A five-acre farm just outside of San Antonio is taking a different approach to the growing trend of horse-veteran bonding. While many ranches and farms are offering forms of equine-assisted therapy, Jim Schaale, co-founder of New Tactics, says they are doing something unique.
“We don’t do anything with therapy…it’s a real big turnoff for some of our warriors,” Schaale said. “…that opens us up to being a lot more receptive.”
Along with his wife Tammy Schaale, he founded New Tactics in 2018 in Somerset. They aim to provide an equine experience for veterans, service members and first responders who may be hesitant to engage with “therapy” of any kind.
He says what sets New Tactics apart from other services is both its approach to offering healing with a staff made up entirely of veterans and service members.
Therapeutic horseback riding programs geared towards military veterans with PTSD have become increasingly popular in recent years. A Baylor University study found that using equine-intervention as a complement to traditional treatments helped lower anxiety and depression, and improve quality of life in veterans.
Post-traumatic stress disorder has become a signature injury in post-9/11 combat, the VA estimates that 7 out of every 100 veterans will experience it in their lifetime. It is also more common among women, 13% of all female veterans will experience PTSD, compared to 6% of male veterans.
The New Tactics experience
The Schaales met while they were both serving in the U.S. Army, with Jim going on to serve for 23 years and Tammy getting an M.S. in mental health counseling.
The typical Saturday sessions they offer riders are a combination of those two experiences. They start with 30 minutes of “mindfullness” led by Tammy Schaale.
An early August session began with two minutes of silence. Then she poses a prompt to the group. “Take your biggest negative belief about yourself and reframe it, and give at least two reasons why your new belief is true,” she said.
The four riders gathered in the small barn took turns sharing before the Aug.1 passage from the book “The Daily Stoic” was read aloud.
“Don’t go expecting perfection. That cucumber is bitter, so toss it out!” the passage began.
The mindfulness portion of the session concluded with each rider setting two intentions, one for horsemanship and one personal.
Jim Schaale led the next three hours of horseback riding. He gave instructions in military terms as branch rivalry banter was frequently exchanged between riders. He says it’s important to be “real” with the riders, which often takes the form of a tough-love approach to guidance.
“I was a lost soul until I found Jim and Tammy,” said U.S. Army veteran Luis Montijo.
He retired from the Army after 20 years last October, and he’s been coming to riding sessions since March. He says it’s the joint approach that keeps him coming back.
“Following Tammy’s process, having gone through a bunch of other types of therapy that didn’t work, but following her uninvasive process just kind of guides you to it, gets you zeroed in, and then Jim yelling at me on the other side simulates the controlled stress,” he said.
He says what he likes about the sessions is that they aren’t riding horses in circles, instead they are going through obstacle courses and completing tasks. He says coming from a military background, he needs something complex to devote all this energy to so that his mind isn’t wandering.
New Tactics is a nonprofit, and they say that 95% of the horses on the farm were donated. Some are older, several walk with a gait and a couple had given their previous owners difficulty.
“We know that the horses, like a lot of our warriors, have their own issues that are going on, so we can relate to them and their behavior,” Jim Schaale said.
Mike Waite started coming to the organization at his wife’s insistence. Now he’s a staff volunteer and he owns four horses and 25 acres of land. Currently in the reserves after serving 19 years in the U.S. Air Force, he says horses bring out the vulnerable side of their riders.
“We have a big macho thing in the veteran world. We all like to be ‘Billy Badass’ and all tough. But you can’t trick a horse,” Waite said.
After two years at New Tactics, and now a volunteer staff member herself, U.S. Army veteran Nancy Arriaga says she has felt her bad back and her anxiety lessen since she started riding.
“My confidence has come up a lot too. I used to be super insecure, very intimidated,” she said. “It’s the same thing with the horses. You have to be confident. You have to let them know that they can trust you.”
Jim Schaale says the majority of their riders have no prior experience with horses, but once they start, they often keep coming back.
“My daughter is getting baptized today…but whenever I’m in town, I come back out,” said Scott Brown, who is currently serving in the U.S. Navy.
For some riders, weekly sessions aren’t enough. Orlando Narvaez is getting out of the U.S. Navy in November and he says horses have become a family affair.
“We’re planning on looking for a farm somewhere … where we can buy a couple horses,” he said.
He said his wife loves horses even more than he does, and she helped convince New Tactics owners to start holding sessions for military spouses. They also hold couples sessions every other Sunday.
While the ranch might not use “therapy” to describe their approach to helping “warriors” navigate through their PTSD, trauma or their transition out of the service, Waite says they have still found a way to positively impact members of the community.
“We’re not here to provide any kind of mental health services…but there are inherent benefits of community fellowship with other veterans, people who are all in the same spot,” he said.
The San Antonio Report’s military and veterans coverage is supported by Report for America.
