There's more horse information at your fingertips than ever, and somehow owners are more anxious than ever. Fran of The Honest Equine wants to help you become a better observer of your horse without becoming an anxious one.

Fran is an equine musculoskeletal and rehabilitation practitioner based in the north of England. She spent years in racing and racehorse retraining before studying equine therapy and rehabilitation at university, and her work now spans functional assessment, hands-on treatment, rehab, prehab, and owner education. She's built her practice around knowing her scope, working as part of a team with vets, farriers, saddle fitters, and trainers, and being honest with owners about what their horse is actually telling them.

We get into what ”evidence-based” really means (it's not finding one study that agrees with you), why sometimes the most evidence-informed answer is ”we don't know yet,” and why a horse with horrendous X-rays can be going beautifully. We talk about prehab as building the capacity your horse needs before it becomes the thing holding them back, why variety in surfaces, terrain, and work matters, and how long lining or watching someone else ride your horse shows you what you can't feel from the saddle. Then we walk through the rehab path for a kissing spines horse: what injections and mesotherapy actually do (they don't create space between the spinous processes, they buy you a window), why groundwork comes before the rider, and why Fran works within the limits of the horse, not the rider. We also talk about serviceably sound horses, Sue Dyson's Ridden Horse Pain Ethogram, and why not every behavior is a diagnosis.

If you've ever scrolled past a post and thought ”oh no, my horse does that,” this one's for you.

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