Horses helped this Weld County woman through a mid-life crisis and a brain tumor. Now she wants to help others.

Andrea Hall had a mid-life crisis. She figured out her dream job wasn’t all it was cracked up to be, and she learned she had a brain tumor. But horses helped her get through it, so she worked to establish Withers Whisper. Photo by Dan England.

By Dan England

In order to feel well again, Andrea Hall needed her mid-life crisis, her new marriage or treatment for her brain tumor. But what she really needed was her horses.  

She wanted to be around horses her whole life, even when she almost died in a riding accident in her mid-20s. She somehow knew she connected with them. But she didn’t realize how much she needed them until she went through a life crisis that left her questioning her career as a defense attorney.

She thought she wanted her own law practice.  She moved to Loveland, Colorado in 2004 to practice law after graduation and to be with her two brothers, planning to be an award-winning aunt.

She built a nice life as a defense attorney. She especially loved what she called “the kill,” when she delivered one of her closing arguments and knew she couldn’t lose. 

But she questioned that rush many years later, after the death of her 18-month-old toy poodle and a tough jury trial in the same week nearly broke her. It left her wondering why she was killing herself over her work. Her clients, after all, didn’t send her Christmas cards. After a summer off, she only got worse, especially when she realized she didn’t want to go back to work.

She struggled for three years with exhaustion and depression, severe headaches and an elevated heart rate. She changed her diet, went to a chiropractor and saw a neurologist who told her nothing was wrong. She had her doubts, fought with her insurance company to get an MRI and, sure enough, got the news she had a brain tumor.

She was almost glad. Yes, her job was another problem, but it was nice to know she wasn’t crazy after doctors kept telling her nothing was wrong.

She had emergency surgery, and after the biopsy confirmed that the tumor was benign (which is a funny word, given what she went through, but at least it wasn’t life threatening), doctors removed it and she got her life back five years ago.

Well, kinda. 

The tumor, as it turns out, was not the turning point. It was the horses.

She began to notice how she felt around the large, majestic animals even before she was diagnosed with the tumor. They made her feel safe, even grounded, more so than she ever had in her life, probably. That inspired her to start her own program: She wanted others to feel what she felt around them. 

Andrea Hall isn’t a therapist, but she knows how much of an impact horses can have on people. That’s why she set out to establish Withers Whisper. Photo by Dan England.

She’s had her horses for three years, but she got Withers Whisper truly underway this year: Her clients come to her with problems, and Hall, with the help of her horses, figures out the underlying issues that cause those problems.

Hall is not a therapist, and she doesn’t call herself one. The horses assist in helping her clients find peace, their truth or make the self-discoveries they need to move forward in life.

They react to people by sensing the energy they give off. Hall learned how to read that energy. Yes, it sounds a little mystical, even weird, but it works, Hall said. 

“If someone tells me, ‘I have a great relationship with my husband,’ and my horse isn’t moving, I know that’s not their truth,’” Hall said. “They may want that, but subconsciously they know it’s not true. The horse shows me what’s going on, and I can ask questions later. When people are telling me what the problem is, it’s usually really not the problem. The horse helps me find the real problem.”

She has nine horses, and they all have different personalities and do different things, like all animals. Some are her key players, such as Bugs, a huge horse with a big heart who can soothe people with his masculine, majestic presence, even while he’s hogging all the attention. Dash just had a filly and is in “mom mode,” Hall said, but she helps people discern their truth and then speak it. Lady can connect with women struggling with abusive relationships and help them heal. G-Man works with a therapy team who comes out to her farm. All of them are older, mature horses. 

“I won’t work with a horse unless he’s older than 5,” Hall said. ‘They’re not ready yet. They’re all over the place emotionally.”

Hall uses her own horses to stay centered as well as to work with her clients. She remembers the first time she realized what they could do for her during her struggle. 

“My world disappeared, and I was breathing,” Hall said. “My heart wasn’t racing. I could be there for hours, and it felt like five minutes. Now, when I think I’m fine, I just spend five minutes with my horse, and I can be brought to tears.”

In fact, she remembers another emotional time, just a few weeks before her wedding, only she didn’t realize it was emotional until Bugs sauntered up to her, as he usually will whenever she approaches his pen. 

“I began bawling,” she said. “I was so busy on the tasks that I wasn’t in my body anymore. It was such a relief to have him close and be grounded again.”

She and that husband of two years, Jonathon Schiestel, own some property out near Eaton and Ault and hope to live on it one day, although a lot of the room is occupied by the horses and Schiestel’s hay farming operation. They live in Greeley in the meantime. She continues to work as an attorney, something she’s done for 15 years. 

“My goal is to eventually not do that,” Hall said. “But I still need to pay bills. Starting a new business is a process. I’m back to eating Ramen Noodles.”

Don’t worry about the horses absorbing all this excess energy from her clients and herself, negative or not.  Horses, Hall said, live in the moment. 

“They don’t hold onto anything,” Hall said. “They live in the present moment. That’s why they are good at helping us get grounded. We are never in the present moment. They help us get there.”

Her clients usually have what she calls “ah-ha” moments after a session, the same kind of moments she had years ago, when she discovered a new path for life, one she wanted to walk all along. 

“I don’t hold the answers,” she said. “I believe we have our own answers. I’m just here to hold up a mirror.”

For more information:

To learn more, go to https://witherswhisper.com.