I shared this 7 minute video (of a 25 minutes session) with my Timmy who has never stopped cribbing and windsucking despite a good diet, good shelter and unrestricted grazing and hay with The Trust Technique Practitioners and it was lovely to share something like this in a group of people who don’t immediately judge his behaviour, my response, or want to find quick fixes. This is a long process.
It is an amazing conversation where I have finally learnt that Mindful Regard is so important, and how the present moment can be but just one or two seconds at a time. On the first side he stopped cribbing when I was led to focus on his gutteral pouch, his throat and his windpipe if I remember it rightly, then I moved to the other side and we had two very significant areas of discomfort in his left side (could be stomach, intestines) and then his head between his eyes. Just focusing on those bought him into a second or two of acknowledgement which was all he could manage.
I am not sure yet what the next session will look like, he will tell me. We have done a lot with the emotional side of the cribbing, acknowledging and releasing past experiences. We are now in a place of working with the physical discomforts I believe. I am not sure how we break the cycle of the cribbing and windsucking both causing and relieving the physical issues. Finding the present more and more for longer and longer is likely to be the answer as it will be a place where the cause and relief will come together and cancel each other out (I hope that makes sense).