Meet the Staff
Jane Strong, SEP, IFS, Trained
Executive Director
Co-founder, Lead Facilitator
Eponaquest Equine Experiential Learning Instructor
Somatic Experiencing® Practitioner
Certified Enneagram Teacher
Internal Family Systems® Trained
Jane began her relationship with horses as a competitive rider. When she left that world behind, she never envisioned horses becoming an integral part of her life again.
For 25 years, she worked as a research professional, executive coach and enneagram teacher — helping people‘‘take back the reins’ in their personal and professional lives. It was only after returning to horses and horsemanship in 2002 that she realized how much they could help us rreveal and reclaim our authenticity.
As she began to learn who horses really are as powerful, non-predatory animals and what they have to teach us about healthy relationships, she was able to build what TEE calls emotional fitness skills. in her own life. These skills and practices had never surfaced directly in traditional therapeutic settings or coaching, so she felt compelled to bring what she had learned to others. Among many other things, she learned. how to:
manage her own energy
set healthy boundaries
become congruent in communication
discover the art and skills of intention, attunement and the pleasure of course correcting in real time.
This was clearly lightening in a bottle.
The TEE curriculum is a reflection of what Jane and her partner David learned about horses and themselves through Eponaquest, Buck Brannaman, Peter Levine and the Somatic Experiencing Training Institute..
It was designed to reveal what it really means to be emotionally fit and stay present under pressure.
Then, in 2008, she and David read the news that 22 veterans were taking their own lives every day.. Rather than seeing these men and women as broken, they saw them as canaries in the coal mine.— reflections of the disconnect that many people feel in the 21st century. They believed that connecting and collaborating with horses through new and challenging exercises would offset the struggle that they —and many other high functioning people — have in handling people and situations at home and work. They were right.
Jane believes that ANYONE who wants to gain both agency AND attunement to others can have a great and lasting impact in both personal and professional settings.
JANE’S STORY
For me, one of the first and greatest Aha’s came when I attended a workshop before training with Linda Kohanov in Tucson. I had no idea how much I buried fear and how I pushed forward in life against all odds. No one but a horse could have revealed the real cost of my dauntless approach to life — and she did. It was a shock point for me and I was hooked. I came to believe that if I could release this burden of ‘going it alone no matter how I really felt, this work with horses could be life altering for others.
II was right — and have seen this time and time again with hundreds of high functioning people. They arrive with some unconscious belief or behavior that they wouldn’t even think to tell anyone, and leave lighter, brighter and much freer to be themselves.
I believe that they key is to have horses who are given permission to express themselves and facilitators who are highly trained to recognize even subtle non-verbal cues from clients and from the horses. For me, I never would have thought to tell anyone about the fear that was lodged way below my conscious mind.
Horses engage all of our senses so we get to experience the pleasure of being 100% present and cast aside the shells and armor we may no longer need.
That’s what happened to me and I believe, that’s what can happen to anyone who wants to live a more fulfilling life.
From what I’ve seen, the applications are endless.
– JS
David Sonatore, LCSW, SEP
Program Director
Co-founder, Lead Facilitator
Eponaquest Equine Experiential Learning Instructor
Somatic Experiencing® Advanced Training Graduate
Certified Martha Beck Coach
David’s journey with horses began at age eight, on the back of a spirited trail horse who launched them both over a frozen stream and into the wild exhilaration of pure horse-power. That early spark lay dormant for decades, waiting for a chance to return which finally happened on a trip to Montana.
It was there that David immersed himself in the wisdom of what people call natural horsemanship. World-class horse trainers like Bill Dorrance, Buck Brannaman and Leslie Desmond were modeling a way to work with horses based on trust, understanding, authenticity, and presence rather than dominance and control. This was far removed from his role as a filmmaker in the advertising and marketing world of New York City.
It was actually because of his introduction to this approach with both horses and people that he became a Licensed Clinical Social Worker. Far more relevant and meaningful through, were his year-long apprenticeship at Eponaquest in Tucson, AZ and a three=year course at the Somatic Experiencing Training Institute. David now guides others through transformative journeys from the ground up — helping people break free from lives lived by default and stepping into ones that are both intentional and empowered.
Today, as co-creator of The Equus Effect, he brings the profound power of the horse-human connection to those seeking transformation — making this extraordinary work both accessible and attainable.
DAVID’S STORY
Early in my equine bodywork practice, I agreed to demonstrate my work for a magazine at a local riding barn. What should have been a straightforward session for me, was instead a tangled reality of traffic, mounting frustration, public pressure, and a nervous system fully overloaded. By the time I showed up at the horse’s paddock, I chose instead to present a mask of unfettered and cool confidence. Bad idea, but one I’d learned all too well in the school of “fake it ’til you make it” and “never let ‘em see you sweat.”
