At Conquest Centre we offer something for everyone regardless background, age or ability.
Mentors are professionally trained to work in a Trauma Informed Approach and with Thrive Approach for younger clients when appropriate.
Our wonderful facilities allow us to offer this in a fun and creative manner.
We believe in treating everyone as an individual as regardless of what has been diagnosed or assessed, everyone experiences life in their own unique way and will find wellness in similarly individual ways.
For this reason, we don’t publish ‘programs’ as such, instead our mentors work with each individual according to their personal needs at the time.
We celebrate steps toward improved life skills rather than measuring outcomes, these emerge for each individual in terms of confidence, independence and practical developments that enhance day to day life.
Similarities of symptoms in autism spectrum, ADHD or other neurodiverse conditions shouldn’t be ignored but they play out differently for everyone depending each individual’s circumstances.
Conquest mentors have exceptional training and experiences to draw on that enable them to assess and offer appropriate activities at different times, if it’s not quite right they have a vast pool of knowledge to draw on to offer alternatives.
For instance, whilst being with a horse one person might be happy to ‘hang out’ together and not touch, others may prefer grooming the lovely silky and warm fur, whereas someone else might like to brush the tail. Another person may prefer to play with the goats, clicker train a chicken, make a bug hotel, play football or be artistic with paint or make up – we are all different, so we like to celebrate these differences and not fit everyone into a set of steps that make up a program.
We know that the power of nature has the most remarkable ability to positively impact mental and physical health, there is plenty of research to back that up. We add in the stimulating interaction with peaceful or playful animals, and it becomes a magical mix that can contribute to reduced symptoms of even the most entrenched conditions.
Sometimes this means playing football or being highly active to release pent up energy and frustration. Other times it may mean sitting in the haybarn calmly chatting together whilst cuddling a chicken or a guineapig, or going for a walk around the fields with one of the horses or a dog.
Our mentors come from a variety of backgrounds and have mostly been drawn to working at the centre through word of mouth or personal experiences as a client, parent carer or volunteer. You can see their introduction videos on the ‘Meet the Mentors’ page. Each mentor also draws on their own lived experiences to further support the work of finding balance in the lives of our valued clients.
For clients in wheelchairs or anyone in need of assistance with mobility and movement of tight joints and muscles, then therapeutic riding is the answer as the warmth and movement of riding a horse offers gentle movement and stretching.
The student programme engages learners with animal and nature-based experiences that translate into life skills whilst working with the animals. There is also an opportunity to join a group following a curriculum to achieve a recognised qualification from British Horse Society or Riding for Disabled.
Sessions can be either one-to-one or in groups depending on individual needs and are facilitated by mentors with lived experience and understanding of highly individual needs. The special therapy animals include horses, goats, donkeys, chickens, dogs, sheep and guineapigs who all have their role to play in the activities.
For adults looking for counselling there is an extensive range of animal and nature assisted activities, equine assisted psychotherapy and equine assisted counselling.