providing equine services to people of all kinds of special
needs right there in the city center.
Populations who would not normally have access at all, and therefore, of course
has to make it work, particularly for equine wellbeing in a way that many
people who are running centers who have.
The luxury of doing it from a place in the country do not have
to strategize around quite so much.
And child vision, vision might give you a bit of a clue as to what
many of the clients and service users are facing problems with
and conditions affecting sight.
It used to be St.
Joseph's School for the Blind, but the services go way beyond that
and are being offered at scale.
So Lucy works her behind off and produces a service that I have been watching now
for over a decade, well over a decade more like approaching 15 years and just
kind of going from strength to strength.
So she's one of my heroes.
So Lucy, thanks for coming on.
Can you tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do, and why you do it?
Lucy Dillon: Okay, so yeah, I'm Lucy.
I, so I run the equine unit in Chart Vision.
I've been working there for nine and a half years, but I've been running
the unit for just over two years now.
We have 10 horses, 'cause I actually recently just purchased two more.
And we see roughly 150 kids a week.
And that would be a mixture of children from our internal services.
So like, Rupert says there we are, child Vision, which is the
National Education Center for children with vision impairment.
So that's children from our preschool, our primary school, and then there
is an adult residential service.
So we see a couple of the young adults in that service as well.
And then we see external clients and the majority of those
would be children with autism.
And then recently, more and more we're starting to see children who perhaps
maybe do have diagnosis as well, but would also fall into areas where,
say, perhaps community groups where they are experiencing trauma, either
through their, their living con living environment or their family environment.
And so we are often, that's sort of a service we're offering
more and more now as well.
Rupert Isaacson: Your background, your English obviously, and you
are living there in Ireland.
How did that happen and what was your horsey background before you got
into this whole therapeutic malarkey?
And why did you get into this therapeutic malarkey?
Because it's such hard work.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
Although actually on that point, I always think that people
always say, oh, it's such public.
It's public, but it's actually really good fun as well.
That's, that's indeed.
People always say that to me.
Oh gosh, it must be so hard working with those children.
You're like, no, it's just really good fun.
Yeah.
You know, we have a laugh.
Yeah, no, so I, yeah, I'm obviously English.
I'm from just outside North London from a completely non horsey family.
Just really, really, you know, I was that little girl that loved
horsey books and, you know, looked up ponies and just wanted to ride.
And I probably had my first ride in lesson when I was, I
don't know, about eight or so.
A very big center, which is still there actually in North
London, called Trent Park, and I
Rupert Isaacson: rode at Trent Park too, being a fellow London North Londoner.
Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Very funny.
A friend, very good school friend of mine who's like completely non horsey.
Her daughter now rides at Trent Park and is like, she's just me at 13 years old.
Lives up there if, if she, if she can.
And then I progressed to a different place in Enfield, which is also in North London.
Quin, funnily enough, all my horses actually went.
I actually went further into London to do all that rather than out
into the huck cart for countryside.
And was just completely mad about them.
Had my own pony who was useless, but I adored him.
And and then when I was finishing school, I wanted to do a degree in
horses, which was a very new thing.
There was actually only two degrees in horses at that point, and neither
of them had actually finished.
I had had a full cycle of people doing them.
So, my parents were like, well, you know, you sure about this?
Maybe you should go and work for a year and actually make
sure you really wanna do this.
So I went and worked in a place in Hartfordshire as a working pupil
through a scheme that's long, long gone, which was called YTS in those days.
Rupert Isaacson: I remember YTS Youth Training Scheme.
Yes, yes.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
And I did my BHS exams.
Okay.
Lovely woman.
She was an examiner herself and the center did run some exams as well.
So it was a great experience and was then still completely convinced I wanted
to go to university and study horses.
And so I went to Warwick Agricultural College and did the BA in equine studies.
And that wasn't particularly a practical degree, it was like a
business, like people do business in French or business and something,
it was like business and horses.
But then I also, while I was there, I really sort of immersed myself in
the equine unit and sort of got to know, 'cause there's lots of practical
courses running there as well.
I got to know everybody in the unit and I worked there for a year
and a half in my placement year, which is like your third year.
And that involved you know, helping with the, helping obviously with the lessons
and the students and stuff like that.
But also they had a four stallion stud at that point as well.
So it was working on the stud as well and and then breaking the youngsters
and, and all that sort of thing.
So it was really good and, and the staff were really good there.
The training was really good.
There was some really good riders.
Most of the staff and then actually the woman I did my YTS with
trained with Jenny Lauriston Clark.
So it was all very sort of traditional based training that
I had through all that time.
Rupert Isaacson: For, for listeners and viewers that, dunno who Jenny Lar
and Clarke was or perhaps still is.
She was the lady who kind of put dressage on the map in the UK sort of in the
eighties, really seventies and eighties.
She was the sort of face of it for a long, long time.
Yeah.
So she was very knowledgeable.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah, I think she was the first Olympic like person to go to the
Olympics dress lodge in the UK with Dutch Gold and the Cabon Stud, which was
a famous stud in Hampshire, isn't it?
I think it was.
Yeah.
And yeah, so my time at college was great.
I really enjoyed it.
I really enjoyed college.
You know, it was great.
Crack at college is great crack and then I learned a huge amount about horses
and we had some fabulous horses in the college as well, which was great.
Like a lot of x three day event.
Horses, x dress horses for the students to ride.
And then when I finished college, I wanted to be a lecturer
in an agricultural college.
And I went to W Hampton and did a postgraduate teaching diploma and
taught in Northampton Agricultural College during the time I was doing it.
Rupert Isaacson: And you taught equine stuff?
Lucy Dillon: Equine stuff, yeah, yeah, like science and that sort of thing to
sort of, what was called then National Diploma Students and higher National
diploma students, which are less sort of, that's like, a level equivalent.
So sort of leaving school age type courses.
And then my.
Then boyfriend, now husband, he moved back.
He was working as a manager of a college, a thoroughbred
college, working in stud work.
But he took a job back in Ireland, in a stud farm near where he grew up.
So I followed him back home basically.
And we, I, I moved back.
I moved here, so that would be 27 years ago, next month.
And so I've lived here longer than I lived in England now.
Rupert Isaacson: Right?
Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: And then I did get it offered a job to, to continue lecturing.
But it was a long, long way away from where I'd moved to.
So I, I didn't do that.
And I started working for a family who ran a big ride in school and
an event yard called Kinsler's.
Really lovely family.
Again, really nice horses to ride.
Nice riders themselves.
And, I worked there for about nearly two years, and in that
time I got married and then I also had my first child in that time.
And I then stopped working when he was about three months old, just 'cause
of things that happened in my life.
And then I carried on teaching riding and riding for people and
teaching privately and teaching pony club and all that sort of thing.
Had two more children.
And then I found out about Child Vision through Terry Rosen,
who was the manager there.
She'd put an advert out looking for staff, and I just sort of thought,
oh, you know what, that sounds nice.
I'm, you know, I, I've been teaching kids for a long, long time.
I was a little bit frustrated in the job I was in.
It was a lovely, lovely yard, but it wasn't growing in the way that I, it
was sort of, I thought it was going to.
And so I applied for travel vision and kind of that's, that's it.
Then after that, I just really liked it once I started and went
from part-time to more part-time to full-time and now running it
Rupert Isaacson: now.
That all sounds very smooth.
When I first met you however many years ago that was, and I should, I should
by the way iterate here that Lucy has only gotten younger since I met her,
whereas I of course have gotten older.
But back when we first met, I remember we were doing a horse boy training at
Child Vision, and I don't think, it wasn't the first one I'd done that.
I think the first one I did was.
In June of 2013 or something, I remember a blizzard hit while we were doing
it outside there and I was thinking, God, how did these Irish do it?
And I thought I was hard coming from the uk and I watched you guys at Child
Vision over the years, despite the fact that you were attached to a very
large institution and school that was relatively well funded despite the fact
that you were there in the middle of Dublin where one does have access to
fundraising and that sort of thing.
Despite all of that, the equine unit, I have to say for a long,
long time, was somewhat marginalized despite the fact that you guys
were doing an amazing job there.
And so therefore the working conditions were tough.
And I remember doing.
Training after training there, sort of out in the rain in the, I'm watching
you guys just like battle through and produce a really sterling service,
like no matter the conditions.
And the fact that the horses also had to live, you know, basically mostly inside.
There wasn't really turnout when I first went to Child Vision.
There was, there was actually a small estate still attached to
it, but then that was all sold for housing and things shrank and shrank.
And then I watched you guys getting really clever about how to use the local
rugby field for trails and how to rotate your horses in and out from town to
country to ensure that they had their wellbeing and their turnout and so on.
And I watched you guys really.
Not just deliver this amazing service to up to 200 clients a
week, but really ensure that the standard remained incredibly high no
matter what you were dealing with.
Things are much better.
Now, I know that you, you guys have an indoor arena and so on.
Can you talk to us about, you know, you'd come out of agricultural colleges
where they have all the nice facilities.
You'd come out of those, you know, north London riding schools like Trent
Park, which have great facilities.
You'd come out of that nice event yard, and then you find yourself
in this kind of pioneer situation.
And Terry Brosnan, by the way, anyone listening, you need to go listen to the to
the podcast we did with Terry, who talks about having grown up in the troubles
and what she had to deal with just as a family, let alone, you know, but it, it
brings a certain resilience to the table.
Which I think is really important in what we do.
Talk to us about how you guys made it work there, because I was
always really impressed with that.
Lucy Dillon: Well, I suppose I had been working in yards without indoors
for the last however many years.
I think bef when James was born, I worked for the Kinsler.
That was the last yard I worked in that had an indoor right
after it was all outdoor.
And so I was well used to the rain.
Especially for my own horses at home.
I, I just used, I just ride in the field at home.
And I suppose we just kind of got on with it really.
Because, you know, and you know, this is Ireland, you know, it's
gonna rain, you know, it's gonna be cold, you know, it's gonna be gray.
You know, it rained for 50 days, the first half, first 50 days of this year.
This year, although we had an indoor this year, it makes all the difference.
Yeah.
And then I suppose we just, we just got better and better at what we were doing.
You know, at the beginning we were just learning, you know, what we were doing.
But I do think there's a huge amount of skills if you've worked with horses for
a long time and you've trained horses and you, you know, I, I, I've broken a lot of
horses in my time and worked with young event horses and, and that's my thing.
That's what I love.
I'm not really a competition rider.
Never was.
I, I did a bit of competing on a horse I had, but I actually preferred
more when I worked with the event horses, schooling them all, weak for
the other person to compete them.
I was lorry driver.
That was my job when I worked with the event horses.
And I suppose we just put all, a lot of effort into the horses.
And it was really nice to see these horses, particularly as some of them
were a bit older, once we started doing all the, the horse boy stuff with them,
tra change and, and become happier and more physically able to do their jobs.
And then, I suppose we had a great team.
Myself and Terry are great friends as well as work colleagues.
Like we know we were right from the word go actually.
'cause like literally the week I started there, we realized that my daughter
and her twin daughters were starting school together, secondary school.
And they, they, they're still great friends as well.
So yeah, we just, I dunno, I suppose we just got on with it really.
I think it helps if you are very, and I'm really, this is one thing I'm really
passionate actually about equine assist activities and all those things is if you
are really confident in your horses and you know how to train your horses, you
can be really confident in the rest of it.
