Satori Center

When Mia unloaded, it was mostly about calmly walking to the barn in a new place.  When she turned around in the stall, I got a slightly better look at her muscling.  Which looked a little ... we'll say odd.  

The muscling across her croup was immense, and the groove along her gluts extremely pronounced.  Her hind feet and legs didn't travel straight, and her hips were uneven.  While her former Mom knew about some things going on in the front end, I also saw something going on in the backend.  

It's the sort of thing where you don't need to know muscles or anything.  You kind of just look at the horse and think, 'well, that's not quite right.  need to keep tabs on that.'  At that time, it was more about settling her in so I just made a 'footnote to self.'  

Now it's time to do something about it!  

What to do about it?

One of the first 'healing modalities' I learned for horses was the Trigger Point approach taught by Jack Meagher.  I had  friend who'd trained with him and had worked with my horses.  She was very happy to share what we knew and a small group of us enjoyed delving into this.  Eventually I was able to attend a clinic with Jack and see his magic first hand.  

This is a labor intensive modality!  So nowadays I am much more likely to use Equine Positional Release/Equine Ortho-bionomy, which is an extremely low intensity modality and much easier on my body.  Yet every now and again, I find myself instinctively turning to Trigger Points.

Mia is a case in point.   There is something where I  just want 'more.'   

In people, I have found some folks just don't respond to Ortho-bionomy.  They need the deep tissue stimualation.

In practice with Mia, because this is so labor intensive, I kind of rotate around the horse.  One day it's left back end, next day it's right.  Then it's left front end, then it's right front end.  If I'm particularly spunky, I might do both sides of the back end or both sides of the front end.

The technique I learned is pretty straightforward.  

• find the knot
• mash the knot for a minute or so
• do cross fiber friction for ...ever
• do compressions along the length of the muscle
• follow up with appropriate movement

In the book, each trigger point has specifics.   Some of these muscles you've really got to keep at it for awhile -- like 10 minutes!

Being Practical

What I typically do is I run my hands over the horse, find the knots, and wing it.  Afterward I go look up what they do! 

Knots will be in the muscle right next to where the muscle and tendon meet.  Any muscle on your body can develop a knot (O yay!) so it's a little bit handy to familiarize yourself with what a knot feels like.  You don't need a chart to find them so much as the ability to feel them in the muscle.

Sometimes they feel like a bb pellet.  Sometimes like a pea.  Sometimes, if it's serious, they can feel like a rather large, solid mass.  

In Mia, there was a very large mass of muscle across her croup between her hip sockets which stood out 'the most' and which is why I started feeling around in that area.  That is how point 15 got included.  And it's also a pretty common point to get triggered.  From there I continued exploring and found two significant knots near 16 & 17.

Point 15 is indicated when the horse has a 'cold back.'  While this isn't the most obvious thing about Mia if you're not riding, it was for sure a consideration when I had been.  Good to know this will alleviate that!

And it turns out the back end points of 16 & 17, which are treated at the same time, are for when the horse's hind feet scuff and/or trail behind are often tight.  Yay!  Another confirmation that these things correlate.

From the book Beating Muscle Injuries for Horses by Jack Meagher.

Beating Muscle Injuries for Horses by Jack Meagher.

Right now I'm concentrating on these points and when I have time I include other points.

Because there is so much going on with Mia, it would probably make sense to set aside an hour or two and do a really thorough once over of her.  For the moment, that's not happening.  The good news:  even working as haphazardly as I am, I am seeing benefit.  So even if you haven't got a ton of time, ten minutes or so can make a significant difference.

Here's the pages for these points:  (do a view image via your right click to read them)