让马儿治愈你？

Debbie Matthews was "petrified" of horses growing up.

黛比·马修斯本来从小就怕马。

She would turn down the opportunity to attend race days with her father and had no interest in the sport.

她曾拒绝了和父亲一起参加比赛日的机会，对这项运动也不感兴趣。

But all that changed when life dealt her the cruelest of hands.

但当生活给了她一副烂牌后，一切都变了。

Matthews suffered the tragic loss of her baby and was later diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

马修斯不幸失去了孩子，后来被诊断患上了创伤后应激障碍。

She continues to battle with mental health problems today.

时至今日，她仍在与心理问题作斗争。

However, in the depths of her struggles in 2015, a freak meeting with a horse in her own back garden proved to be a tonic.

然而，在2015年她苦苦挣扎的时候，在自己的后花园里与一匹马的一次偶然邂逅，后来证明成了一剂良药。

A thoroughbred from a nearby livery yard began regularly escaping and would turn up at the bottom of her garden almost every morning to eat from the compost heap.

这匹来自附近一个马场的纯种马开始有规律地跑过来，几乎每天早上都会出现在她的后花园里，从堆肥堆里吃东西。

"I ended up talking to him from afar and he just came to me," she told us from her home in Somerset, England.

她在英国萨默塞特郡的家中告诉我们:“我和这马会远远地聊天，它还会主动来找我。”

"I spent that whole summer, every day just talking to him. I would go out at 5 a.m. in the morning and talk to him.

“整个夏天，我每天都和他聊天。早上5点我就会出去和他聊天。

"It was such a hard thing to understand, why that had happened to me, there were just no answers and I felt no one understood. I was upset, I was cross and he became my therapy."

“这是一件很难理解的事情，为什么偏偏发生在我身上，没有答案，我觉得没有人能理解。我那时很难过，很生气，而它则成了我的治疗师。”

Those early encounters led to an unlikely sanctuary in horses and the world of horse racing.

那些早期的相遇在马和赛马的世界之间形成了一个奇迹般的避风港。

Matthews' growing love for horses escalated in 2017 when, pregnant with her youngest child, she watched champion race horse Altior jump for the first time on television.

马修斯对马的爱在2017年进一步升温，当时她怀着最小的孩子，第一次在电视上看到冠军赛马阿尔蒂奥的跳跃。

Impressed by his magnificent ability, she started following his races and it was her desire to see Altior jump in the flesh that pushed Matthews to attend Ascot in January 2019 -- the first time since her struggle with mental health.

被这匹马的非凡能力所震撼的马修斯开始关注它的比赛，为了亲眼见到阿尔蒂奥她专门参加了2019年1月的赛马会——这是她患上心理疾病以来的首次参赛。

Watching her beloved horse parade offered Matthews a rare therapeutic experience but she never felt entirely happy at the track.

看到自己心爱的马的表现给了马修斯一种神奇的治愈力量，但在赛道上她并不能感到全都是幸福。

"Racecourses are not generally environments I'm comfortable in because I suffer with social anxiety, panic attacks and all sorts of things," she said.

“赛马场通常不是我感到舒适的环境，因为我患有社交焦虑症、恐慌症和各种各样的疾病，”她说。

"It's quite a chaotic environment, it can be very busy, it can be very noisy. Generally you get a lot of groups going, more male-orientated, so it can be hard for people on their own. It can be a volatile environment at times."

“这是一个非常混乱的环境，可能非常繁忙，也可能非常嘈杂。通常情况下，你会看到很多男性为主的团体，所以让我一个人面对很难。这里有时可能是一个不稳定的环境。”

She is now on a mission to make racecourses more accessible to others with invisible illness.

她现在的一个任务就是让那些患有隐形疾病的人更容易接近赛马场。

Using horses for therapy has gained credibility over the years although it still lacks extensive research from within the scientific community.

使用马进行治疗多年来已经获得了信任，尽管它仍然缺乏来自科学界的广泛研究。

However, Matthews knows first-hand what a difference horses can make.

然而，马修斯亲身感受到了马能带来什么不同。

"People say they couldn't manage without it. Not everyone goes racing for the drinking and the betting," she said.

“甚至有人说没有马他们无法生存。不是每个人都为了喝酒和赌博而去比赛，”她说。

"There are a lot of people who want to go for the horses."

“还有很多的人是冲着马本身去的。”

She is now working on a package in which she will advise racecourses on how to utilize existing facilities to help those with mental illness, including quiet areas and safe places for people to go for a bit of peace and quiet.

她现在正在制定一个计划，她将向赛马场提供建议，告诉他们如何利用现有的设施来帮助那些患有精神疾病的人，包括安静的地方和人们可以寻求片刻安宁的安全场所。

"It's not actually asking them to build anything or doing anything special," she said, explaining how the initiative shouldn't have to cost racetracks a penny.

“这实际上并不是要求他们建造任何东西或做任何特别的事情，”她解释说，这项计划不用花费赛道一分钱。

"The financial reward will be that there are more people going racing, so hopefully it's a win-win situation."

“经济回报将是有更多的人参加比赛，所以希望这是一个双赢的局面。”

问题

文中提到了对马修斯有帮助的有几匹马？

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