Alix Tidmarsh Canine & Equine sports therapy massage

24/04/2026

Never treated a cow before! What a wonderful experience...major dialogue with strong indicators of where she wanted my hands to move next and huge sleepy stretching in the beautiful sunshine 🤩

03/01/2026

Postgraduate Diploma in Integrated Fascia Therapy Equine and/or Canine The Postgraduate Diploma in Integrated Fascia Therapy is an advanced, professionally focused programme designed for practitioners working with horses or dogs...

24/12/2025

🎅Day 7🎅

18/12/2025

Things that should not still be controversial heading into 2026 but are:

1. Horses are social herd animals and being able to socialize with other horses is a key component for their welfare. When they are unable to do so, their welfare suffers.

2. Horses are made to be MOVING. Excessive confinement, especially when paired with isolation, is damaging. Confinement and inability to move increase colic risks, make horses more unpredictable and difficult to handle and also impact overall wellbeing. Stalling is well studied and when horses are stalled in excess, there are many physical and mental health problems associated with it.

3. Horses are trickle feeders. They’re meant to be intaking food on a near constant basis. Even with horses who have a tendency to gain weight easily, we need to find means of enabling access to forage for most of the day. This can be done with slow feed nets and other means of slowing hay intake.

Ultimately, what humans currently have access to providing for their horses does not change the facts.

I understand how helpless people can feel when navigating the boarding systems and how hard it can be to take in this information when you don’t feel you have options available to improve the care of your horse.

However, how we feel about the facts does not change the facts.

What we are able to provide for our horses does not change the findings of research that have been replicated for decades now.

The facts are:

- horses are herd animals. Socialization is a crucial component for wellbeing.

Despite this, they’re commonly isolated and kept alone. Common does not equate to normal or healthy.

- horses are commonly kept confined and their lack of ability to engage in free movement contributes to many of the common issues with see with horses.

And, lastly,

- people often use tradition, what they perceive as normal and what they feel capable of providing (or what is most convenient for them) as an excuse to reject factual information.

But, rejecting the information does not change the experience for horse.

We need to sincerely start to reflect on the ethics of much of the horse industry because despite the fact that us humans love horses and want to have them, our desire to do so should never come above meeting basic needs.

We shouldn’t be getting social animals if we cannot meet their social needs.

We shouldn’t be getting large farm animals intended to move lots if we cannot provide this.

Riding cannot and will never make up for autonomous movement and socialization.

It can be a tough pill to swallow, but it’s necessary nonetheless.

16/12/2025

100% agreed!

🟣 Touch, emotion, and the stories we tell
I’ve been reading an ABMP piece on ‘emotional release’ in massage, and it raises something important. People can cry, laugh, feel waves of emotion, or go quiet during touch. That can be a genuine and meaningful human response, and it does not automatically mean something has been ‘released’ from tissue.

I’ve also experienced the unhelpful side of this. I once had a therapist say to me, ‘I can feel sadness leaving your body’. Ugh. It made my experience feel like it belonged to their interpretation, not to me.

So here’s a gentle but clear position.

✅ Trauma informed is not the same as trauma treatment
Trauma informed practice is about creating safety, trust, choice, and collaboration. It is about helping clients feel in control of what is happening, and reducing the risk of overwhelm. It is not about ‘processing’ trauma through touch.

❌ Claiming to ‘release trauma’ is not within scope for massage and bodywork.

If we say we can treat trauma, we are implying that we can assess it and identify what it is. That crosses into areas that require specialist clinical training.

Yes, bodywork can be profound. I’ve had sessions that felt deeply settling and supportive. Touch can help someone feel calmer, less anxious, and more able to cope. It can support a sense of resilience and empowerment. But it is one part of a wider picture, not a magic route to resolving someone’s past.

About fascia and ‘unwinding’
In some fascial approaches including MFR, spontaneous movements are called ‘unwinding’, and they can be described as trauma or emotions being released because they were stored or frozen in fascia. I understand why this idea is appealing, it appealed to me too. But I always had questions, because I’d seen similar emotional and physical responses in other settings long before I ever became a therapist.

I’ve also taught myofascial work in different countries, and the ‘unwinding’ response varies hugely. In some places it is common, and in others, not even a eyelid flutter. Fascia is not different across borders, which suggests the response is likely shaped by context, culture, expectation, and what feels permissible in that space, rather than fascia holding a hidden record of trauma.

And one point that matters
There is no magic trauma release in fascia. In fact, there is no magic anything in fascia. Fascia is living connective tissue, part of an intelligent sensory system, and it responds to load and to touch, but it is not a storage vault for frozen memories waiting for the right technique.

Keeping practice safe and respectful
If emotion shows up during treatment, we can respond with care without interpreting it. We can slow down, check consent, offer choices, and keep the client in control. If someone needs trauma support, it is more appropriate to signpost towards qualified trauma care.

In-toucheducation - Helping therapists move from stories to standards.



See ABMP article here - https://www.abmp.com/massage-and-bodywork-magazine/lets-stop-hunting-emotional-release

16/12/2025

Cosmo visits mums care home regularly and is a perfect entertainer and crumb manager! Gotta watch raisin stoppage at this time of year!😜💪

18/10/2025

04/10/2025

Please all my friends, it takes three minutes to find your local MP on this link and print out the letter for them and send off. Very important road awareness Bill to be presented in the Commons soon. Please read and share....🙏🙏

23/09/2025

Hear hear! Please read and share far and wide...

26/05/2025

Supporting a filming day for a fabulous day with good light and loads of laughs ❤️💕