Anonymous
asked:
I'm writing a story in the psychic animals genre... where the animal flies. I'd really like to be able to include people with physical disabilities as riders (without putting in magic crap to justify it ala Daredevil), so I've been looking at Therapeutic horse riding for those with physical disabilities. Whom it benefits and how... I can find. I can't seem to find the logistics and which people with physical disabilities could ride unassisted/equipment to do so. Resources or ideas? Thanks.
disabilityinkidlit
answered:

Therapeutic horse riding is generally not used as a form of travel, and because it is a therapy riders are usually accompanied, so I don’t know if you’ll find much information on how people with disabilities could ride unassisted while researching that, but I’d encourage you to look into the sport of Para-equestrian. It’s an event in the Paralympics. There are some organizations for para-equestrians, though I don’t know how much actual information their websites have about the logistics of it, because everyone’s disability is unique and so their needs when it comes to how they ride would be different. Here’s a couple of the websites:

You might also want to look into equipment para-equestrians use, because you could likely figure out how to modify them to fit the animal you’re using in your story. Here are just a few I found:

There are also several para-equestrians who have blogs, and you should definitely look at those, so you can get a better image of disabled riders as a whole. A few I found:

I should note that both therapeutic horse riding and para-equestrians are not always physically disabled. Many are mentally and/or developmentally disabled, and so the information I’ve given you pertains to all disabled people who participate in para-equestrian.

Source: disabilityinkidlit