Episode #143: Healing Without Words with Stephanie Hathorne

Episode #143: Healing Without Words with Stephanie Hathorne

Curious about how others navigate their sobriety journey? Recovery Lab brings in therapist and horse-lover Stephanie Hathorne to show how healing can happen without saying very much at all. This conversation is especially handy for anyone in recovery who feels stuck with traditional talk therapy or finds it hard to put feelings into words.

Stephanie shares her own history with anxiety, panic, depression and faith, and how starting therapy at The Shepherd’s Staff in 2000 eventually led her to become a counsellor there herself. She speaks warmly of mentor Ruth Glaze, recalling a moment of lying on the conference room floor mid-panic as Ruth stood over her saying, “Sweet Stephanie, let me help you breathe.” It’s a reminder that therapists are humans doing their own work too.

Stephanie explains that in her model everything is done on the ground, not on horseback, and that sessions are highly experiential: “We’re trusting that we’re creating a blank slate… and I want the client to start projecting themselves, their story… onto the animals.” She walks through powerful stories of clients wrestling with boundaries, including a woman learning to stop letting a dominant horse crowd her space, and a man in addiction treatment whose attempts to control a “sassiest horse” ended in a well-earned bite and a major breakthrough.

From there, the chat shifts into equine-assisted psychotherapy and why horses can be such sharp mirrors for our nervous systems. There’s also rich discussion about working with kids with ADHD and autism, involving parents in the pasture, and how nature and animals can help people feel safer being vulnerable.

If you’ve ever wondered whether healing might be easier with hay under your boots and a horse at your side, this episode might give you a new way of thinking about recovery. Could your next step involve fewer words and more connection?