Does your horse have anxiety? How to read the warning signs..

If you google the symptoms of anxiety in people, you will get these results from Mayo Clinic:

Feeling nervous, restless or tense.

Having a sense of impending danger, panic or doom.

Having an increased heart rate.

Breathing rapidly (hyperventilation)

Sweating.

Trembling.

Feeling weak or tired.

Trouble concentrating or thinking about anything other than the present worry.

Every one of these symptoms could be found on a horse. Horses, dogs, cats, children, they all experience anxiety; not just us. While each is an individual and may exhibit slightly different signs; most will be the same across the board.

I am not *nor do I claim to be* a veterinarian, or equine psychologist. I am not diagnosing, or otherwise medically treating you or your horse in this blog. It is my intention to bring up some points to ponder and help shed some light on how your horse MAY BE feeling, and help them to NOT feel that way anymore.

An overactive sympathetic nervous system can lead to anxiety. The sympathetic nervous system is the "fight or flight" response. There is actually another, lesser talked about, sympathetic reaction and that is "freeze", anyone who has ever experienced trauma of some kind knows what I am talking about here. Afterwards, you may think to yourself, "I could've done X,Y, Z," or, "I should have said X,Y,Z". But the simple fact of the matter is you cannot force yourself to do ANYTHING once your brain has switched over into instinct driven reactions. Once your self preservation (sympathetic) nervous system gets switched on by a real or perceived threat (key word there: PERCEIVED) the adrenaline and cortisol in your body get switched on, pedal to the metal style, and your body is on edge and ready to react (another key word there: REACT). The kicker is the more you spend time living off of your cortisol and adrenaline; the more your body thinks you need it on a day to day basis. The same could be said for our horse partners. The longer they live life in an "on edge" manner, the harder it can be for them to learn to come down and stay down.

Our key words above are very important when working with our horses. Perceived threats are VERY important here. Just because you see the object in your hand as a harmless plastic bag, doesn't mean that's how your horse sees it. Perception determines your reality. So if they perceive it as a threat, it will be categorized as a threat, and they will go into threat management protocol. Snorting, backing away, eyes getting wider, head going up, neck going tense, etc. All signs the horse is ready to REACT and protect self (running away or fighting). Now, they are reacting here. They aren't thinking.

We, as trainers (if you own/ride/pet/lease a horse you are training them when you are interacting with them), want to condition a thinking response, not a reaction response. How do we do this? By teaching them how! We have to teach them HOW we want them to handle small stresses, we have to show them HOW to handle their nerves, WHERE to put their bodies, so their mind follows and they find relaxation. Only through relaxation within the body will their mind be able to THINK instead of REACT.

The parasympathetic nervous system is commonly known as our "rest and digest" side of our autonomous nervous system. SO instead of loading up on adrenaline and cortisol, ready to fight, flee, or freeze if the previous two are prevented, we are now ready to relax, think, process, eat, etc. It conserves energy as it slows heart rate, increases gut and gland activity, and relaxes our sphincter muscles. This state of mind is where a horse can think.

Now, when learning new things their brain is going to drift somewhere in between relaxed and alarmed. Which is fine. That's normal. Productive even! That's how we learn new things; outside of our comfort zone! However, you want to facilitate an environment or training method conducive to relaxation to help them "come back down" so to speak, when they do become elevated. Life is going to elevate them; it is our job to teach them what to do when there and how to come back down from it.

I like to think of it like this... Every horse has a scale of excitability, we'll say on the lower end 1 is relaxed, napping in the pasture with their buddies in the sun. on the upper end 10 is a fight or flight reaction happening, such as: bolt, buck, rear, spook, jigging, kicking, striking, etc. And we will say for example, that the catalyst will be something like a rabbit jumping out on the trail, or maybe snow sliding off the roof of the indoor arena. These are worth +5 points on the excitability meter. SO it goes like this: Your horse is lacking a solid foundation and has pretty low confidence in himself, his world, and in you. This horse may be existing daily at a 5 or a 6 on the theoretical excitability meter. So if this catalyst event happens to this horse, it will push them to the brink, possibly over; they will quickly go from a 5 or a 6 to a 10 or 11.

Let us then compare a horse with a solid foundation and pretty high confidence in himself, his world, and in you. This horse may exist at a 2 or a 3 on our meter, so when the same catalyst happens to this horse, he jumps to a 7 or an 8. Still possibly a reaction, still possibly a bit worried, but not pushed to the edge, no explosion, and it's easier for him to come back down afterwards.

The flow typically looks a little like this > SHOCK! A thing that moves, makes a noise, wasn't there before (or maybe all 3) > start to switch over to sympathetic nervous system to prepare to save hide > THING comes closer, person wants to prove THING is not to be feared, yet horse feels no better about THING and now it's coming even closer > horse reacts in some way fight or flight, typically flight > person "corrects" horse's "BAD BEHAVIOR" (the reaction they are having to THING) and has now added fear of the person into the mix > horse's reaction is now exacerbated by fear of THING and fear of PERSON (and also, I think, fear of getting the answer wrong again in most cases) > horse reacts worse, is still no closer to THING and doesn't like it anymore either > person's reaction is intensified to counter the horse's reaction and it goes on and on my friends. You've seen it, I've seen it, perhaps you've done it in the past (I know I have).. Crossing obstacles, loading in the trailer, putting on a blanket, putting on a saddle, soaking a foot in a bucket, hosing, bathing, trimming feet, going down a trail, going in the barn, etc. There are a million examples of this but the process is the same.. Horse gets worried, person doesn't know how to support the horse, horse freaks, person freaks, fear ensues, anger ensues, and on and on. It isn't pretty my friends. But it happens. How can we change this? This isn't how horses learn! Shoot, this isn't how people learn!

If you are scared of spiders, like genuinely terrified of them, you don't magically get un-scared of them because I shoved it in your face and forced you to see it do you? And you certainly aren't going to appreciate me much after that either! You become confident around something you were previously frightened of through education and experience. Our horses are the same. They need guidance, education, and experience with scary situations and stimuli to give them confidence. They need guidance to be shown how to handle themselves when something pops up, because eventually, something will pop up. This is why a proper foundation is so crucial with horses. By not skipping over the beginning levels of his foundation you are giving your horses the answers he needs to the questions life is going to ask him. You are ensuring he knows the answers to the questions before you, or the rabbit that pops out on the trail, can ask him the question.

Now, I am going to leave this blog there, but I will say something on the lesser talked about reaction of FREEZE. We all have probably heard FIGHT OR FLIGHT. But there is also FREEZE. FREEZE in prey animals helps them disconnect when they are being ripped apart by predators and eaten so they aren't present for the pain. People do this too, when we experience trauma, we also can freeze.