Horse therapy program could expand to help veterans with post-traumatic stress

Aug. 29--Special education teacher Tessa Maxwell used to ply her trade in public school classrooms.

Now she serves students with special needs on a private farm, with help from about a dozen four-legged assistants named Huck, Fiona, Sprout, Sprocket, Rosie, Joe and Sparrow, a mustang mare who once roamed the Bald Mountain range in Nevada.

Physical therapists, volunteers and Maxwell's mother -- Mary Kay Soergel, 61 -- also aid the people of many ages with a myriad of needs who visit Orchardview Stables in Marshall to soak up the physical and emotional benefits that often flow from sitting on a moving horse.

"It's like there's this magic medicine in a horse and you want to hand it out," Soergel said about Orchardview Stables' mission.

To make that medicine available to traumatized U.S. military veterans, Orchardview Stables will host its first fundraising Barn Bash on Sept. 10 at Richard and Mary Kay Soergel's apple farm off Wexford Run Road in Marshall.

"We want to do a pilot program," Maxwell said about her goal to help veterans with post traumatic stress syndrome. "I always hear about the difficulties they're having and I thought we could help."

The Barn Bash will include a sit-down barbecue dinner, music, silent auctions and introductions to the stables' therapeutic steeds. Tickets are $50. Reservations are required and due Sept. 4.

"My mom and I decided a few years ago that a lot of people benefit from this type of therapy but they have financial difficulty," said Maxwell, 35, who used to work as a special education teacher for Penn Hills School District and Chesapeake Public Schools in Virginia.

To make equine-assisted therapy more widely available, mother and daughter launched Orchardview Stables two years ago as a nonprofit venture separate from Mary Kay Soergel's for-profit riding school, Soergel's Orchardview Stables LLC.

As a certified therapeutic riding instructor for Orchardview Stables, Maxwell now goes to work in a T-shirt that proclaims "My Therapist Lives in a Barn."

About 30 clients currently receive equine-assisted therapy at Orchardview Stables, including long, straight walks on horseback through rows of Fuji, honey crisp and other apple trees.

For non-verbal, non-ambulatory Hudson Pieramici, 4, of Peters, sitting on a moving horse makes him squeal in delight and activates the muscles that he must develop to walk.

Once a week, Hudson visits Orchardview Stables for hippotherapy, the term for equine-assisted physical therapy.

"The horse's pelvis moves in the same three planes as a human," said physical therapist Katie Bunn, 38, of Franklin Park. "It's the three-dimensional movement of the horse that helps the rider."

Rebecca Pieramici, Hudson's mom, didn't tell Hudson's other physical therapist about his horseback riding sessions until that other therapist wondered aloud why Hudson seemed to perform his exercises better on Tuesdays -- his riding days -- than Thursdays.

"It's organizing his sensory system," Pieramici said about hippotherapy's benefit for Hudson, who has a rare genetic mutation known to afflict only 31 children in the world.

For Lori Roberts, 48, of Franklin Park, horseback riding helped her recover from the passing of a loved one.

"Coming here helped me to heal," said Roberts, who now volunteers at Orchardview Stables. "This is a barn that just embraces everyone and gently guides you to discover your best. It's an amazing place."

Deborah Deasy is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach her at 724-772-6369 or ddeasy@tribweb.com.

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