Training & Background
Training
Lee has had over 430 hours of classroom and supervised hands-on training in equine massage therapy and has worked with hundreds of horses from a variety of equine worlds: dressage, harness racing, barrel racing, eventing, working drafts, backyard pleasure, and therapeutic riding.
Her Equine Body Worker certification is from Equinology, founded by Debranne Patillo. She took their 8 day, 80 hour Foundation Course in Calgary, Canada with Debranne Patillo. The course is followed by 200 hours of externship requirements prior to receiving certification. The course included a strong introduction to equine anatomy and the techniques needed to give a full equine body massage. Hoof care, saddle fitting, movement and pathology were also included.
Her Equine Massage Therapist ceritification is from Prairie Winds Equine massage therapy college in Wellington, Colorado. Massage therapist Sara Stetson and her husband Michael designed an intensive 350 hour program with a focus on anatomy, pathology, movement, quieting the horse, hoof care, and days of shiatzu, cranial sacral, neuromuscular, myofacial release massage approach and technique. The college collaborates with a therapeutic riding center and several dude ranches along the front range so students have access to hundreds of thankful equine volunteers.
Additional training
Equine Acupressure:
Lee completed the full Tallgrass Animal Acupressure course series in 2007 via a combination of online and hands-on courses held in Massachusetts and Colorado. Practitioner's certification exam remains to be completed in 2008.
The Equine Touch:
In 2007 Lee completed the levels 1, 2 and 3 training series in Colorado and Texas. Similar to Bowen therapy, The Equine Touch is taught by founders Jock and Ivana Ruddock and staff. It is a non-diagnostic, non-invasive, hands-on system of bodywork addressing the whole horse with an organized series of unique, gentle, vibrational moves over soft tissue.
Upcoming training:
Cranial Sacral Massage for Equines – Fall 2005
Zero Balancing Level I & II – Fall 2005
Reiki Level II – Fall 2005
Accupressure for Equines 2006
Background
Lee grew up in St Louis, Missouri and rode hunter jumpers until high school sports kicked in. Then college and careers. She graduated from Wells College with a B.A. in Theatre Arts and worked as a framing carpenter in Maine for a few years. Afterwards she worked as the Technical Director of the Wells Theatre, which lead to a magnificent job working all over the world with the Swiss mime troupe Mummenschanz.
In 1998 Lee entered Columbia University's School of Architecture and Design culminating in a master's degree in Historic Preservation. After years of working with historic properties in the greater New York area, she bought an 1820s cape style home in a small village in Maine, Bolsters Mills. It was via that purchase that she met her partner Michael. She worked for the nonprofit Women Unlimited, teaching non-traditional skills to women, for her first years in Maine. Then in 1996 a significant historic garden and farmstead in South Paris became endangered and she worked with community members to establish a nonprofit, purchase the property, and guide it towards a sustainable future as a cultural resource. From 1997 to 2005 she was the Executive Director of the McLaughlin Foundation.
Horses came back into Lee's life at that point when she met Nancy Hohmann, who conveniently owned two horses. They've been riding together, going to clinics and equine events for years now. Horses became increasingly important to Lee's life, health and well-being. During the initial frigid days of 2003, Nancy's 30 year–old Morgan gelding Josh, died suddenly. The manner of his death and his presence during his last four days of life triggered a desire within Lee to work with horses professionally when the opportunity arose. When the time was right for both herself and for the McLaughlin Garden, she resigned, and has now fully dedicated her time and skills to animals with the founding of Northorse Equine Massage.
Her approach is to work with each horse at the moment she is working with the horse. The horse's body will tell her what hurts, what needs change, and how deep she need to work at any given time. They work together for improved movement: range of motion, float, flexibility, endurance, grace, and joy.