And you can, and you can see it, you can see it in the
horses that we have now as well.
And some of 'em are the same horses that we had eight, nine years ago.
And then we've got obviously got new ones over the years.
I suppose, yeah, we just kept going.
Really just kept doing it.
Rupert Isaacson: Right.
It's it what you, you know, you had a lot of background and I remember when
I first met you and Terry and you know, it was, it's always a great relief for
me when I'm doing trainings, when all I need to do is sort of show the techniques
for this particular subset population, in this case, autism or whatever.
And some equine techniques to people who already have this
immensely solid equine background.
'cause I know that all they need to do is just take the tools and
add them to the tools that they've already got and they'll be grand.
One doesn't always have that luxury.
And when I met you and Terry, it was very obvious to me immediately, oh, these
people have really massively solid skills.
I remember encountering, what was that lovely Dark Bay horse that you had again?
That,
Lucy Dillon: well, my, that was before I worked there.
He met.
Oh, Bruce.
Yeah.
The beautiful views.
Bruce, that was all,
Rupert Isaacson: yeah,
Lucy Dillon: he from Warwick Agricultural College.
When I moved here, I bought him as a 5-year-old 'cause I loved
his father so much and I knew he stamped all his youngsters.
And I'd broken, not him, but I'd broken several of his siblings and I, I went back
to England about a month and a half after I moved here to sit my BHS stage four.
And then I went to, and I went up to college and was like, you
know, I'm kind of half looking for a horse and can I try Bruce?
I don't, you know, see what he's like.
And he, 'cause he had been sold to the States and then,
and then it fallen through.
So he was still there.
And and I sat up on him.
He was a fight.
He was just turning five.
And I was like, oh yeah, you just feel like St.
George, I, I'm gonna bring this horse home.
And I did.
I had 20 years.
Gotta love him.
He was,
Rupert Isaacson: yeah, when I encountered that horse with you and
I sat on that horse I took that horse for a trail ride and I was like.
Whoever produced this horse knows what they're doing.
I remember there was this magic moment where I just adjusted my seat and brought
my lower legs back just a little bit, just as a, I don't know, curiosity.
And he went into this perfect PFA, like this perfect PF and I'm like,
whoever produced this horse, and I think it's that Lucy lady has done
such an incredible job with this horse.
I will, I have complete trust in anything horsey that's
coming from this, this human.
And that, of course has been born out.
And as you said, I like that you made that point.
If you have trust in your horses, if you have that confidence in your
horses, it gives you the confidence to go out into unknown situations.
You know, in the old days we were doing that as cavalry, weren't we?
And we were going out there to do that.
Sadly to do harm to our fellow man and now we do it to heal our fellow man.
But we still go out into the unknown.
You though did not, you had this, all this solid horse background, but you
didn't have really a background in working with special needs and you
know, I know the extreme nature of many of the, particularly the kids that
were coming out of the Child Vision school, 'cause they weren't just coming
with blindness or visual impairment.
They were coming often with severe autism.
They were coming sometimes with really severe medical conditions and
feeding tubes and things like this.
That was all at that stage outside your Ken, and this is really technical stuff.
Talk to us about the learning curve you went through with that, because I know you
said, oh, we just got on with it really.
But that's a, a way of glossing over actually a really step-by-step learning
curve that I think a lot of people who are just kind of getting into this field
could really benefit from your wisdom.
How did you.
Go from not knowing much about that, but having these solid horse skills and a big
heart to really learning how to work with this type of technical medical stuff.
Lucy Dillon: Well, child Vision itself obviously has a two therapists who
work with the children, so there was always lots of advice and, you know,
if you had a question, there was always someone to ask how to support somebody.
And then I suppose I just started reading about it.
I started Googling, I started watching stuff about therapeutic riding and
then I that, and then like that, you know, doing the horse boy training and,
and sort of, I, I just basically read everything I could find and all the
different things and sort of, and made my own decisions about which things I
felt maybe looked the right way to go.
And then I think as well as a horse riding instructor, you're already very good at
judging a child's emotions because you're not, you know, quite often when you're
teaching riding one, you've got several of them in front of you, but you're not
close enough to sort of whispered someone.
You are right.
You're right.
That you've gotta watch their, their body language and, and stuff see that.
So you're quite good at that, even without realizing it.
You, you are, I suppose, and then, and then talking to parents as well.
And, you know, I I, I always ask parents, they're the experts.
And I suppose, yeah, we just, we all kind of learn together.
I and I do, when I look back, I think sometimes in the beginning
maybe I was a bit too sort of behavior led not understanding sort
of sensory issues quite as well.
And, and.
Whereas now I know for a fact now that we are very, and I hope
now I can relay this to my team.
As, as you know, I've had a lot of new staff in the last two years.
This just sort of follow the child.
And that is actually, you know, it's, it's the, it's the horse boy thing,
followed the child, but then it's actually a child vision ethos as well.
It is very much follow the child, be child led and, and lots of
organizations say they are child led, but child vision actually really is.
It's very, and interesting enough on the Last Horse Boy training we were
doing there a month or so ago a lady came to the training and she has a
significant vision of impair and she's most amazing artist actually look her up.
Clara Ryder, she does these.
Clara
Rupert Isaacson: Ryder, is that Ryder with an I or a y?
Okay, right now are they talking
Lucy Dillon: of horses?
They are stunning.
Her paintings and she, we were just talking about she wants to volunteer and,
and I think she's got so much to offer us all in, in, not just in the equine
unit, but everybody because, you know, she's a young adult who has a significant
visual impairment and is living her life.
You know, she's an artist.
But she was saying about she, what she loves about child vision.
She wasn't engaged with child vision as a child.
It wasn't the service she was engaged with that it's so, see, the person first
don't see the visual impairment first.
And, and I think perhaps that helped myself and Terry as well,
because that is the general feeling you get in chart vision.
And people are treated like,
Rupert Isaacson: go ahead.
Sorry, I, I interrupted you.
Please finish your thought.
Lucy Dillon: No, that was it.
Just like, you know, quite often people, particularly people with
vision impairment, can be treated as if they have an intellectual disability.
And they don't, they have impairment.
And whereas in television it's not like that.
And I remember when I first started working there, like you sort of,
you'd be like, oh, you know, you might say something to, and it's
amazing how much in language we use the word, see, can you see this?
And, and, and like, oh, you look great today and, and look at you on the horse.
And then you're like, do I say that?
But actually, yes, you should, because that's language and that's
the way people use language.
And that's one thing that's really nice about Child Vision is everybody's treated
just as, as, as the person that they are.
Rupert Isaacson: As you say, a lot of a lot of places like to
think of themselves as child led.
The ethos of Follow the Child as someone who's had to go through
that learning curve yourself.
And let's face it, your average horsey person, male or female.
We tend to, we're a bossy bunch.
We're an opinionated bunch, and we sort of have to be a bit
to do the job that we do it.
It's part of it because we have to lead, we're in dangerous situations.
It's, it's built into the culture.
So I often find that it can be quite a tricky thing to help people
to understand really how to do it.
Some people have it as an innate knack, but not everybody.
What for you, really talk us about your, basically what, your learning curve about
how you went from not knowing much about that to where you are now, and then what's
your advice to people and why, why does it really work, do you think, to rather
than just sort of top down instruction?
Lucy Dillon: It's all to do with safety.
Okay.
I, that's what I personally, that's what I think.
If, if someone doesn't feel safe, they're not.
Going to engage with you.
You know, that applies to all of us, you know?
If you don't trust someone
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Or
Lucy Dillon: particularly like their views or, or feel that they're
sort of not actually listening to you, you don't trust them.
And so if you, if you, if a child doesn't trust you, be it
consciously or subconsciously that you're not gonna get anywhere.
So you've got to have trust.
So like, and it, so it works.
And, and I must admit, when I first started, you know, it was
sort of like, yeah, the whole lane was get the kid on the horse.
That's what we do.
But it's get the kid on.
Whereas now it's, yeah, whatever, you know, if they
wanna get on, they wanna get on.
If they wanna get off, they wanna get off.
And, and I think possibly when we first started, like you say about
our environment, when we first started, it was more difficult.
We were living in a building site, you know, it was, there was you
know, there was loud noises going on.
Things they, they finished one building site and then they started on another
one, the other side of the yard.
And so like that even leading the horses from the stable to the arena, you had to
be a bit more controlling with the kids because it wasn't such a safe environment.
But I do feel particularly in the last I think kind of when we came
back after COVID more myself and Terry, I think we both kind of
just were more, this is our unit.
I, on a side note, I actually took all the horses home for COVID and and that
was, it was actually a great opportunity to really, really work on all the horse
boy stuff with them because basically you rode them and, and lunged them and in
hand with them every day for three months.
And so it got really, and I, and I do feel that got me really,
really connected with the horses.
Now we've got different ones as well since then, and a couple of those have retired
since then, but they live with me anyway, so that I'm still connected with them.
There's one of'em I think live forever and she's gonna be one.
The Guinness Book of Records, you mean she
Rupert Isaacson: Oh, is that, is that
Lucy Dillon: echo the gray man?
Rupert Isaacson: Echo,
Lucy Dillon: yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: Oh yeah.
An amazing horse.
You must be 40 by now or so.
Lucy Dillon: 33.
Well,
Rupert Isaacson: yeah.
Yeah.
Wow.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: That's a testament to your equine wellbeing, I can tell you.
Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: And I think that was the time that really convinced me about the
training of the horses and how, 'cause she was, you know, she was a, what, a 26, 20
7-year-old horse that we were doing this with, and it completely transformed her.
But with, with regards to the kids, I think it becomes very clear once
you start being child led, you can see the parents change towards you.
You can see the environment change towards you, and you
see the kid change towards you.
One of the first kids that I work with.
Like completely by myself.
'cause we did have an occupational therapist who was working with us in
the yard and leading and giving and you know, we learned loads from her loads
about sensory processing and about just the d child development as well,
which was really interesting to learn.
You know, what, what should the child be doing at two, what
should they be doing at three?
So you can make comparisons and you can see that following of development
as well and the development of speech and the development of motor skills
and, and all that sort of thing.
And I find that really interesting.
I, I quite like science and that sort of thing.
But I, one of the first kids I worked with, like just on my own, this kid
and, and, and I, he, he just turned up one day and I was the only, I
was the only member of staff there.
Nobody told me he was coming.
A bit of lack of communication.
So he just arrived and he hadn't had an assessment or anything and which
was how we'd previously done it.
So it was like, oh, well, we'll just go up to the arena and see what happens here.
And he was a child who had, he was about seven or eight,
seven, quite big for his age.
Really, really sensory.
His father had taken time off work to support him more.
'cause there was a lot of disruptive behavior, a lot of biting,
kicking and stuff like that.
And it was, we just went up to the arena and I don't forget, it was so funny.
He went and the first thing he did was he ran, we used like big
steps for mounting the horses.
And Fred, one of our horses just stand there.
The first thing he did was he ran up the steps and he bit Fred on the neck.
And, and Fred just sort of turned around and looked at him like, what you that for?
And I was just like, yeah, whatever.
And and he ran back down.
He was running around the arena and, and I could see the dad, 'cause the
dad was like, you know, the first thing his response was, and he looked at me
to see what was my response gonna be.
