OurHealingHerd

Today, the souls of my beloved Dartmoor ponies Meadow and Luna were waiting to greet me at the entrance to a Bronze Age settlement to remind me of a lesson they once taught me.

I adopted Meadow from Carolyn Hillyer and Nigel Shaw’s wild Dartmoor herd in 2014. My daughter Jasmine had been so traumatised by our years nursing Zac on the bridge between life and death that she had lost her trust in life and had stopped daring to dream.

One of the most painful things as a mother is to witness your child suffer trauma at a young age and lose her belief in the magic of life and in the possibility of dreams coming true.

So I made a promise to make her biggest dream come true – to have her own pony. I couldn’t afford to buy her a horse so after a weaving of synchronistic threads, I adopted Meadow who came to us wild and pregnant.

Little did I know how much our horses would come to mean to us. As a single mother of 3 children at a time when Zac was at his most challenging to care for, they became our greatest healers and teachers.

We experienced the magic of our mare birthing her foal and raising her. The girls would lie in the field nose-to-nose with Luna whilst Meadow watched over them.

Then we adopted our gorgeous big gypsy cob Tocho de Taos, who was my animal Soul mate and taught me more about life and relationships than most humans ever have.

However, the horse world forms a microcosm of society in that it brings out the very best and the very worst in people.

In the 3 years that we had our little healing herd, I experienced huge kindness, generosity and support from some women, and I was on the receiving end of the worst kind of patronisation, judgement and defamation from others.

The souls of my horses came to me today through the bodies of an identical black Dartmoor mare and foal to remind me of probably one of the most important lessons they ever taught me.

That I am powerless to control what people think or say about me. That if people want to judge me, tell lies about me or project onto me, my response will be to hold my head up high as the Queen I am, confident in my own truth and integrity, and hold strong boundaries.

Meadow (now Epona) and Tocho (now Logan), are now part of the incredible healing herd of 16 horses owned by Livvy Adams, founder of the charity Painted Horse UK. We will soon be offering Horse Rewilding weekends as part of my charitable Wisewoman Warrior programme, helping vulnerable women to heal. Please sign up to the Wait List if you’re interested in working with us and the herd.

Blessings from the wild mares of Dartmoor
Annabel Du Boulay ?♥️?
Rose Priestess of Sophia-Magdalene
Priestess of Avalon