PTSD

Mo has been kind of a turd lately when it comes to flatwork. He just wants to invert and run around because pushing from behind, lifting his back, and coming round into the contact is hard and he is VERY lazy. It's probably not any more fun to read about than it is to ride, so I'll skip all the gory details, but the freaking horse needs to get with the program. And he will. I have the trainer for it, and I'm in no way intimidated. Just annoyed, really. But that's green horses. One day they're all "I love the bit" and the next day they're like "I don't know what I was thinking yesterday, but this bit is for the birds."

The good news is that I don't totally want to kill myself, because I have other cool horses to ride (and in fact I just took a super fun jumping lesson on the 2nd level dressage horse, of all things) and because I know we'll get through this. But I'll admit to having a little bit of Lex-based PTSD about everything. It was about this time last year that she started to melt down, and contact was where it started. But she had a physical injury and Mo doesn't. M isn't worried. In fact, she's all "If you get sick of him just sell him to me!" So.

Anyway, I'm trying to look on the bright side and think about how much this will improve my riding, and it's like immersion therapy for getting over the remaining Lex trauma. Also, check out how much fun I was having on Sunday in the show jumping. I can't wait for the jumps to start going up, which means the flatwork has to get fixed, which means I'm MOTIVATED.

Photo by GRC Photography

How do you push yourself through the crap times with talented, wonderful horses?