MASSACHUSETTS HORSE
MAGAZINE
December/January 2015 Issue
By Susan Graham Winslow &
Stephanie Sanders
Print & Online Magazine
Enhancing Your Horse's Well-Being
Holistic Treatments
ANIMAL COMMUNICATION
Recently Susan Deren, an animal communicator, psychic , and medium, helped a horse that had become a chronic head shaker, much to the concern of its owner and trainer. "The trainer told me the horse would start to shake its head the minute the bridle went on," Susan says. "They tried a different bridle, different bits, they called in a veterinarian. They had even taken X-rays of the horse's head, but there was nothing definitive and the behavior continued. When I read the horse, I immediately felt a pain that told me the horse had an abscessed tooth. They called in a specialist, who found the abcess and removed the tooth. The horse is no longer shaking its head. It's very rewarding when I can help an animal like that."
Susan, who lives in Haverhill, says she noticed her gift when she was a small child. "My desire to help animals and people has always been there," she says, "and my ability to communicate with animals has grown stonger in the past twenty years."
She makes it clear that she has great respect for veterinarians, and that she's not a substitute for one. "Horse owners should always seek advice of their veterinarian," she says. "I often work with them to augment what they do, but I don't overstep my bounds as a medical intuitive. Animals don't have a voice to tell us where it hurts, but when I read an animal, whether it's a cat, a dog, or a horse, I can feel the area in my body that relates to that animal's condition or pain. I often describe it as stepping into that animal's body for awhile."
Many horse owners call Susan for physical concerns, and she tackles behavioral issues as well. Her psychic abilities helped a rider whose horse would jump for other riders but refused every time with her. "I asked her to show me what was happening," Susan says. "As they approached the jump, I knew immediately what the problem was. I asked the rider if she had had a crash at a jump when she was twelve years old, and if she broke her leg at that time. She said yes, it had happened more than twenty-five years earlier, and she was just starting to jump again. I told her that it wasn't a behavioral issue with the horse. I could feel the deep-seated panic in her, and the picture of the crash in her mind that she was inadvertently sending to the horse every time they approached a fence."
"Because she now understood the problem," says Susan, "the woman could work on a positive resolution instead of perhaps punishing the horse for behavior she herself was creating."