And I was like, don't worry, he's fine.
He will come back, he'll come back.
We'll let him come back.
And, and as you well know, our arena in that day, those
days it wasn't quite as safe.
It was quite near the road and the car park and, and people could
look over the fence and watch you.
That's one thing I really don't miss in our new building is
being by the general public.
And so, yeah, and then eventually he came back to the horse and then
we were like, do you wanna get on?
And we did, and we went for a bit of a walk around the field and he, he
kept Headbut the horse and his dad was sort of saying, you know, this is, it.
It's, it's just sort of that overwhelming feel feeling of this.
And Fred actually kind of led the session really, because every time he headbutted
Fred on the neck, Fred just stopped.
And then, and then we were like, well, he'll go again if you stop.
And so we walked again and then he'd headbut Fred again, and Fred would stop.
And then we were like, do you wanna get off?
And he was like that.
And it was just the first, probably one of the first sessions where
it was completely led by him.
I didn't put any 'cause because I had had no time to prepare or
think about what I was gonna do.
We were just winging it basically.
And and it went really, really well.
And he came for a good few years, that kid.
And then they, and it just worked really well.
And then they got an assistance dog and that worked really well.
'cause he'd already had the experience with the horses.
And yeah, I, I suppose that was probably one of the first sessions that made
me think, actually I need to just follow my instinct doing this now
rather than what I think I should do.
I should just follow my instinct.
Rupert Isaacson: Previously.
If you had been in a previous incarnation of yourself trying to
follow what you thought you should do, what would you have thought you
should have done in that situation?
Lucy Dillon: Probably try to get him on the horse quicker and get
him to hold the rope and stuff.
I, I like to think I was always, even as a horse riding instructor I was
always quite relaxed with the kids.
I, we were talking about teaching Pony camp, actually
pony club there a while ago.
'Cause my business makes you feel old, doesn't it?
My new member of staff would've been a child at Pony Club when
I used to teach Pony Club.
I was, I always used to sort of, and even in Pony club, I wasn't
that one that was like, come on, everybody's tech needs to be spotless.
Isn't the yard spotless and blah, blah, blah?
So accordingly, I used to sometimes get the kids who weren't those type
of kids and we'd have a bit of crack.
And so I don't think, I was never really that super strict
horse riding instructor anyway.
My kids would probably say completely differently about, but
I, I was never, I've never been that super strict horsey person.
And I do think most, and it's funny when we talk to run instructors who are
looking into going into this and we talk to them about their own places and their
own horses and we talk about the Yes.
Environment, like the horse boy Yes.
Environment that, you know, if the kid wants to run up and, and the
ham touching them, they all love the horse of tails, don't they?
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.
Lucy Dillon: You know.
Start touching the horse's tail.
It's fine.
And I always say to people, you know, think about your riding school ponies.
Would you really be worried about someone doing that with them?
Because actually they, they, they're not, they're probably not in your
riding school if you're worried about 'em doing that sort of thing, are you?
And then most of them are like, well, yeah, actually, you know, and, and think
about, I always say this to people as well, think about your own pony you
had when you were a kid, you had a yes environment around that pony, didn't you?
Who climbed up on their pony in the field?
Who, who, you know, sat down in the stable underneath their pony, while ate
hay and laid down on the floor and stuff?
So I, I don't think I've ever been that sort of BHS woman.
Maybe that's 'cause I didn't come through the sort of pony pump and
the, as a child, I dunno, I'm done.
Maybe I'm just lazy.
Rupert Isaacson: The, the follow the child thing of course goes
much deeper than that though.
Like when.
I'm doing it for example, because, you know, I, I was taught
that really by Temple Grandin.
Okay.
I had a sort of my temperament, like yours is more that way anyway.
But, you know, she was the one who really explained to me, Rupert, if
you're going to reach somebody who doesn't really want to communicate,
I autom, you know, self ism, then you have to really meet them where they are.
You gotta find out what interests them and really follow those obsessional interests.
And of course, in my early days with horse boy, with my son, I mean,
I had, I could do that because I had the, the leisure to do that.
And then of course as we began to build new trails, the ranch we had the luxury
of working usually with very, very small groups or one-to-one or so on.
You guys didn't have that luxury.
And there was a necessity of delivering services to many, many kids.
Often at the same time.
And I was often impressed at how you guys managed to take
the, follow the child ethos into that more institutional setting.
Can you tell us, I, I think it's really useful for a lot of people who are
going to this as a career now, and you yourself are now teaching people how
to do this as a career when someone is gonna follow the child in that way.
But yeah, they don't have the luxury of maybe one-to-one, they don't
have the luxury of a lot of time.
How, how, how are we gonna do that?
Lucy Dillon: I suppose, I think one thing we always make really clear to parents
or, or the caregiver or whoever comes with a child is, you know, yes, the get
on the horse, it's a bonus, but that's not the B end or an end all of this.
And I think that's a really important thing to.
Get into your head.
Even just being with a horse can help.
And so we, it is hard sometimes in, you know, we run on half an hour slots.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Now we run them on 45 minute slots, but they're half an hour sessions.
But to allow part, partly the fact that we're, 'cause we're in the city center,
it allows people to like, get stuck in traffic and not have a freak out
that they're gonna be 10 minutes late.
But I, I dunno really, I suppose just, I just think the whole environment
now creates that environment anyway.
And that probably possibly helps, I think we see, follow the child
bit most with the school groups.
So we see a huge number of school groups.
The end of this academic year, I have seen 27 different school classes.
So that's six kids for six weeks and they come for like an hour.
To be honest, most of the time we don't fill the full hour.
'cause that's a lot.
Most of these kids are, they're primary school age, so that, that's a long
time for a primary school kid to focus.
Yeah.
And so with the school groups we have, there'd be six kids and there'd
be generally three instructors, if not four, there in the group.
And so you have an idea of what you're gonna do with the group, but we,
it's very much, and even in the old yard, we used to do this, you could
shut the gate at the top of the yard.
If a group came in, you could shut.
We had like a little picket fence you could kind of shut
and the yard was closed in then.
And you make your environment safe and they'll come in and you can then just
say to the SNAs and the teacher relax.
They can't go anywhere.
Doesn't matter what they do with the horses.
These horses are not, these horses are trained for their job, you know, because
particularly actually being in the city center, a lot of people's perception
of horses is, is quite different.
So you sort of see the teachers and stuff like panicking as the kids
will come running in at a hundred miles an hour into the horses.
So you, you've set it up then with the teachers and the SNAs.
And now actually what I do is I, I actually send them all the information
before they come and there's information about the problem and the solution, the
cortisol and, and the oxytocin and I, and there's information about what's
expected from them and they get there.
Hopefully they read it.
I don't know if they do, but I send it anyway.
And so the school groups come in and they come in.
They're like a whirlwind when they come in, these kids.
But we actually almost, you don't encourage it, but
we do almost encourage it.
And then you, you just, that when a kid comes in and they know they're
allowed to come in and run up the hay, which they all absolutely love.
It was gas when we moved into the new building.
We have a community group that come every week.
And these, this will be a parents group of parents, children of
autism, huge community group.
There's, there's about 40 families in it and it's in ringed, which would be
right in the city center of Dublin.
And they came in and one of the first things they said to me when they came
into the new state was, where's the hey?
I was like, it's there behind you.
I was, thank God, because that's all they like doing is climbing up the hay.
So we create this environment where the kids can just kind of, you know, just
run around and be, and it's just have fun and then you can very quickly see,
well, which is your kid that, you know, you need to get on that horse and give
loads of movement to, which is your kid.
You're gonna actually, let's get this one up last.
'cause he needs to watch everybody else get on first.
And, and then, or even one who actually, do you know what, maybe one
instructor might just take that kid off by themselves 'cause this is a bit
overwhelming what's going on around here.
They might be better just going off by themselves and
doing something really quiet.
And so that's how I, I suppose that kind of sums up child led that even if
they're coming in a group of six, you're still looking at them all individually.
And some will, so for example we had a school group on Thursday and now
actually only three of them came.
And two of them were really keen on what we were doing.
We were finding we'd found the horse's names on our trail, like a piece
of paper with the horse's name on.
And then we were going back to the arena 'cause it was raining.
And on the arena side was the letters and they had to find the letters to spell it.
Now, one of the little ones, it was obviously he wasn't gonna want to do
that, so, but he was loving himself outside there, so they just stayed
outside while the others came back in.
So I suppose that kind of means being child led, not having an agenda.
Having an agenda, but not sticking to it.
Rupert Isaacson: Absolutely.
I think that's, we, we have to sort of have these plans to go in feeling
regulated ourselves, knowing that we're gonna go into a dysregulated
environment, but we are ready to abandon that plan at the drop of a hat to
just follow what that kid wants to do.
And I, I do definitely see that some people adapt to that really naturally.
Other people struggle with it and need to go through kind of a, a
learning curve, but if one doesn't do it, it's just not gonna work.
Particularly with people that don't follow cognitively, don't
yet follow top down instruction.
You know, you can, it's like if I don't learn Chinese, you can yell
at me in Chinese, but I'm still not gonna understand Chinese.
And, and yelling loud is not gonna make me understand it anymore.
You said earlier though, also having confidence in your horse and some
of that is of course, training.
But a lot of it is the wellbeing of the horse.
And when I first.
Was doing trainings and even actually before I was doing trainings and the horse
boy had just been published and I was going round doing a lot of fundraisers
for a lot of therapeutic riding places.
And I realized quite quickly that a lot of the horses didn't have much wellbeing.
That they were quiet but stiff, so not so happy.
And I remember thinking, how can this horse who doesn't really
have wellbeing, give wellbeing when it doesn't have it to give?
And by then of course, I knew about the necessity of oxytocin and of horse
going in sort of soft collection so that the hips can rock and the kid
so that they will get the oxytocin, communication hormone and speak.
That had been explained to me by then.
So I knew that no horse is gonna be able to do that unless they also have
a kind of wellbeing in their body.
So you walked into the situation there, you and Terry.
At Child Vision and you had to create this equine wellbeing, and you had
to do it in a way that wasn't optimal in terms of the environment because
you're in the middle of a city.
So you had limited options there.
You guys are, were very quickly one of the gold standards, in my
opinion, for equine wellbeing.
How, and you now show other people how to do it.
This is super important for people that are gonna go into the industry.
Talk to us about equine wellbeing, what it means for you, mental, physical emotional.
What do you do to ensure that?
And particularly what do you do to ensure that when you are in the middle
of the city, can you talk to us?
Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: I, I think when you make your horses feel good
about themselves physically
Rupert Isaacson: mm-hmm.
Lucy Dillon: Feel good, you know, it's the same with us, isn't it?
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Feel good.
If you physically feel good, you mentally feel that, you know, that's,
and I'm, I'm probably even more,
Rupert Isaacson: it has to start in the body.
I agree.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
And I think probably even more so for, for a horse.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: And I know, and I am really aware of our environment.
And so like that, the new building has been fantastic 'cause it's all super
duper and the horses can all talk to each other over the walls of their stables.
Or the one thing we've realized now is when you give one horse a
treat, everybody else can see it.
So, so we're cutting down on the treats at the moment.
But yeah, they, they, and, and actually even the old stables, the way the stables,
'cause they were very old buildings, very beautiful like, old coach house.
Yeah.