The horse met me exactly where I was — on the inside! As soon as I placed my hands on him, he reared, tried to take a nip of my shoulder, and then bucked and bolted to the opposite side of the paddock. to say that the energy of all I was covering up was too much to hold in one body would be the grossest of understatements. Where to look? Certainly not at the folks recording it in their notepads. Instead, I made a beeline to the backside of the paddock facing the woods to hide.. I faced the woods trying to collect myself. Then, despite the fight, the tears came. And came. After about a minute, I felt a sensation between my shoulder blades as his nose came to rest on the length of my back. It was the most telling of moments for me. When I turned to see him, he stood with the lead rope still dangling from the halter. Gathering up the rope, I proceeded to perform the bodywork sequence on him and we both into a level headed beacon of regulation.
After years in a business that crafted “truths” coupled with a lifetime of managing people’s perceptions of me, it took a horse’s natural instincts to move me to trust and allow my own self to emerge.
This experience showed me that healing isn’t something we impose or perform. Regulation emerges through attunement and authenticity. Bodies—human and animal—respond when they feel met rather than managed.
This principle guides how I work with people today: creating the conditions for co-regulation, listening to the body’s intelligence, and supporting the nervous system’s natural capacity to reorganize and renew.
– DS
Patty Ganey
PATH CTRI, PATH ESMHL
Senior Facilitator
Facilitator Trainer
Patty grew up in a family of first responders, and her son is now serving as an officer in the Navy. She knows first hand the toll the work that our military and first responders takes on family life.
Prior to her involvement with horses, Patty’s career as a consultant in the business world also gave her a deep understanding of how people who work in organizations handle change and growth. She recognizes barriers to navigating transitions and what it takes to be an effective leader.
Since then, Patty became involved with horses; and has competed in the disciplines of eventing, dressage and fox hunting. She also taught riding to special needs individuals through traditional mounted therapeutic riding. She noticed that volunteers, family members, staff, as well as riders, experienced positive shifts in their emotional and mental well-being after spending time with the horses and became interested in what was at work for people who were not engaged with horses for sport.
Curiosity about how this happens led her to The Equus Effect and continues to inspire and inform her deep interest in the neuroscience behind how our nervous systems operate and how ours intersect with those of our equine partners. She is a lifelong learner and regularly adds to TEE’s resource library as new findings and insights emerge in the field of human-animal connection, nervous system regulation and equine behavior.
She is now a senior facilitator and has a particular interest in working with the families of people who work in high stress environments and individuals who are interested in personal and professional growth..
The TEE curriculum is a non-medical intervention that provides enough structure to invite real growth and positive change without relying on diagnoses or treatment plans. Patty is adept at using that structure to create psychological safety as well as the opportunity to move beyond comfortable and familiar habits. She uses the principles and practices as gateways for participants to experience their own blind spots without seeing themselves as flawed. She firmly believes that ‘It’s not what’s wrong with you, it’s what happens to everyone’s nervous system under stress. She knows this from first hand experience and meets people wherever they are on their journeys in life.
Patty also knows that giving people tools to deal with stress helps them show up more fully for others in all aspects of their lives.
PATTY’S STORY
Learning to facilitate the curriculum at The Equus Effect was the next step on my journey. Coming out of the therapeutic riding world where the aim was to help people move beyond physical limitations, this was completely new — and challenged my own belief that I had to be in charge of others’ experiences. Holding space is entirely different than seeing every moment as an opportunity to ‘teach’.
This curriculum taught me how to become congruent myself, what the horses were telling us and when to invite clients out of their stories and back into the present moment. It was a game changer for me too.
It was so refreshing to work in a peer to peer setting without preconceptions about what the sessions “should” address. I learned to allow things to unfold and lean into the scaffolding of this robust curriculum and it worked.
Whenever someone gets activated, I’’m confident that the combination of skills I’ve learned — and the horses — will get that person to a place of more freedom and choice in life..
Donnaldson Brown, JD
Registered Yoga Teacher - Yoga Alliance
Senior Facilitator
Facilitator Trainer
Donnaldson is an attorney and writer and has ridden horses from the time she was eight from riding with cowboys in Texas to competing nationally in equitation and hunters. Keenly aware of the connection between horses and humans, she was thrilled to learn of The Equus Effect’s unique program of experiential learning to help bring and keep people, no matter the circumstance or context, into more authentic relationship with themselves, colleagues, and loved ones.
With a career spanning litigation, trusts and estates work, as well as film production, Donnaldson has spent the last twenty-plus years working primarily with multi-generation families. There’s a saying in the family office world: the soft issues are the hard issues, which alludes to the fact that it is family relationships and dynamics that are often the most challenging for families, and their advisors, to navigate.
