Meet the Leeds woman offering therapy to terminally ill patients using sheep in an Eccup farm

Therapist and author Grace Olson, 50, has been treating people in Leeds for more than thirty years. 

She began with massage therapy before learning about lymphatic drainage to help cancer patients. 

And it’s been a rewarding career. Grace told the Yorkshire Evening Post: “Treating all these amazing people - it changed me.

“Being with people that are dying, you can learn so much from them. They changed me, which then has helped me to help more people.”

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When Grace got horses, she looked into equine qualified coaching. 

She said: “The horses mirror what the person is feeling so you can read the person by looking at the horse because a lot of people find it difficult to talk. The horse will tell you what they aren’t saying. 

“Then I accidently ended up with sheep and the sheep just decided to get involved with the therapy - that’s how sheep therapy happened. 

“People have left here smiling - people who have not smiled in years. 

“Just by being with an unusual animal, it just makes people feel happy, it makes them laugh and that opens them up so they can then just start talking about their deeper issues.”

In January, she released a children’s book Merlin Find His Magic to share the “magical” benefits of therapy sheep.

Find out more about Grace Olson and how the therapy sheep can help via the video above.