And, and the stables, they were all very beautiful looking weren't they?
And everything.
Yeah.
From visual impairment point of view, they were really not very good.
But even there, even in those stables, each horse could
actually touch its name, but.
Rupert Isaacson: Hmm.
Lucy Dillon: Which was important.
I think even like, I, I'm a great advocate of the riding school pony and, and pe.
Their riding school ponies get so much stick and people who have
them get so much stick for, not like, oh, the riding school pony.
Wanna look after 'em.
I wouldn't give my horse to a riding school.
I gave my pony to a riding school.
I have a little pony.
Depends
Rupert Isaacson: on the riding school.
Depends on the riding school.
Yeah.
Yeah,
Lucy Dillon: yeah.
But I gave my pony to a fabulous woman up in me.
In You've met Rita and Marita her daughter.
Yeah.
And 'cause crunchy.
He's been up there for three years because I know she looks after them really well.
Yes, they work hard, but they look after them really well.
They have great crack with them.
They have great variety in their life and they live in gangs.
And actually that's what horses want to do is live in gangs.
That's one of the biggest things with horses.
So for our horses in Child Vision, I think the way we made them happier
was, the big thing was make them feel really good in their body.
And you see it now with who's, well bull, who's still in the
service, who's a fabulous horse.
He'll be 24 this year.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: And he gets lunch three times a week and he loves it.
Like he's waiting for you to tell him to do a walk counter.
Like sometimes he'll just do it anyway.
And you're like, no, I didn't actually ask you to do that.
But and, but even and, and Ian hand work and, and they, I, I, I dunno.
I suppose if you look after your horses nicely and you have consistency with
them, consistency in their handling, consistency in their routines, you
make them, you train them in such a way that they feel good about
themselves, you feed them properly so they have the energy to do their job.
Mm-hmm.
And they are sociable with each other.
That's the big thing.
So I think the thing with our horses, yes, they are in the city center.
Yes.
They don't have turnout.
So we have like, the way the new stables have been designed,
we have a little playpen for them that's, it's not that big.
It sort of wraps around the back of the stables, but they also, then it links
to some of the stables have windows that we can open, and then if someone's in
the playpen, they can actually put their head in the window and talk to three
or four of them through the window.
But they don't have big turnout, so they, so they have to, we rent land
and they go on holiday four times a year to just have a week of nobody.
So they're going to Easter again.
They were out at Christmas.
But they're very tight little herd.
I think that's another thing that's really important for horses is that they
are, they have their gang just like us.
You know?
We need our gang.
Like my, you know, I'm, I'm blessed.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Stability, stability within the herd is a wonderful thing if one can have it.
Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
And and they are, they're a really tight little gang now.
I've just added two new into it, so I'm waiting till after they've had
their Easter holidays before I start using those two in group sessions.
Because they'll be in the gang properly by the time they've had
a week in the field altogether.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: They have met, they've all met each other, but they haven't, you
know, bonded as the, the gang as such.
So yeah, I suppose we just, and when I did notice that when I first started
working at Child Vision, and Terry hadn't long started there either.
Some of the horses weren't great.
Mm-hmm.
They weren't suited for that job.
They didn't like the high volume of people coming up to 'em every day.
They didn't like having another horse really close to them.
And some, and that's, you know, that's horses.
Some do just, some don't.
You know, I may here at home and she just wants to do her job and
then put me back in the field.
Leave me alone please.
She's not that fuss around, fuss around, fuss around type of horse.
Whereas I have another pony who actually has now joined Child Vision.
My daughter's pony 'cause she's at university.
I knew one when she's got too busy to keep riding him.
He was the one every time you went to the field, he's like,
hello, can you bring me in please?
So I knew he'd be brilliant for child vision.
He loves it, all the attention and, and he loves the other horses and being
close to other horses all the time.
So yeah, I suppose you just, you've gotta have the right horses
in there as well for the job.
Rupert Isaacson: You do, but you, you've actually elucidated
quite a good structure there.
So you've said, okay, your horses get lunged.
You know, so we know that's gonna help them feel good in the back because that's
where the, that's where the monkeys are sitting is up there on that back.
Yeah.
And I remember bull, you know, you, you, you, he's one of my favorite horses,
boy horses partly 'cause he's so pretty.
'cause he's such a lovely pie ball SKU ball.
But also, I remember watching you guys transform him from a horse with
a very sore back and, and the attitude that would go with that to a horse
that felt really good in his body and whose back issues were always
just managed and assuaged and yogurt.
And I really watched you guys do that.
And, and you, you also talked about echo.
You know, who.
I first encountered in her mid late twenties and sort of went on
to be this kind of super horse.
'cause you effectively reverse aged her.
So you lunge them, you work them in hand, you have an integrated herd.
They can all touch each other.
They have playpens and then you also rotate them out to the country regularly
so that they can get a good break, eat grass in their herd, and then come back.
I think it's really good for people to have an idea of
that sort of structure, right?
Because often within the horsey world there's, you know, a thousand conflicting
opinions and people often aren't trained communicators, so they're often quite
vague about what it is they're doing.
And you have to, even my people who've mentored me, I've had to
really watch them and kind of dissect and pick apart what they're doing.
Because they often can't quite communicate their structure.
But I, I know that you and Terry have these really good structures and it's
useful for people who are going into the field with this because as you and
I both know, you can't really, a horse can't really have a bad day when you've
got a very vulnerable kid up there.
It's a bit more like going into battle with your horse.
It's for that hour.
You and that horse have to be total colleagues.
I like also what you just said about riding skills.
I remember one time you had a go at me for saying, Rupert, you s slag off riding
schools and you know, and I don't slag off riding schools, but what I do do
is I point out that if they're not well run, horses do suffer and kids suffer.
And I think we've all experienced that.
And it used to be.
I think it's getting a lot better now, but it used to be that that was a bit
of an accepted norm when we were kids.
So you noticed when you went to a really good writing school and
there were all kinds of reasons for that, economically and so on.
But things have gotten a lot better and perhaps they've gotten a lot better 'cause
people like you were coming along and showing people how to make them better.
We also know that riding schools are kind of in trouble.
It's difficult.
It's getting more and more difficult for people to make a living, running them.
And if we don't have them, how are people gonna learn to ride?
You have a kind of outreach to the community through child
Vision, where to some degree you operate a little bit like that.
You are showing people.
How to ride and interact with horses.
Do you feel that it's now time for the e for the therapeutic industry in, in
a funny way to go back to the sort of sport industry and the riding school
industry and, and say, actually, look, we've evolved technologies here for equine
and human wellbeing that can benefit you all over there in the commercial sector.
If you're in the equine assisted field, or if you're considering
a career in the equine assisted field, you might want to consider
taking one of our three neuroscience backed equine assisted programs.
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Equine assisted program specifically designed for autism, mentored by and
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It works incredibly well.
It's now in about 40 countries.
Check it out.
If you're working without horses, you might want to look at movement
method, which gets a very, very similar effect, but can also be
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If you're working with families, you can give them really tangible exercises to do
at home that will create neuroplasticity.
when they're not with you.
Finally, we have taquine equine integration.
If you know anything about our programs, you know that we need a
really high standard of horsemanship in order to create the oxytocin
in the body of the person that we're working with, child or adult.
So, this means we need to train a horse in collection, but this
also has a really beneficial effect on the horse's well being.
And it also ends your time conflict, where you're wondering, oh my gosh, how
am I going to condition my horses and maintain them and give them what they
need, as well as Serving my clients.
Takine equine integration aimed at a more adult client base
absolutely gives you this.
Have you noticed a bit of an interplay now going on as we, as the horse industry
evolves this way with the more sport oriented side, beginning to look now
a bit more to the therapeutic side?
What, what are you noticing?
Lucy Dillon: I think so.
I think that I think therapeutic writing is the good news story
that the equine industry needs.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: And, and actually I was just talking to someone yesterday about that.
Now just to give a bit of background, our beautiful new indoor arena is
in memory of a young man called Jack Bromhead, whose father is Henry
De Bromhead, who's one of the most successful trainers in this country.
And Jack was very tragically killed in an accident three and a half years ago,
pony racing on the beach down in Kerry.
And so family and friends of the de Bromhead raise the capital
fund to build our center, and it's named the Jack de Bromhead Center.
And one of the other things that we hope comes outta this tragic,
tragic story is that we get a relationship with the racing industry.
And it's, and it not getting a relationship with the industry, it's
bringing this sector and what we do to the racing industry because
Henry is such a high profile.
Figure in Ireland, he, you know, and he's also, the, the goodwill
towards that family is, is huge.
He's, you know, they're a lovely, lovely family.
And he, they get it as well.
They really, this isn't just, they've just given the capital fund
there, there isn't a reason behind.
They've given the capital fund and equally, Henry and his wife,
Heather and Amir and Georgia, there are other two children.
And, but Henry and Heather in particular, they've come and they've seen what we
do in Child Vision and they get it.
They understand why we do it.
If you listen to Henry being interviewed about the center, he can
talk about econ assist activities.
He talks about allocation in the city center and how it's so important
for to be in the city center.
And so I hope that, I think the industry as a whole is paying more attention to
this section of the Indus of, of horses.
I'm very passionate.
I work with horses.
That's what I do.
I work with horses.
I'm not a therapist.
I don't wanna be a therapist.
'cause actually this is something we say when we give training as well,
it's almost a little bit more, you are less strained by not being a therapist.
You can follow the child and you can do do crazy stuff with the
kids because we're not therapists.
But we, I do think we're, we are building relationships with Show Jumping Island.
We're building relationships with horse racing island.
And we are seeing, because there's an we, there is a lot that those
industries can learn from us.
And I think as more people start to run centers and more people get into this
section of the industry, people who have been in other sections of the industry.
So for example well myself and Terry and David Doyle there and and
then like that, Sammy Uping, castle Leslie, I I've been talking to one
of her instructors who wants to.
You know, be had to develop her program up there eventually.
These are all strong horse people who are doing this, whereas traditionally, perhaps
maybe it'd come from the other side.
And, and so then how do I just say this without sort of sounding a bit righteous,
but I do think very much it needs to be horse people leading the therapeutic
equine assisted activities section.
So that we will get the respect from the rest of the industry.
We need to change the view of, of what this, we are not just touchy
feely patting ponies, you know?
So I'm really strict about when people come down to visit us.
I explain the science, I explain how we train the horses.
I show them the horses.
Because we are not this.
So for example, yesterday actually we got a very kind, got a nice check from
the Irish Thorough Breeders Association and it was kind of like the younger
generation in the Irish thorough breeders to generation through TALs Island.
And they came down to present the check and bolstered there looking fabulous,
you know, while they presented the check.
But meanwhile, the session that was going on in the arena at the time
was three young lads with their youth workers, with Rachel and Ali.
My two instructors, and these are lads who are at risk.
So they, they, they don't have a diagnosis as such, but one of 'em does,
but they don't have a diagnosis as such.
But they're school avoiding their prime targets for the
drug dealers to pick as runners.
And and so this is an early intervention youth program.
They all got, half two or three of them have got their own ponies on
the housing estates in Darndale.
Now, one of them, Jeanie showed us picture absolutely stunning horse.
Yes, down there's absolutely stunning Palomino Co.
And they're in the arena there and we are just trying to one, have
a crack with them, let them drop the guard and be kids for an hour.