As a long-time yoga and meditation practitioner and instructor, Donnaldson knows first-hand the efficacy of body-based practices in helping to regulate a nervous system out of balance and to remain grounded in oneself. Because of their sensitivity and non-judgmental responses, working with the horses deepened her own sensitivity to the dynamics of relationship. She became not only more perceptive, but a better communicator, and more able to navigate conflict. This has been tremendously useful, particularly when working with participants who find themselves in challenging emotional territory, but also want to move forward.
Donnaldson’s approach to facilitating incorporates her warmth, compassion and humor to support all participants in re-connecting with their essential selves.
DONNALDSON’S STORY
My love and respect for horses, and an opportunity to deepen my skills working with those recovering from chronic stress is what drew me to The Equus Effect, first as a volunteer, in 2019, but I never realized how much the work would affect me
Early on, I was spending an afternoon with Jane and the horses when she asked if I’d like to do some liberty work, which I’d never done before. We brought one of her horses into the round pen without a halter or lead rope, and she asked me to use my body language, intention and energy to move him. I was a little nervous, wanted to do this “right,” wanted to show I was a “good” horsewoman.
The horse, a lovely and sensitive gelding, didn’t pay me much attention at all. ‘Guess I’m not going to get this job,’ floated through my head. With Jane’s gentle guidance and cues, I soon acknowledged—just to myself—what I was feeling. The vulnerability that came up, despite all the experiences I’ve had with horses. The expectations I had of myself. The self-criticism starting to rear its head. Then, the most remarkable thing happened. As soon as I acknowledged, honestly, what was going on inside me, the horse began to respond. He had no judgments, no stories. He just responded to a simple truth, my simple truth in that moment. I breathed, and in what felt like no time at all, the connection—the sensation of an honest relationship with myself and between him and me--became palpable. It is an experience that resonates in me still, seven years later, and continues to help guide me to my more authentic self when I get—as we all do—saturated with emotion, confusion, or fear.
I believe The Equus Effect is a program like no other, with roots in the most current study of neurobiology and social science, it offers experiential learning that is both challenging and energizing. Watching the horses, who by virtue of their presence and honesty, support, and even accelerate, the process of restoring balance and connection never ceases to humble and amaze me. I am profoundly grateful to be working with this talented and committed cohort—both equine and human!
Tracie Shannon
Senior Facilitator
Equine Massage Therapist
Tracie is the founder and owner of an independent equine-based practice specializing in Equine-Assisted Resilience Coaching, HeartMath-informed regulation practices, equine massage therapy, and Reiki. She also serves as a TEE Facilitator and works throughout Connecticut and NY State.
Several members of Tracie’s family have served in the military. Her father served in the U.S. Coast Guard; her uncle, a U.S. Marine; and her grandfather was a Corpsman in the U.S. Navy. Her family’s legacy of service also extends to the animal world. Her grandmother’s Doberman Pinscher, who officially served as a scout and protector with the Second Marine Raider Regiment, was among the first dogs selected for formal military training and deployment.
She began as a volunteer with TEE in 2013 and graduated as a senior facilitator in 2016. She also supports students training to facilitate the TEE curriculum.
Tracie integrates an understanding of equine and human nervous system dynamics to help participants develop practical, sustainable approaches for managing overwhelm, improving focus and fostering resilience.
In her work with horses, this awareness supports their well-being and readiness for the important roles they play in the program.. With human participants, it helps her recognize the subtle cues that reflect underlying patterns that keep them stuck. This helps her create a supportive, grounded approach that guides individuals toward becoming steadier and more self-aware.
Participants express a deep appreciation for her body-based skills and the unassuming and direct way in which she goes about conveying her insights.
TRACIE’S STORY
When I first came to The Equus Effect in 2013, I worked as a volunteer horse handler because of my own experience with horses and equine massage.
I had no idea how the work would ‘work’ on me, since my whole practice and experience with horses had centered about doing things for them rather than them doing things for me..
I soon realized however, that if I was going to be a part of this program with Jane and David, I would also have to walk the walk. From the horses’ perspectives, we were all in the same energetic field or herd.
This became crystal clear to me when I came to the farm after having had a harrowing experience with my own dog and some coyotes. The close call had left my system full of adrenaline and when I tried to tell David that I was fine, he immediately suggested that I run around the barn a few times to discharge the adrenaline in my system and tell the group what had happened.,
Not only did the horses appreciate my honesty, but the group realized that ‘life happens’, even to us facilitators
Janice Sibilia
Program Logistics - Volunteer Coordinator
Expert Horsewoman
Dave Wagman
Cohort & Volunteer Coordinator
Guardian Revival
Team Chief, Peer Services Division
Cathleen Halloran
Barn Manager
Expert Horsewoman