Save the barn

This is a letter has had personal information removed as it is very personal for the volunteer who wrote it. It is a letter being sent to the judge of the Ready Set Ride case. The intent of this letter is to show how the horses not only help the kids and adults who ride but they also help the volunteers. We as volunteers receive our own type of therapy when we are at RSR.

RE: Ready Set Ride Therapeutic Recreation Facility
Case: 2017LM001374

Your Honor,

My name is XXXX XXXX, I am 36 years old, a resident of Plainfield, IL. for 15 years and have been a volunteer with Ready Set Ride (RSR) for 5½ years. I am writing to you today to tell you what RSR means to me as someone who has given so much of my time, effort, energy and money to such a worthy cause. RSR is so many things. It is a place for therapeutic riding, a place for parents to gather during lessons, a place for volunteers and also a place that receives horses who have become homeless, who are taken in and in some cases are nursed back to health and become a permanent part of RSR. I am proud to be part of such a worthy cause.

I am one of about 200 volunteers that keep RSR in a position to be able to provide much needed services to kids and adults with disabilities. The riders have mental or physical disabilities and in some cases are terminally ill. What is so magical about RSR is that the horses do not know one person is different from the next. Horses will love you no matter who you are or what your abilities are. Another magical part of RSR is what the program and the horses do for the rest of us. How the horses give the volunteers therapy as it did with me and everyone who joins me on our Saturday mornings at RSR.

My journey to RSR started in 2010 when I was diagnosed with severe depression and anxiety. It was so severe that my doctor required me to take a leave of absence from work so I could focus on getting myself better. Fast forward to the end of December 2011 into January of 2012. I had to take yet another leave of absence from work to take care of myself. I was put into Intensive Out Patient Therapy (IOP) with Edward Hospital. I was in therapy there four hours a day 5 days a week, seeing a psychiatrist for medication, on top of which I was still seeing my personal therapist outside of IOP. After 4 weeks of IOP I felt I had the tools necessary to take care of myself better, but there was still one little piece missing. Before I could leave IOP I had to find a charity to work with, as this was a requirement upon leaving. It could be anything I wanted, and I was handed a list of options. On this list were many charities and organizations such asthe Plainfield Humane Society, originations to help elderly people or to help at Morning Star Mission. Looking over the list I saw Ready Set Ride, and I realized I had driven past this barn a few times when coming home from my brother’s house.

To give you some context, when I was a kid, between the ages of 5-10, I rode horses. I was a jumper, and I LOVED the thought of being around horses again. A close friend of mine also rode and jumped horses when she was younger and she was also going through similar personal situations like I was experiencing. We both immediately wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to go to RSR. I immediately called Lisa Afshari, who is in charge of the program, and she said she had an opening for Saturday mornings and we met with Lisa by the end of the week.

The first time I stepped foot into the barn, the smell brought me back to when I was a kid waiting to ride a school horse named Brass, Black Jack or Malibu. What blew me away was Lisa had 3 horses that looked just like the ones I rode when I was a kid and their names are Sadie, Audrey, and Scooter. That was five years ago this past January. Since then we have had many more friends join us on Saturday mornings to help with feeding, turning out, and cleaning. When we started, it was just the 2 of us, taking an average of 4 hours to clean the barn. Now we are a team of up to 11 people on some days (depending on schedules) and it will take us about an hour and a half. My Saturday mornings have turned into my favorite time of week as I get to spend that time with my closest best friends and the horses helping a wonderful charity. Being with the horses, as well as with my own dog, I feel has done so much for me; animals are very special that way

We as a group, we call ourselves the Saturday Morning Crew and love getting the opportunity to go to RSR on Saturday mornings. We are not at the barn when the kids are there, we are more of the behind the scenes people. We know what we do is important because what we do helps to keep the horses happy and healthy for the kids to enjoy riding. I always say we are one piece of the puzzle that is RSR. If you ask any of us, we would say these horses are ours as well. They are an extension of our families, when they get sick or injured we do our best to help take care of them, when they pass away we feel as though we have lost our own pet.

We were there when the RSR was flooded in 2013. I drove with Lisa and her daughters to get sandbags and I was throwing sandbags in the paddock to keep the water from getting in, trying to save the barn. We were there all through the Polar Vortex winter when it was below zero in the morning, and the barn doors would be frozen shut, but we still needed to feed the horses and get the boys inside. We had to find a way to get the doors open, and we always did! We are there if its already 90 degrees outside by 8am. When Sadie was injured, I volunteered to use a hose to get cold water on her swollen hip, shoulder and belly every morning for 10 days straight while she ate breakfast. I have even cut vacations short to be back in time to go to RSR on Saturday. We are there no matter what happens.

I know I speak for myself and my fellow Saturday Morning Crew members, when I say we have the dedication and love we have to RSR and the horses because Lisa asked for it or expects it. We have the dedication and love because we love RSR and are so grateful for the opportunity Lisa has given us over these many years to be a part of something so much bigger than ourselves. To be a part of RSR isn’t something I can exactly put into words what it means to me. But I wanted to try so you would know what RSR has done for me, everyone in our Saturday Morning Crew, all of the other volunteers, Lisa and most importantly the kids and adults who ride.


Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,




“Everyone must ride a horse in the same way, it is for this time that all of us shall be equal”