Stop trying to be the hard boys all the time.
The other thing is also then teach 'em a little bit how to handle the
horses nicely and then, and then how to like, so Rachel was teaching them
to long re and stuff so they can go back and do it with their own ponies.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: They're in the arena.
One of our ponies, Brad, is standing there at the mountain block.
There's three kids all around him, and then they're doing this thing where
one's getting on and the other one's leading the other one, and they're
going as fast as they can to see if they can actually make each other fall off.
That, that was the aim.
And this leads into follow the child.
That's, you know, that's as far as you can get from the strict riding
instructor as you can get, isn't it?
Actively trying to make the kid jump on the horse and they're running round and
round and round, having so much crack and then they're all waving the whips.
'cause what is it about young boys and whips like, they just, they
just wanna crack 'em and wave them.
And the, the three guys from thoroughbred Readers Association,
like Jesus, look at that horse.
He's just standing, France's just standing there in the middle of it all
and they're like cracking whips all around him and he's just standing there.
And that's again about the confidence thing.
And I said, well, you know, I said, if you look really closely, you'll
see Brad close his eyes in a minute.
Because Brad, he does, Brad takes any opportunity for a little nap.
So there's Brad, Brad's in the middle of it, all his eyes half closed.
There's three lads running around him waving whips.
And I think that's really important to show people like that.
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.
Lucy Dillon: That we, you know, these are really good horses.
These aren't, we're not dragging horses around arenas and pat people on the back.
Aren't you great sitting on the horse?
It's actually full on wild session sort of thing.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
And the horsemanship that goes into that is Yes.
Huge.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
The
Rupert Isaacson: horse, you know, you guys, I think in Ireland are
really at the cutting edge, you know?
There's involvement from horse sport island.
There's involvement from the Thoroughbred Association now
it's coming into the other areas.
Show jumping as you say.
Because of course all these people are having to look for what's the aftercare,
what's the second career for these horses?
But also there's money coming from those sectors now into the therapy world.
And this of course, was not.
So when we were all beginning and I work a lot in the USA, the
Thoroughbred Aftercare Alliance there is getting more and more active.
Some of the horse boy places like square peg in California definitely
have that relationship with them.
But your average place over there, and I think to a large
degree in the UK as well, is very self-supporting and a bit isolated.
And I, one of the things that really encourages me about Ireland is this
embracing by the horse industry of the therapeutic side of things which I
think will spill over to other countries because other countries do look to
Ireland as a sort of horse authority.
And whether they're doing that romantically or whether
they're doing that practically.
When you talk about, for example, the show jumpers, what, what, what are you
seeing now coming in from these other parts of, say, the competition industry?
Because they're the, they're, they're coming under fire, public, you know,
from the public eye in the way that the racing industry has been for a long time.
People are starting, you know, there's bad stuff has happened at the Olympics.
We all know about it.
You know, more and more the whole public license conversation gets going.
Are you having to go and court them?
Are they coming to talk to you?
What are the conversations that are going on at the moment?
Lucy Dillon: I think an awareness, I think the thing, I think the reason
why Ireland probably is a bit more ahead than other countries at this
is, is it's a very small country.
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.
Lucy Dillon: You know, it's a very, very small country.
So everybody, has everybody knows everybody.
I mean, I really noticed that when I first moved here.
I, you know, I came from North London, like, you know, so, and you
know, it is a very small country and, and there's certain circles
that all move around together.
And I, I suppose so then it's sort of people naturally reach
out to each other for support.
That's the way it works in this country.
Mm.
Who, you know.
And and so then, so the more people get into therapeutic riding and particularly
ones who have maybe previously been a, a competition rider in the past
or knows or has worked with people it just brings everybody into it.
I think also equally in Ireland, as a country, and I noticed this when I
moved here, you know, 27 years ago.
And I suppose other countries probably are the same now, but in those days even
as well, disabilities are much more open.
And and I think everybody I dunno what I'm trying to say here really, but I think
especially in the horse industry, it is a very small industry.
So I You have connections everywhere with people.
Yeah.
And so if I might meet someone and they're down the country and that they're, they've
come to Child Vision and they're here for some corporate thing or something,
and I'll say you know, well, you know, have you heard of Li Skin at Farm?
And that, and they'll probably know someone who knows someone, or
they know someone who attends it.
They, it's, and I think that's probably gonna help with Ireland.
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.
Lucy Dillon: There is also a thing where in Ireland, everybody has to
come together because if you don't come together, you're gonna be the odd one out.
So come together.
And the horse spot island have been very encouraging.
Like I think they want to bring this section in.
And again, as I just said earlier, I, as more and more strong equine places
come along, the more they will listen.
And then as, as we, I'm part of a like national network of people doing this.
And you came to the thing, castle Leslie, where we would walk the HSE
and the NHS and, and people like that.
And, and we are, I'm lucky in the sense that I come from a large
organization, so I have the backup of a large organization behind me to
allow me to do that sort of thing.
I'm, I'm, I'm not a sole practitioner.
But there's very.
I like to think now there's very little gatekeeping on what we do here.
Rupert Isaacson: Mm.
Lucy Dillon: I and this is one of the things we say at Child Vision.
Anyone can come and visit us.
Anybody can come and see what we do.
Come and shadow us for the day.
See what we do.
'cause I could be doing, I could build a whole nother child vision
in still on the north side.
Actually, the north side of Dublin is, there's anyone who's not Irish.
The north side of the dub are Dublin.
And then the south side is the more Porsche side we are on the north side.
That you could have a har, you could have a center like Ion doing
Equis activities in every city.
Rupert Isaacson: I agree.
Lucy Dillon: And they'd still have waiting lists.
Rupert Isaacson: I agree.
Lucy Dillon: Because of what you do.
And so we're, there's no gatekeeping on what we do.
I'm not special.
I'm, you know, anybody can do this.
If, if you're learning and you wanna have a bit of crack, so I think
hopefully the more we talk about it and the more I think as well, hopefully
we make it accessible to people.
'cause I think a lot of people don't get into it kind assisted activities
'cause they think they might do it wrong.
Rupert Isaacson: Right.
Lucy Dillon: And so like that a lot of riding schools are, are, are being asked
to say, maybe take an autism class.
And they're afraid to,
Rupert Isaacson: yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Afraid they're gonna do it wrong.
And I, that's one thing we say when we give training, we sort
of give two different types of training here at Child Fisher.
But one of the things we say in both of those training is, you
know, cut yourself some slack.
Even if you do get it wrong, it's only come from a good place.
It's not like you to to go out and do it wrong and make it,
make a mess of it, you know?
And several times, you know, more than several actually, to be honest, you know,
I've had to sort of say to the parents, sorry, I think I might have just read.
A child there too much, you know?
And, but it's fine.
And, and I think, I think that's something maybe that's actually you
can come back to you say you know, what kind of help you be child led.
I, well, my children might disagree with you, but I always felt growing up as a
a when my children were growing up and parenting, you know, I of course I'm,
you know, made huge mistakes as everybody does, but I was always quite quick to sort
of apologize to them if they, if I did them, my, my, my parents were the same.
They, they, you know, if they had made a wrong decision about something,
they always apologized to me.
That's
Rupert Isaacson: interesting.
That's unusual.
Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: My, my mom bless her, she, she's passed away a long time now.
She she was, yeah, she was very forward thinking in her way.
So, so consequently, we were very we always had a very honest
relationship with our parents.
Mm-hmm.
My dad is my dad's fab.
He is fab.
You know, I'm very lucky.
I have a really, really good What does
Rupert Isaacson: your dad do?
What, what did your parents do?
Lucy Dillon: He was an accountant.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: But his father was a milkman and he had a horse in Tottenham
Rupert Isaacson: in London.
Okay.
Oh, so it did run in the family a bit?
Lucy Dillon: No, not really.
Although my mom, my mom did say, my mom always kind of said that
if she'd have been born, she was born in North London as well.
If she'd have been born in the countryside, maybe she
would've been more into it.
And when I was 16, they bought me a horse and the plan was that my mom took
some lessons and she wanted to try and learn to ride it on the days where I
wasn't allowed to go and see it, you know, the days I had to do my homework.
And she did it a few times and then she fell off.
And and then she was like, she used to just go and take
it for a walk with the dogs.
But yeah, they like there isn't really a horse connection for the family.
But animals, we always had animals, you know, we always had dogs, we
always had cats and stuff like that.
Rupert Isaacson: You talk about the trainings, you're doing trainings and
I know that you and Terry, obviously you teach Horse Boy and movement
method, but you've, you guys have also developed your own course curriculum,
which is a really interesting one.
Which is for people wanting to enter the industry, the, the
therapeutic end of the industry.
Maybe people who are horse, young horse professionals coming out of
agricultural college or having done their BHS exams and thinking, can
I, can I make a living at this?
Which is a new thing, right?
Because up until recently the answer would've be no, you can't
you, you're gonna beggar yourself doing the therapeutic thing.
But recently this has changed and funding is available and more and
more it's becoming a, a, a viable career and, you guys have developed a
course which looks at a whole range of options for people wanting to enter.
Talk to us about that.
'cause that's quite pioneering and I think could be quite ground
groundbreaking for other countries.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
So we, the course was developed
Rupert Isaacson: what's it called by the way?
Lucy Dillon: It's, well, it's changed its name now actually
with the new certification.
It's called Equine Assisted Activities Coaching Course.
Okay.
As opposed to therapeutic writing.
'cause it's more than therapeutic writing.
Rupert Isaacson: Indeed.
Lucy Dillon: And that's actually, we don't call the service therapeutic writing,
we call it equine assisted activities.
'cause that kind of 'cause it isn't just about writing.
So the course, we, the course was written in 2020, really?
2019.
By myself, Terry Broin, who was the unit manager at the time Audrey Darby, who
was the OT that worked here at the time.
And Gerald, no, Neil, who is also retired from 12.
I'm the only one remaining who's, who was like head of
training and stuff in television.
So she was the one who kind of took all our ideas and
put it into a nice structure.
And basically the course is to sort of, kind of summarize up in a course what
myself and Terry did in the, the first few years when we worked here, which
was, well, myself in particular, come in as a writing instructor and then
become an EQU activities instructor.
So when we were sort of planning what to put into the course, I
kind of just sat down and thought, okay, what have I learned?
In the last three years and just sort of wrote it all down.
And then we sort of put structure onto it because like that, as I said earlier,
there's a lot of transferable skills.
You know, if, if you've, well, one, we don't teach people how to look
after horses on the course because they're qualified riding instructors.
They know how to look after horses.
We don't teach them how to teach people because they have a qualification in that.
So they've learned about teaching and they've had experience of teaching.
But we teach them then how to apply those skills in a different way.
And then we give them all the information, sort of general
background information on disabilities.
But when we give the background information on disabilities, it's not sort
of like, well, this condition is this.
It's, yes, it is.
Like, you know, cerebral palsy is this, it's caused by this, et cetera, et cetera.
But the way it could affect someone on a horse is this, this, this, this, this.
And the way it could, you can benefit the person by putting them on the
horse is this, this, this, this, this.
So that's how the course is very much written.
It's about how to deliver this type of program.
So, but we do talk about doing, we do encourage everybody to then
go and do the Horse Boy as well for the horse training side of it.
But we talk about just running sessions and how to commun.
