Introduction to Equine Assisted Therapy using Polyvagal Principles
Course Status:
Open
Course Overview
Outline
Format
Recommended Audience
CE's and/or Certificate of Completion Available
INSTRUCTOR(S)
Rebecca Bailey, PhD
Rebecca Bailey, Ph.D. is a leading family psychologist and equestrian who has become a world-renowned professional educator, speaker, author, and entrepreneur. She is a author of Safe Kids, Smart Parents (Simon and Schuster) and has co-authored several publications in academic journals. Recently she co-founded The Polyvagal Equine Institute with Jaycee and long-term friend and colleague Margie McDonald. Dr. Bailey is also the founder of Transitioning Families, a group of independently licensed mental health practitioners dedicated to Bailey's innovative ideas for helping families through crisis and difficult change. She is best known for her work with survivors of non-familial abduction and is on the advisory board for The JAYC Foundation, the Elizabeth Smart Foundation and the National Center of Missing and Exploited Children. Together with Jaycee Dugard, Dr. Bailey has created an innovative model utilizing horses and other animals to help teach and educate judges, police officers, therapists, and other professionals about compassion, kindness, and connection. She is also the co-author along with Jaycee Dugard, on a curriculum designed to promote and support empathy and compassion in children. The two joined together with Ruthless Kindness Foundation to bring the program to the children served by the Family Justice Center.


Rebecca Bailey, PhD
Jaycee Dugard


Jaycee Dugard
Jaycee Dugard is a survivor of extreme trauma. She feels strongly that without animals in her world, she would not be the person she has become. Thankfully, her recovery included a team of four horses who remain in her life to this day. She has made it her life’s work to support the equine-human connection in tribute to her four teachers. She is the author of two books: A Stolen Life (New York Best Seller List) and Freedom: My Book of Firsts. She has presented with Dr. Bailey at several venues, reinforcing her work and supporting victims’ innate resiliency, and recently co-authored a publication on “Appeasement: Replacing Stockholm Syndrome as a Definition of a Survival Strategy (2023) with fellow authors, Dr. Porges, Dr. Bailey and Dr. Smith.
Margie McDonald
Margie McDonald is a lifelong accomplished equestrian and horse trainer. She is trained in classical dressage and has applied the teachings to an approach that embodies compassion and connection. Her work has included promoting self-awareness and kindness between horses and humans. Her approach has always embodied awareness of heart-to-head connection. She is the author of Notes from the Barn: My Life with Horses and has raised the conscious compassion of numerous equine enthusiasts.


Margie McDonald
