The Horse Straightener, or An Aligned Horse is a Happy Horse

One sees the most unusual sights when walking through the countryside.
Like today, for instance. I saw a chiropractor. Now, that in itself isn’t unusual, but this time the patient, who weighs in at around 1500 pounds, was. She was a horse.
There they were, in Lamar, Colorado. Three men and a horse. One man was standing on a platform doing something to a horse, who was just standing in one spot, held on a lead by a second man. A third man was standing near the horse’s left rear leg. I approached, told them what I was doing and asked if I might watch, to which they replied in the affirmative.
They told me that the man on the platform was a horse chiropractor. When I made a joke about a name for that job, he looked up from the horse’s back with a smile, and said, “Call it ‘equine skeletal alignment'”. I was mesmerized.
I watched as he demonstrated what he was doing. He began by gently but firmly tracing a path along the horse’s spine, pushing down, and almost palpating the area, with about as much force as one would use to knead pie dough. When he hit a spot that was affected the horse would react by raising her head, or by making a pained little sound and jumping around just a bit. The “equine skeletal aligner” then proceeded to place the heel of one hand over the sore area, and the placed his other hand on top of that hand. In a motion very similar to CPR, he would count out “One two three” and push down hard, apparently shoving whatever was protruding back to where it was supposed to be. He did this several times as I watched, and each time the horse’s head popped up and then she was fine. It did seem to have a positive effect on the animal. The man in front of the horse with the lead didn’t have a hard time of it but the fellow at the horse’s rear had a tough job. He had to hold the horse’s leg up off the ground while the pushing down was going on. This was to keep the horse from running off or jumping too much, I assume.
After one last check of the spine the horse was led around for a test walk. Im pleased to report that she walked a nice straight line with no visible discomfort. I even posed for a picture with her afterward.
Now, those of you who follow my Facebook page know I take a lot of pictures of horses as I am walking. There is something about them, the most intelligent and noble, not to mention beautiful creatures on this green earth, that makes me feel akin to them. Many, many times when I walk by a bunch of horses in a pasture or field, I ll hear them call out in a whinny---calling to me, I like to think. They look at me, make motions with head and feet that seem to be beckoning calls to come over and see them. They also follow along as Im walking and when I look in their eyes I feel the intelligence burning inside. When they are happy, they LOOK happy. When they are sad…..
I never want to see a sad horse. The young lady who I had the privilege of watching get “aligned” today walked around looking happy, so I have to believe she was. Good job, Doc.