Author Rupert Isaacson has pioneered the Horse Boy method, an alternative treatment for autistic children which involves getting them to interact with horses. Scientists and autism campaigners, however, say the method is unscientific, unproven and peddling false hope. Lynne Malcolm and Diane Deane report.
Rupert Isaacson is confident about the psychological power of horses, and how that power might be used to help people suffering from autism. He’s confident about it because his son Rowan has the disorder, and after trying to reach out him in a number of ways, Mr Isaacson noticed a special interaction between Rowan and a horse called Betsy.
When you are lost out there in what to do with your child and you don't know what to do, you'll do anything.
NICOLE ROGERSON, AUTISM AWARENESS AUSTRALIA
‘We tried everything. He didn't speak to us,’ says Mr Isaacson. ‘One day he ran away from me and ran right up to a horse called Betsy. The moment I put Rowan on Betsy's back he began to speak. And a light bulb went on in my head ... was there a place on earth that combined healing with horses? Mongolia.’
Nicole Rogerson, the CEO of Autism Awareness Australia, also has an autistic son—Jack, who’s now 18. She remembers receiving the devastating news of his diagnosis when he was three and a half years old.
‘It’s incredibly upsetting to realise that your child is not reaching the developmental norms,’ she says. ‘You then go into the job, and it is a job, of managing the school system for the next 12 years. Where I am now as my son with autism is leaving the school system and transitioning to work. So they are very different phases that families go through.’
A child with autism needs a lot of ‘management’ but that this does depend to some degree on the level of early intervention the child has had. Those with less intervention can need a significant amount of care and attention. Although nowadays children can be diagnosed at 18 months, the early signs are not so obvious. Mr Isaacson and his wife were initially confused about their son’s behaviour.
‘We knew something was up but we didn’t know it was autism,’ he says. ‘We got a list of all the early warning signs and realised that he had them all. The crucial one is no pointing, no perspective taking, and then these massive, massive, massive tantrums that we later realised came for neurological reasons, but at the time it’s just like incoming artillery. Then we realised, okay, yes, he's on the spectrum.’
Raised in England by South African and Zimbabwean parents, Mr Isaacson has spent much of his life in Africa. Through his contact with groups like the Kalahari Bushmen, he got to know traditional healers and shamans, who offered to help Rowan.
Mr Isaacson pursued the shamanic approach across the world, heading to Mongolia and eventually southern Siberia
While Mr Isaacson acknowledges that many people will be sceptical of his approach, he emphasises that the main ethic is to follow the child.
‘When you ride with the child in front of you—which is how we do it in Horse Boy—you can create these really dance-like rhythms,’ he says. ‘The reason it feels so good is it fills your body with a feel-good hormone called oxytocin, and the child who is racked with anxiety, with sensory discomfort, gets this industrial-sized shot of bliss hormone.’
‘One of the big difficulties is the relationship with the exterior world. What the horse can do which no other animal can really do as well, is it carries us into the exterior world ... so it's delight, it's wonder, it's fun, it's cool, and you're out there. So it’s not as if people have to go out and buy a horse, or see shamans, but you do need to follow your child, you do need to get out there in nature.’
Ms Rogerson, however, strongly disagrees with Mr Isaacson and his Horse Boy method, which is not backed by scientific studies. She says her job is to protect vulnerable parents.
‘When you are lost out there in what to do with your child and you don't know what to do, you'll do anything. We have to point parents in the direction of scientific evidence-based best practice for children with autism, which is not universally available in Australia.’
‘I do know it is important to keep children with autism active,’ she says. ‘So to a certain extent, if he was spending a lot of time with his son, albeit on a horse, his son certainly would have been at least engaged and interacting, and that part of it certainly has merit.’
She disagrees with Mr Isaacson’s idea that parents should follow their child’s lead. She believes that a two- or three-year-old child does not have the ability to decide on their own future or therapy. It’s the job of parents to lead them to independence and to alleviate the more drastic aspects of the diagnosis.
Mr Isaacson acknowledges that initially there wasn’t much mainstream science to back up his approach. He thinks that we could see a new generation of scientists who are willing to try alternative methods.
The University of Texas has studied his Horse Boy method and the University of Belmont in Nashville is looking to his program as part of their PhD program for occupational therapy.
‘The people that we really ought to be listening to are the autists,’ he says. ‘Most adult autists will confirm that these sensory issues are there, will confirm that the kids need to move, that the tantruming comes from these neurological firestorms, that they often feel that they are falling through space when they are young. We need to talk to these people.’
Ms Rogerson took a more scientific approach with her son: 10 years of applied behaviour analysis. It was expensive: although the Australian government has best practice guidelines, unfortunately the funding doesn’t cover all of the treatment. She says good quality early intervention is key. Autism treatment is an unregulated, buyer beware market.
Rowan Isaacson is now doing very well. He’s started his own web-based TV series, which he scripted and filled with animal characters. His dad would like to see a wider integration of autistic people into society, so that their skills can be acknowledged and used.
Jack Rogerson, meanwhile, has just graduated from high school and is about to start work. Ms Rogerson thinks he’s ‘the best kid on the planet’. It’s her firm belief that if we don’t intervene with autistic children at an early stage then we won’t benefit contributions as adults. Something, perhaps, she and Mr Isaacson agree on.
An exploration of all things mental, All in the Mind is about the brain and behaviour, and the fascinating connections between them.