The big section on the bit of actual running sessions is communication as well,
and how to communicate with people and the different ways to communicate with people.
Yeah, so it's, it's, it is, it is a good course.
I, you know, I really like giving it to people because it's very we,
we try and give it in such a way that's very backwards and forwards.
You know, there's an awful lot of stories from us and stories from them
making it very relatable to people.
So yeah, it is, it's, it's a great course.
I like it.
Rupert Isaacson: So, who has taken this intro course to the
industry that you've seen now go on and do some interesting stuff.
Lucy Dillon: So, a lot of people actually, there's been a lot
of people through the course.
Yeah.
A lot of people have opened up their own bus, like a new
business doing therapeutic.
And then other people who, it's a right, you know, it's a riding school and they've
added it as a section of the riding school and a bit of overlap between
people who have done horse boy as well.
Between the two courses.
'Cause one of the aims of the course is that it, it's very accessible.
So actually Arrow, which is the Association of Irish writing
establishments, that was the, the body that was involved in getting
the funding to write the course.
Initially there was a bursary there for qu people in arrow
centers to take the course.
'Cause that was the aim of the course, was to roll out these services more
nationally through our centers.
So Ara is a self regulatory body for the, the writing
school industry in this country.
And it's part of Four Spot Island.
Right.
So, so there's a number of writing schools have incorporated it into them, and then
just people started their own business.
So, for example, I know two people here in, in Meath, which is where
I live, the county I live in, which is just north of Dublin.
One is she was a show jumping coach for a long time and she now does this from her
yard instead of producing show jumpers.
She does therapeutic riding and absolutely loves it and was like,
I'm never going back to show jumping.
And, and another lady, she did have her own school and she closed it down
when she got married and had kids and, and now is doing therapeutic.
And, you know, and making a good business out of it.
I think that's another thing we teach on the course as well, is we
te we explain to people that you can make a business out of this.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Just because we are doing something for, for people with additional
needs doesn't mean you can't charge them.
And, and I think a lot of people took a take a bit of
time to get around that idea.
Because there is funding out there.
So,
Rupert Isaacson: and they didn't used to be, I mean, it used to be
that if you did this, you did it as a volunteer and that was that.
So people were in a bit of a poverty trap with it.
Yeah.
Or they just had their own resources.
That has changed.
Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
And then also one of the parts we do the, there's a section on the course about
like the business side of it, and we talk about the different funding sources
there, but also the funding that a person if you have a child with additional
needs, the funding that you get as a parent to support that child as well.
That and so people are looking for services for their children.
And, you know, in the same way that as a parent you pay for your child
to go swimming lessons, you pay for your child to go horse riding lessons
you pay for your child to, you know, parents are looking to give their child.
And what's so lovely about equine assisted activities is yes, it is therapeutic.
And yes, it has wonderful benefits for them, but it's also fun.
That's, you know, it's, it's a fun, enjoyable thing for your child to do.
So yeah, the courses, it, it is, it's good.
It's, it's it's led onto a lot of places, incorporating it into it.
So I have at least to there are 10 centers previous, you know, writing
centers who are now offering therapeutic as a big part of their service.
And then there's many more who are offering it on a smaller scale.
Rupert Isaacson: Do you see yourself taking that course, that intro level
course out, perhaps internationally first?
I think the obvious place would be to the UK and then
beyond, because I think there's.
Actually a need for people to, as you say, know that this exists as a
career now, whereas perhaps it didn't so much before that there is funding.
What are the funding sources?
How can you structure a business around this that is actually going to give
you and your family quality of life?
So I think that's, there, there are a couple of problems in the horse
industry for a lot of people that are coming in at grassroots level, which
is that, you know, it made me chuckle when you were saying you, you learned
the sort of business side of horses at college because of course there's that
old saying, how's you make a million in horses by starting with 2 million?
You know?
And that the idea is that, you know, you lose money through horses.
But I've actually found that that's not true.
I've found that if you have a skillset that is for whatever reason in
demand, it, it's not a poverty trap.
And ironically for me with horse sport, you know, I started flat
broke because my career had ended.
My journalistic career had ended because of Rowans, my son's autism.
I couldn't travel and I was a foreign correspondent.
I was, you know, I was broke.
And I never expected that the technologies that I learned to help my
son would end up becoming the mainstay, mainstay of the family income and then
end up being how he makes a living.
'cause he now makes a living that way as well.
He, he helps on trainings.
He explained to people autism from the inside.
And, and so it's, and it's become an economic platform for him.
And then because of the way we had to train the horses, we ended up with, a
whole secondary dressage career, which I never saw coming because of how we
had to train the horses for horse boy.
So now clients fly in from all over the world just to learn
that with our horses and stuff.
So I often am encouraging people to go out and learn the skillset, but
I think that you guys have come at it really interestingly, from a much
more structured way saying, look, here are the institutional structures.
And if you're coming in, as you say, out of learning how to be a writing structure,
and now you are wondering, how am I gonna find my place in this universe?
And yes, there are people coming in with much more money behind them, and
frankly, they will probably be the ones that dominate in the sports side because
that's just how the economics of it go.
Where are you gonna make your niche?
So I think you're providing a real service, not just for the people
that are gonna be the service users.
Who need it, but the people who are gonna be the service providers as well.
So do, how do you see Yeah.
What you're doing there, developing and going out and broadening.
Lucy Dillon: It would be great if we could broaden the course.
It's all down to time.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Because, you know, if you went off and started giving the course
all over the place, I, I wouldn't be getting to see kids every day.
And I still really enjoy that side of the job.
Like, you know, when, when I became the manager of the unit, I was
like, yeah, but I'm still gonna see kids, you know, the majority of
my week is doing that side of it.
But I do, I think, but there are other courses coming along.
And hopefully, you know, maybe in the future it might be part of the
British School Society exams that this is a sort of way that could go or, or
there could be a college course in it.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: I think the co
Rupert Isaacson: Are you working on that at all with any of
the agricultural colleges?
Lucy Dillon: Not with the agricultural colleges, no.
'Cause at the moment, the, see, the way our course works is it's
for people who, the people who have attended the course they've
Rupert Isaacson: already graduated.
Right.
Lucy Dillon: They've, and they're already working, so they haven't got time to go
and start a year long college course.
Rupert Isaacson: Right, right.
Lucy Dillon: It's five days really intense.
And then, then there's sort of assessments and things to go with it.
But again, it's all quite tight 'cause that's what people have time for.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: You don't wanna put off the very people that you want to bring in.
So the course is hopefully over the next month going to be certified
by Lancia, which is a land-based agency, UK Irish land-based agency.
So that means it's quality control checked, checked.
We've been for all sorts of processes.
To talk about the quality of the course and the content and the,
the assessment types and things.
And so hopefully maybe that might roll it out more in the future.
It continues, you know, the, the demand is there for it.
And maybe there is similar things happening in the uk.
It's, and maybe it's something that one of the colleges in the
UK might pick up as a thing.
You know, and if anyone's listening, I'd be very happy to help.
But
Rupert Isaacson: well, people are, I know there's people who are involved at
Har Pre and Capri and places like that.
They'll definitely be watching this podcast, and I think we should, we
should throw that challenge out there.
It's like, this ought to be part of the curriculum somehow.
And, and the curricular should offer the therapeutic angles, the equine
assisted angles alongside the other things as people are going through
those modules, because they're gonna have to go out into the.
Industry.
This is now, as you say, how the industry is developing to not put
these things in at the college level.
How does that serve the student?
So maybe, maybe we should actually make a, a bit of a formal approach.
Worst thing they can do is say no, and then we'll try again.
Lucy Dillon: I majorly, you know, I, I did one of the first EQU degrees yeah.
You know, my, one of that, that was, that's where we met at Coach College.
He was one of the, he was one of the first equine graduates, that first 50 of
them that did a degree in EQU studies.
Mm-hmm.
And it, it saddens me sometimes when you still hear other people in the
industry criticize the colleges.
Yeah.
And because I think, you know, things have changed so much in 30 years.
And you, you can't criticize the colleges and you can't criticize.
Oh, young people don't, they don't wanna work in the industry and
learn the hard way like I did.
No, they don't actually, you know, because actually nobody wants to work.
Like people worked in labor in physical jobs 30 years ago.
Do they?
You know, society,
I, you know, I don't wanna wear, my grandfather was a milkman around
London with a horse and cart.
I don't wanna do this.
Yeah.
So I think you know, people have to be realistic about, it's not that
young people are flaky, they're just a bit more informed and so is society.
I
Rupert Isaacson: yeah.
Well, and also what we know is, you know, even if they go through college to learn
this stuff, you're still going to have to run your program and that program
will still demand a lot of physical and mental and emotional challenges from
you that's gonna take care of itself.
Yeah, if you're a horse nerd, and if you're on this podcast,
I'm guessing you are, then you've probably also always wondered a little
bit about the old master system.
of dressage training.
If you go and check out our Helios Harmony program, we outline there step by step
exactly how to train your horse from the ground to become the dressage horse
of your dreams in a way that absolutely serves the physical, mental and emotional
well being of the horse and the rider.
Intrigued?
Like to know more?
Go to our website, Helios Harmony.
Check out the free introduction course.
Take it from there.
Lucy Dillon: I agree.
There's an awful lot still in our industry of sort of, you know, you should work
for nothing, just for the privilege with so and so or this sort of thing, and,
and that just can't happen nowadays.
Cost of living is completely different.
Yeah.
The, the, it, it just can't happen.
But I, yeah, no, I do, I think, and I get, we have a lot of there's a year
in Irish education called transition year, which is a year before you
take your final two years of school.
It's, it's optional.
Some schools it's compulsory, some it's optional, and it's a year of sort of
work experiences and trying new subjects and it's a really great year actually.
Well, it depends what the kid makes of it.
That year.
And so we have a lot of transition year students come and volunteer with
us in Child Vision and, you know, massively helps us support running
the service because they, it is, you know, you rely on volunteers to
run on, run this type of service.
And we get a lot of transition year students because of our location, you
know, they can actually get to us.
Yeah.
And it more and more in getting ones who come, not necessarily from local
schools, but come a little bit of a distance and, and ones from local
schools as well who have an interest in horses and they say, I want to
be a therapeutic riding instructor.
And I think that's great because that, you know, when I was 16,
no, it wasn't even a thing.
So I think that's, you know, I think that's great.
And, and so then like that, I, I always say to them.
Go to college and learn about horses or go and train and get your BHS
exams and learn about horses properly, then start looking about being
a therapeutic riding instructor.
You've got to go and do the horse bit first.
Rupert Isaacson: Yes.
Yes.
I so agree.
And it's interesting I think you've met, you've met Leanna Tank
from Michigan, who is, I think she was there our last tribe day.
She's an occupational therapist.
She's an OT who works in the criminal justice system in with people, in
some cases in secure units where they've been acquitted from reasons
of insanity from having done things that are so heinous that they
can't be allowed back into society.
And she's using she, she's a very accomplished horse woman.
So she's using also tacky and horse boy movement method in that, but she's
using many other modalities as well.
But she's.
She's also a professor.
She's an adjunct professor at a university there in Michigan teaching OTs.
And she's the first to say when it comes to the equine being a therapist, is
you are like third in the tier of importance in that unit.
