December Volunteer of the Month: Megan Wilson

December is such a festive month. There are so many reasons to be happy and so many things to celebrate. December Volunteer of the Month, Megan Wilson, is one of the reasons we’re celebrating this month! Megan has been volunteering at SAFE since April. She is at Safe Harbor every Sunday morning (except when she is called away to take care of a sick patient or deliver a baby!!), doing chores and lending a helping hand with whatever is needed at the barn. Megan has a variety of skills, is great at multi-tasking and is very efficient. She can do three things at once and do all of those things well. She is amazing! Thank you, Megan, for all that you do for SAFE. 

Tell us a little bit about yourself.
I’m convinced that there’s a “horse gene” and that when you have it, you can’t fight it — you just need to have horses in your life. Luckily for me, this gene runs in my family and I grew up riding. We got our first horse when I was 13. He was a very special, very funny, and sometimes very challenging OTTB named Dreamer. I did hunter/jumpers with him and some eventing. I liked the eventing more than he did and we were disqualified on the cross-country course nearly as often as we completed it. A few years after getting Dreamer, we got Ginny, a Percheron-Thoroughbred mare who was much braver on the cross-country course and was primarily my sister’s horse. I rode Dreamer and did some showing into college, but didn’t have much time to go home to do that. I found a therapeutic riding program in Charlottesville, VA where I was in college and it quickly became a huge part of my life. I volunteered there throughout college and medical school and was the volunteer coordinator for a year. I moved to Seattle 3 1/2 years ago with my husband to start my family medicine residency at UW. Time was very limited during residency and I only rode when visiting my parents on vacations. My mother kept Dreamer and successfully did dressage with him until he had to be put down a few years ago. She has since gotten an amazing Warmblood mare named Atlanta, who I’ve enjoyed riding a few times. 

How long have you been volunteering with SAFE? What made you decide to volunteer with SAFE?
I discovered SAFE online about a year ago when looking into ways that I could be with horses. I finished residency at the end of June and started volunteering in July. I’ve been at SAFE since then on Sunday mornings and have loved every minute of it. There’s something so therapeutic about cleaning stalls and just being with the horses. I didn’t know much about horse rescues until I found SAFE. I have an adopted rescue dog, but just hadn’t thought about the possibility of adopting a rescue horse. I feel so honored to be a part of the lives of the SAFE horses. Their ability to trust people after all they’ve been through is incredible. 

Who is your favorite SAFE horse?
I love all the SAFE horses, but I’ve really come to love Dottie since spending time hand walking her while she’s been colicky over the past few weeks. She’s such a sweetheart and tolerates nose kisses, which I think is a very important trait in horses. 

Is there anything else you would like to share about yourself or your experience with SAFE?
Eventually I’ll have a horse of my own again and would love for it to be a SAFE horse!