The equine therapy program pairs counseling with barn time while children live with foster families on the property. Danielle Peters, the ranch's equine specialist, teaches kids to work with their horses. She wants them to enjoy the barn the way she did as a child, not treat it like a chore or a requirement.
Peters remembers one boy who showed up grumpy, shut down, and unwilling to talk to anybody. "Within the second session, he was opened up, laughing, cutting up, and just really enjoying it," she said.
Meagan Miller, the ranch's donor relations officer, said children walk their horses through obstacles while working through obstacles of their own. That matters for kids who "maybe can't voice the trauma they've been through or maybe even remember the trauma they've been through," she said. The setting helps too. Miller said being outside of town gives kids "somewhere peaceful" during hard times.
For foster kids here, that means help that does not depend on finding the right words. It also does not end when the system lets go. Once children age out of foster care, the ranch still cares for them. Miller wants every child to know they can come back for help, no matter what phase of life they are in.
One former resident is now going through Texas Tech as a single mom, and Miller said the ranch gets to "serve almost as her parents."