Reining Liberty Ranch

Reining Liberty Ranch By

Kierstin Gunsberg

It’s a rare January afternoon that the snowflakes have stopped falling, making the world seem somehow as warm as Becki Bigelow as she describes her joy in welcoming the Women Warriors visiting Reining Liberty Ranch that day. On eleven acres of sprawling pasture just down the road from Silver Lake in Traverse City, Becki and her husband Dennis invite Veterans and their families to connect with the Reining Liberty herd of over a dozen equine, which includes a mini donkey named Tulip. Though it’s the baby goats and chickens, the children of these Veterans flock to first, says Becki, who notes that learning how to handle the delicate eggs without any helicoptering from the adults creates a sense of responsibility and purpose that comes only from being entrusted with something so fragile.

And it is fragile, growing up, Becki knows this from her childhood, which was marred by an injury her father received in World War II. After his return, the realities of that life-altering event created deep loneliness in her that grew and grew until she was a teenager. That’s when she met Spindle. Gifted to her, and at sixteen hands tall, the White Tennessee Walker was an ethereal blue-eyed beauty who, like the stuff of teenage dreams, saved Becki from the shadows. She learned that where humans may fail with words, horses make up in quiet spirit, “This amazing creature...mirrored who and where I was emotionally in a most amazing, gentle way with no judgment or expectation.”

Those years spent with Spindle galloping through her family’s cherry orchards in Acme, along with the firsthand knowledge of how important compassion and support are to Veterans and their families, would be the inspiration for the Reining Liberty Ranch. She and Dennis, who served on a nuclear submarine in the Navy, would work incredibly hard to create this ranch. After the new year of 2013, the ranch officially opened to those in the Veteran community, offering Horses 4 Heroes Therapeutic Riding programs, which facilitates increased confidence, anxiety reduction, and trust-building. Led by a team of professionally certified Therapeutic Riding Instructors, each participant is initially matched with a member of the Reining Liberty equine herd. From there, they set off on a four-phase, months-long experience that begins with learning alongside their designated horse and culminates with riding through peaceful wooded trails in places like The High Rollaway overlooking the Manistee River. Between these months of back and forth with Cricket, Topsy, Nim, and the other hooved companions, Becki says those in the program benefit from social connections with not only the horses but the instructors and other Veterans as they “navigate obstacles together like a horse and rider team.”

Although Horses 4 Heroes is a mainstay of Reining Liberty’s focus, there’s so much more to the ranch where Dennis, Becki, and their crew enjoy bonfires, reflective garden walks, and weekly meals with the heroes who spend time there. Their cozy “Outreach Building” is also set up to host peer-to-peer meetings and sometimes utilized by other Veteran support groups. To the Bigelow’s, this isn’t their ranch, it’s a safe place for Veterans and those who love them to commune with one another, learn something new, and most of all, exhale from the stressors of everyday life.

To contribute to the ranch, you can reach out to Becki & Dennis at reininglibertyranch.org, or contact their office at 231-421-3958.