It's the people who are the horse professionals who have to lead and
guide this because if you don't understand the animal, the environment
that you are working with, no amount of theoretical expertise
is going to be of any use at all.
And I think you guys really.
Exemplified that through quite a lot of the pioneering work at Child
Vision, you know, because you were working with so many therapists and
those therapists were coming out of
a, a, a very established organization, had been St.
Joseph's School to the bride, then it rebranded as Child Vision.
There was a real kind of momentum to working in that
institution as a therapist.
You know, you guys came in as the equine unit somewhat on the side.
So it was very natural, I think, for people to look at it a little bit as
an add-on, when of course it wasn't.
And then I noticed more and more that child, child vision when they were
going out and doing their marketing stuff, would put the horse thing front.
You know, that would be like the first thing on the leaflet.
The first thing on the thing.
It's like, why?
Because it really works, but why does it really work?
Because the people running it on the horse side, were rock solid.
And, and so I I absolutely agree that it, it's, it, and you guys, I think
have done a incredible service, I think you and Terry particularly within the
therapeutic field to kind of legitimize the horse professional as absolutely
central to this role who can then go cross fertilize from one therapy to another.
So if you come in as an ot, you come as a physical therapist,
you come in as an equine assisted psychotherapist or whatever.
You, if you don't have that solid horse professional there, who
actually understands more about.
What you all do in your own little therapy silos that perhaps you may be even
understand about each other because you're stuck in your a, BA silo or your OT silo.
Whatever that horse person who's working with all of you
perhaps understands maybe more.
And, and, and because they're exposed to you all and have to understand what you do
and integrate that through the lens of the horse while keeping you and the child safe
and served, it's a really complex role.
What do you think I is the sort of,
if you are, if you are going to give advice to, not, let's go outside of the
equine, if you're gonna give it advice to therapists, OTs, psychotherapists,
physical therapists, and so on, who want to come in and work in this sector,
what do they need to know?
Lucy Dillon: I think it depends what they want to do.
Mm-hmm.
See, there's a lot of difference between say a therapist comes and they want
to work and incorporate hippotherapy, which is the general term, isn't it?
For for the OT physio speech and language using a horse.
If they want to set up a practice with one horse, possibly two horses,
and it's maybe, you know, they have a personal connection to those two horses
or they, then that's very different to someone who says, who comes from a
one-horse background, who wants to start working with six kids and six horses.
And there's a big difference in that because you can become the expert in those
one and two horses and learn about those.
One just like the individual horse owner.
Is an expert in their own horse.
Just like the parent is the expert in their own child, isn't it?
It's the same thing.
Yeah.
And so I think, God, I don't wanna offend anyone here, but I think the
thing to say to therapists and stuff is to appreciate your limitations
when it comes to the horses.
Equally as the way I appreciated my limitations when I started doing
this as understanding children with vision impairment, understanding
people, children with a physical issue, and now with experience, I've
experienced more things, learned about more things and know more about it.
I do think there is a big difference between working in an environment like
ours with 10 horses, and you're seeing, I know, 25, 30 clients a day to working with
two horses that you own, that you know.
Rupert Isaacson: Sure.
Lucy Dillon: You see them, you're seeing clients one at a time with those horses.
It is a very different environment, isn't it?
And there's space for everybody in this.
Absolutely.
So I suppose if someone is interested in it, I think the thing is, is you can't
learn about horses in six months as well.
It takes a long time.
You know, it doesn't take a lifetime if you really fully immerse yourself into it.
But there is a big difference, and I always say this, there's a big
difference between people who have been with horses all their life.
I've, I've had my own horse, then people who have actually
commercially worked with them.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Because it's just different.
It's different.
Yeah.
You know, I, I used, yeah, it's just different.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
It's understanding that you need to constantly broaden the skillset.
I think that people who are.
Able to work in the commercial sector who are really good at it.
What they, what I always find with those people is that they're constantly
going out to learn something new.
They're constantly, the really good ones are always, and they're willing to
completely change what they do if they find something better rather than just
a set of opinions that they stick to.
And I think that's true across, across any profession.
Something that occurred to me as I was listening to you just now is we haven't
covered, and I think we should cover this as we're sort of heading towards
the two hour mark here, is you really, I know that within Child Vision you
work with a very broad range of clients.
However, you really have an expertise, I know on the autism side as well,
but you really do have an expertise on the visual impairment side.
If you had to, if you're running like a little seminar right now.
And we are all sitting in front of you going, yes, Lucy,
tell us what we need to know.
What are the, what are the five, 10 most important things we need
to be aware of and adapt ourselves to, and skills that we need to get?
If we're going to work with people with visual impairment, what are they?
Lucy Dillon: Gosh, I, I think probably the biggest one is don't underestimate them.
People with visual impairment.
Sometimes I think particularly in television, when you meet the children
and the young adults that are in there and you meet them just, you know, face
on and you meet them in the cafe and you meet them passing and you stop and you
talk to them and you, if you actually read their visual impairment, you'd
be like, wow, that person's amazing.
You know, the way they're negotiating their environment.
And then it's just being careful about things, you know, and that, again, that
comes into, you know, talk to the parents.
So have a, you know, be aware of what that person's vision is.
But then this sounds, this is gonna make me sound a bit, well, hey,
but but don't be too focused on it.
So if the parent says, well, they have no vision at all in their right eye, well
then just make sure you stand on the left.
But don't be sort of worried about talking about something that's on the right side.
'cause they can turn their head and, and be aware perhaps
of, of balance a little bit.
But again, you'll, you'll see it when you, when once you start doing it.
Rupert Isaacson: What do we need to be aware of with balance that, that
might not be so obvious for people?
Lucy Dillon: Just for some thing.
I'll tell you one thing that's a really important point.
We make this with the children of vision impairment when they get off the horse.
And they're gonna come to, we always get mount at steps on and off.
And one, because it kind of frames the session as well, but also it's safer.
And we have two sets of steps and the horse sort of parks in the middle of them.
So if someone has vision impairment, do not move that horse until you've got down
those steps because that movement behind them could be distracting and affect their
balance as they're negotiating steps.
So it's just talking a person through it.
Ask a person with a vision impairment.
Well, do you want to hold my hand?
Do you want me to hold your elbow?
Do you want to take my elbow?
You know, how do you want me to support you?
And and ask them, you know, when you get to the steps, do you want
me to count you up the steps?
Do you wanna feel the steps yourself?
And that's, again, this is something we teach on the course is a little
bit of patient handling as well.
How to best support someone who's say maybe is not just
visually impaired, but physically vulnerable, going up and down steps.
You know, have a wide base pre present yourself.
If they're coming down the step, say they're on the third step, we'll make
sure you are on the second and even the first step with your two legs.
So you are there and from a visual point of view, they can feel
that you are lower than them.
So they know they're going down, but you're also got a wide
base and you know, you're not standing on the same step as them.
'cause if they lose their balance and you are two feet on the same
step as them, if all of you are going head first off the step.
Whereas if you are two steps down with your legs apart on one on one
step and one on the other, you are a secure balance for them to support off.
But most children with visual impairment are amazing, the
way they negotiate the world.
The other thing about the, the most obvious one as well is if someone has a
vision impairment, introduce yourself.
Rupert Isaacson: Okay.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah, I'm trying to think.
So all these things that you kind of do in Televis without thinking about
'em anymore, so introduce, you know.
Hi Peter, it's Lucy.
How are you today?
And, or, and, and say goodbye as well.
That's a really important thing.
People with vision permanent will tell you that.
Don't just talk to somebody and then walk away.
'cause they might keep talking to you 'cause they don't know you've walked away.
Rupert Isaacson: Right.
Lucy Dillon: And that's not very nice for someone, is it?
So like that if you meet someone on campus walking through the camp, you know,
walking through campus, you might sort of say, oh hey Joe, how are you today?
And if you know that you might yeah.
And they'll, Hey, you know, how are you today?
It's Lucy.
And they'll say, oh yeah, hello.
And then, then you say, okay, see you then Joe.
I've gotta go now so that they're not left talking to you.
Okay.
That's kind of it really.
Rupert Isaacson: When
Lucy Dillon: kids are quite with their visual impairments.
'cause I think the thing you have to remember with a child with vision
impairment, that's their vision.
So they have grown up with that vision.
That is their vision.
So that's their Right,
Rupert Isaacson: right.
So they may not be viewing it as an impairment because it's the skillset
they have and they're using it.
Yes.
And that leads me to the next question is how, what are you
actually serving them with?
Like, let's say someone is completely blind no amount of doing cool things on
a horse is going to make that person see.
So therefore, what are we looking for with visual impairment?
Specifically when we're working with horses, for example, if, if, if you were
to say that to me with autism, you know, what I would say is I would say, well, I'm
looking for oxytocin for communication.
I'm looking for novel movement moving problem solving, which
vestibular system, which is BDNF, which is neuroplasticity and okay,
you could say that about anybody.
But given that I'm working with a cognitive issue here, I want
to effectively grow a new brain.
So I know that if I work in this way with a horse, I'm gonna
sort of get towards that way.
When you're working with visual impairment, and I know there's obviously
a lot of co, I don't even like the word comorbidity, let's say co-diagnoses.
So someone might have visual impairment and down syndrome or
visual impairment and autism.
Okay.
But when it's specifically the visual side, what do you feel that the
equine really brings to the table?
Lucy Dillon: Well, all of what you said.
Yeah.
Vestibular system.
So your attention learning focus.
Also again about the oxytocin, because if you think about it we produce cortisol
when our body feels under threat and we have a heightened sensory sensory system.
So any sensory processing issue is gonna give you a heightened sensory system.
Now, a vision impairment is the biggest sensory processing issue you
can have, you know, 90% of our senses are interpreted through our vision.
And then also the biggest thing is the confidence and the spilling of that
confidence in other parts of your life.
You know, they, they, they get up on a horse like, what is
a horse in the first place?
And now you're up, you are up in the air, and and you're moving.
You are also sometimes moving faster than you would move by yourself.
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.
Lucy Dillon: Which is.
The feeling, even just the feeling of that moving faster than you would maybe
move by yourself spills into their confidence and their confidence in their
body, their, their, all that perceptive input, the awareness in their body.
Because again, as a child with a visual impairment, like, you know, if you
think about it, development is slowed so much because of a visual impairment
because site in causes development, you know, the first thing a baby does.
Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: No, we are visual.
We are visual creatures.
We just are.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Lucy Dillon: The first thing a baby does is reach.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: And and if you don't have the vision impairment, if you have a
vision impairment, you don't reach.
Mm-hmm.
You have a significant vision impairment, you're, you don't develop
head and neck control as fast.
Mm-hmm.
Because.
You don't raise your head.
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.
Lucy Dillon: That delays walking, that delays crawling, you know, and,
and well, it delays crawling, it delays sitting and walking and, and
all the steps that, you know, the developmental steps to get to that.
So we can work on the physical things as well, particularly
with some of our preschoolers.
You're working on that physical, you know, it, it's, you know, it's one side of using
the horse is the movement of the horse.
Yes.
For the oxytocin, but also from a physiotherapy point of view.
That movement of the horse, that three dimensional movement is the
same movement pattern as walking.
Right?
So you are reinforcing and developing muscle memory
through those walking patterns.
So we do a lot of work with the preschoolers in child vision,
and a lot of them also would be wheelchair users still at that point.
