The Wrangler Horse and Rodeo News

18 • The WRANGLER • October, 2024 Healing Hands: How Healing Hands: How Bodywork Can Help Bodywork Can Help Although it is usually sought out of necessity, rather than enjoyment, even the toughest cowboys and cowgirls have utilized massage and chiropractic techniques on their own bodies. For our equine friends, bodywork is equally effective and enjoyable. Whether those horses are working on the ranch, in the arena, or the trails, they can benefit from skilled touch. A broad term, "bodywork" is one of the oldest healing modalities on the planet. Its first roots were in China, where gentle pressure was applied with fingers or stones to treat ailments. As science and medicine has advanced, we have a better understanding of biomechanics and anatomy, allowing for greater results. One of those discoveries is a connective tissue, known as fascia. It was previously thought that fascia only covered organs, muscles, and bones, but the tissue actually surrounds all cells, nerves, joints, tendons, and ligaments. It is a complex, multi-layered tissue, which is slippery and smooth when healthy. Fascia is key to all functions of the body and when it is unwell, it becomes thicker, stickier, drier, and tighter. This can cause pain and a restricted range of motion. While many may be familiar with the role hyaluronic acids plays in joints, it is also found between the layers of fascia. The tissue is made up of mostly collagen. Things that can negatively affect fascia include a sedentary lifestyle, repetitive use of body parts, surgery, or injury. Fascia pain can easily be mistaken for muscle or joint pain and if left untreated, the fascia will continue to draw tighter, creating the sensitive knots known as "trigger points." There are no imaging or lab tests to identify fascia pain and there is still much to be learned about the tissue. Fascia pain can even cause referred pain in seemingly unrelated parts of the body. With the proper knowledge and application of methods, these adhesions in the fascia can be released. This not only allows the fascia to return to a healthy state, but the muscle, joint, tendon, or ligament beneath it as well. A barrel racing futurity trainer by trade, Kylie O'Neal of Crowheart, Wyoming, is also a Certified Equine Bodyworker and the hands behind Zen Pony Bodywork. While training and competing on young horses, O'Neal saw the need for further knowledge to help her horses perform their best. The technique she applies is structural integration for horses, a specific type of massage therapy that rebalances the body left to right, front to back, and inside and out. It focuses on working with the fascia. O'Neal has been trained to use a combination of deep tissue massage, physical therapy, acupressure, trigger point release and stretching. The combination of these together helps the horse self-adjust. By Teal Stoll Left: Kylie O'Neal & BullyzDashOfDynamite at the Spring Fling Barrrel Race. Photo Credit: Jenna Bush Photography Right: Kylie O'Neal is the owner & operator of Zen Pony Equine Bodywork.

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