 While while most physical therapy is practiced in a clinic, four-year-old Martha does most of hers on the back of a horse. Our Taylor Archer has more tonight in this week's Northwood's adventure. Four-year-old Martha was born with a chromosome anomaly that prevented her from walking and limited her speech and other muscles throughout her body, until she started hippotherapy sessions. That motion, really, it's about the motion. The horse's pelvis rocks in a similar way to a human gait at walk. So it imparts all of that up to the brain, and it can actually really teach the brain how to walk. When she was first born, she didn't have any muscle movement at all, and she just laid there. On the back of a horse, Martha goes through a series of tasks, such as placing a ball inside a bucket, blowing bubbles, or solving puzzles to train all her muscles and senses. We are really trying to do some of that early childhood activities in our programming. We had her reaching up overhead across her body, which is also good to kind of use those core muscles, all while her pelvis is moving side to side in a normal gait pattern or a natural gait pattern assisted by the horse. And just after five sessions of therapy, Martha's therapists have noticed how much more stronger and confident she has become in her abilities. She was afraid to get on the horse and really held on very tight. And now today, for the first time, she held flags in both hands and rode around the whole arena without holding on. So she was able to maintain her balance without any support from us at all. On day one, we kind of had our support up by her pelvis or up on her upper body more, and now you saw we were able to hold, not even hold on to her, but just had our hands over her lower leg for support and safety, but otherwise she was doing all the work. Just being in the environment of the stable has helped Martha progress in her therapy. It's stimulating on multiple levels. So she's getting stimulation, the warmth of the horse, the smells, the barn cats running around. Martha is getting stronger and stronger every ride. And she's come so far since she first started that she's begun to walk with handheld assistance. In Brainerd, for this week's Northwest Adventure, Taylor Archer, Lakeland News. Martha's Hippotherapy sessions take place at Legacy Stable in Brainerd and are provided by the Acorn Hill EAAT organization. To donate or learn more about their organization, you can visit their website there. If you've enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland Public Television.