Now they may not necessarily always be a wheelchair user or they may
be a wheelchair user, but who then have developed sitting balance
or they develop the ability to stand for transfers and things.
But at that stage, at two and a half, three and a half years old,
they're still wheelchair users.
And so we are working, building up that muscle and that core strength.
And that's when we quite, that's when we ride with them
and hold onto them from behind.
And what's so nice about that is that you can give and take the support
as and when it's needed and you can lean back and let them work on their
head and neck control and stuff.
So there is, it's a huge benefit from a vision and PenPoint
and the kids love it as well.
You know, I rode a horse, like, how cool is that?
If you you know, they, they love it.
Rupert Isaacson: This is, this is I think what's often just not talked
about, but we all know it within the whole et equ thing is it's just
really, really cool to be with horses.
It just is.
And where that's worked to our detriment I think in our field is people say,
well, you're just playing with ponies.
To which.
I've now, you know, I used to be defensive about that.
No, we're not.
We're doing all this scientific now.
I'm like, you're right, we are, because that is quality of life.
Now I can show you the science of what goes on in your brain, in your body
when you have that quality of life.
And there's a reason why many of the world's greatest thinkers have always
have also been horsemen, by the way.
Interesting correlation there.
Because the other thing, of course, that horses demand from
us is emotional regulation.
We have to control our emotions 'cause we get scared up there.
We get excited up there.
We get this up there, we got that, get that up.
They're exactly like the kid that you talked about who's head butting
the horse when it's happening.
And then they start to see the cause and effect and they realize that they
need to modify their behavior in a way that they haven't had to around humans.
All of these things go on, but the element of play, of course, within neuroscience.
We, there's now no argument among neuroscientists that play and learning
are so integral that if you take the element of play out, your learning is
so impaired, even with a neurotypical kid, that it's almost pointless.
The neuroscience is clear on this, but I think what's not
really talked about is the joy.
And if one is coming out of a situation that is un joyful for
whatever reason, you know, there's that cliche, but it's so true.
Money can't buy happiness, but it can buy horses, which is
pretty much the same thing.
But there is something innately joyful about the human
interaction with the horses.
They're not what do you see, you, you work with quite a
few of your people over years.
How do you see that joy component?
Really creating change.
Lucy Dillon: I think it just spills into everything that a kid does.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: And their overall confidence and then, and the joy the parents
get from seeing their kid as well.
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.
Lucy Dillon: Is so lovely.
I can think of one little girl who's who wasn't the pre school.
She's in main, she's gone into mainstream school this year.
And if anybody goes on the Child Vision website, there is the most beautiful
video about her and Jessie, our Shetland pony, who Anya believes that Jessie
came, especially for her, and she did come, especially for you to be honest.
But she's still there.
And the, the effect it had on her that she, she got the confidence
to get on this pony 'cause it was a bit smaller than all the others.
And how it just, then the confidence spiraled in everything from that.
Speaking, being, interacting, everything.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah,
Lucy Dillon: and I suppose that's probably where you see it the most is,
and then we see the way we work, our services, children come into the service.
Royal children in revision impairment, they come into, if they're in the
preschool and if they stay in the primary school, they can continue on.
And then anybody with vision impairment is prioritized in our service.
Anyone who applies, if they have a visual impairment, they are prioritized.
But we see children, other children who come into the service, they, they'll
come into the service, say maybe for six months or so, and then they go
on to our return to service list.
Otherwise, we'd never get through our waiting list.
You know, we, we can't always got a waiting list.
So we have a sort of rotational thing, which is again, partly why,
who wants to train more people to do this so that then I can recommend
other places for people to go to.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: But you see them, you just see them grow and develop and, and, yeah.
Just get really into it.
Rupert Isaacson: No, I, I agree.
It, it, it, it's, I think what's often forgotten when one's dealing
with special needs people is because of the way economics has shifted and
the way technology has shifted, that people who would've been written off
as economic participants, let alone policy makers, let alone politicians,
let alone professors or whatever, educators, people with particularly
the cognitive impairments, would've been completely written off from that.
And that has changed.
And now we know that you can have autism and be a university professor.
Look at Temple Grandin.
Or you can, you know, I mean, we, we just know it's a, a very different field now.
And as AI develops and so.
What I feel that people like you are doing really, is you're actually
training the leaders of tomorrow.
This isn't just therapy, a pony ride for some poor little kid who's then gonna go
live in a group home and have no life.
These people could very well be sitting on the board of Child Vision, you know,
25 years from now as lawyers or whatever.
Because of the cognitive breakthroughs, development, confidence,
happiness, joy, neuroplasticity,
physical abilities, you can never separate those from mental abilities that they
would've gotten from their years with you.
And I think I, I, I do, yeah.
This is just often I think under, not thought through, I think by, you
know, yet it's, it's getting better.
But yeah,
Lucy Dillon: I think more and more you see it more and more, you know, sort of
non-traditional and very fun activities for children with disabilities are
being seen as not just fun activities.
They're being actually identified for what they achieve.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Perhaps what it is it's that there, there is, whereas
ly perhaps it was a separation between fun activities and therapies.
Rupert Isaacson: Absolutely.
Lucy Dillon: Now it's very blurred lines between the two and there is
recognition of the value of the, the results of the fun activities.
And you see, even in general education, you can see that change as well.
A hundred
Rupert Isaacson: percent.
Lucy Dillon: So yeah, a
Rupert Isaacson: hundred percent.
You know?
Yeah, just the, the other two languages that I speak French and German,
or my German, it's not as good as it should be, but it's functional.
I learned them on horseback.
I learned them having the crack.
I learned them doing things that I found intrinsically fun.
I don't remember any Latin and Greek, which I did at school.
Don't remember it.
Nothing.
Not, not, not a thing.
There was no crack.
There was no fun in it for me.
The other two things I could do on horseback.
So I then ended up in other countries doing them, exactly the same.
So it is interesting.
Of course, as you say now, within mainstream education, this is becoming
something that people are looking at, but we're in, so are the early stages of it.
And I, I don't know if yet the equine assisted people
are getting the credit that.
They deserve for the neuroplasticity, the brain development that they are
giving through this joy and this fun.
But with people like you doing your, your course, we have a
sporting chance of getting that out there more into the mainstream.
Of course, you are working with schools, so you are talking
to young teachers about this.
I wonder if people like you should actually be going into the not just
the agricultural colleges where the people are doing the equine stuff,
but the teacher training colleges.
And I
Lucy Dillon: would like to, the, the sort of, one of the biggest island
primary school teach training colleges is literally gone off from our syndrome con.
Mm-hmm.
And I think now I feel more confident in my role.
It is somewhere I'd like to reach out to, to talk about the method and
'cause it's just so simple is not the right word, but it is simple.
It's, it is
Rupert Isaacson: what anything that is good and effective is simple actually.
Yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
It's not.
Science.
And I think perhaps sometimes people think it should be rocket science
to make it effective, but it's not.
Rupert Isaacson: No, no.
I so agree.
I, I do think you need to do that because the people who are going to go on and
be the school principals 20 years from now are just, are in college right now.
And yeah.
If we want to see that change, they need people like you and many of the people
who are watching and listening to this podcast to go in there and inform them.
Yeah.
So
Lucy Dillon: sorry, I mean, I think perhaps you say
Rupert Isaacson: you get, is your, is your dog telling you it's time?
Lucy Dillon: Yes.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, that they do that, don't they?
Okay.
Well that, that has brought us to about the two hour mark.
So your dog is bang on.
I would like you to go and make that approach then.
That's my challenge to you, Lucy.
And I will, I I will back it up obviously, and I'll get others to back it up.
For example, as you know, we, we run now this neuroscience conference outta the
University of Virginia every two years which is mostly aimed at pediatricians,
but more and more it's also teachers coming in and educators, and we can
bring some of these things to bear.
So why don't you put together like a, a nuts and bolts presentation and
we'll put together a little assault special Forces team to, to back you
up and then just see, just start the conversation and see where it goes.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah, yeah.
I mean, we are, we are getting more and more involved in different would be
the children's agency in this country.
Mm-hmm.
And we're getting funding through them for clients and stuff because it is, it's, you
know, they are seeing the effects on the.
Classes on the kids who are vulnerable.
And, and so we are pushing that funding area all the time.
And the health service executive, HSE here, they can't meet, you know,
they're, they're under pressure as well.
So we, we are offering an a nice solution.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, no, I agree.
Because oddly enough, people say horses are expensive, but
we can do for much cheaper what
Lucy Dillon: Yes.
Rupert Isaacson: They try and fail to do with all kinds of
other therapies and interventions.
Yeah,
Lucy Dillon: yeah, exactly.
So, myself and, and again, this task force have that's one of our aims over
the next couple of years is to get the HSE to sort of sit up and listen and, and
it's cross border, so the NHS as well.
Sort of sit up and listen to our results and we are, I'm trying to, not
very well, but I, when I remember I'm trying to collect data from parents
and schools and but I know that Terry, she's starting a PhD, isn't, she
has a PhD student there in Stuart's.
Yeah.
So,
Rupert Isaacson: and we've got, got ke ke Sullivan on the case from University of
Bournemouth and Alex Alex Northover doing it through Manchester Met University.
So we're on it.
Yeah.
But we need to get that data out there.
Yeah, yeah.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
Great.
Rupert Isaacson: Alright, well listen, it's been brilliant as always.
Thank you so much for giving us the time.
Thank you.
People will need to, want to get in touch with you.
So tell them how they do that and how they also, if they want to come
on that course that you're doing for the equine professionals going
into the equine assisted field.
Lucy Dillon: So if they follow Child Visions on Instagram mm-hmm.
Coming off about the course, literally next week.
The next one we're running at the end of April.
And then also if someone wants to contact me, they can just email me.
Lucy Dillon at Child Vision, ie.
Rupert Isaacson: Lucy Dillon.
That's with a y Lucy with a y Dylan, D-I-L-L-O-N.
All lowercase, I presume at Child Vision.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: Ie.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah,
Rupert Isaacson: yeah.
Island
Lucy Dillon: on the Child Vision website.
There's, there's the whole section about the Equine Assist activity service that
Rupert Isaacson: great.
And if they are wanting to do that course there, they're an
equine professional wanting to go.
Just give us the name of the course again.
Lucy Dillon: It's called Equine Assist Activities Coaching Course,
Rupert Isaacson: and it's now being accredited through lanre.
So go and have a look at what Lanre is, lads, which is cross-border between
the UK and Ireland accreditation.
And if you're lucky, you will meet.
The August and illustrious Lucy Dillon and her equally August and illustrious
colleague Terry Brosnan at one of these courses to do, and, and lads do it
because these people know their stuff.
They've been at it for a long time.
And frankly Lucy, you and Terry, you are the gold standard in this industry.
You are.
I should know 'cause I go around 40 countries and I am doing it all the time.
There's lots of great people out there.
You guys are up there in the gold standard and people need to come learn from you.
Lucy Dillon: Great.
Well, anyone's very welcome to come visit Child Vision at Anytime.
Rupert Isaacson: Super great.
Excuse for going Dublin.
Lucy Dillon: Yep.
All right then.
Rupert Isaacson: Alright.
Give my love to all.
Okay.
Lucy Dillon: Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: Cheers.
Bye.
Lucy Dillon: Bye.
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