Thursday, September 6, 2012

When You Want to Quit...

It's been 12 days since I've last ridden my horse. What started as giving him a couple days off to recover from our totally awesome beach camping adventure turned into a friend-crisis which called me away from my horse habit for a few days. Not that I had the time to get to the barn - with the Evergreen State Fair traffic clogging up 522 & US2, not to mention the really annoying road closure just before our barn, I also didn't feel much like riding anyway.

Never fear, though, my fabulous trainer is still putting rides on Ben. She rode him 3 times last week, and 2 so far this week. Last night I heard that he's been absolutely FABULOUS. She's been doing so much with him, and even working on sitting trot. He's just fantastic.

Yay - right? Well, sorta. It totally guts me to hear how wonderful these rides are going because....I haven't ridden him! She's not having to repair constant damage I put on my horse when I ride him. Its very clear that my problem with my horse is...well... ME.

This doesn't exactly inspire me to climb back on because now I feel terrible. I'm confusing my wonderfully good natured 4 yr old. He'd be better off just having someone with a clue, aka the trainer, ride him.

Maybe I should just not ever ride him again and sell him to someone who can ride better than me. Doesn't he deserve that kindness?


2 comments:

  1. Awww, don't think like that! So what if it takes you longer to teach him something! (And I am saying this as an adult amateur who takes 10000x as long to teach my mares anything that I *know* my instructor could do in one ride or two.) You are doing a great job with him. He is only four. Horses are patient with us. And the best training advice I ever received was TIME. TIME. And MORE TIME...with lots of patience. Hang in there. And carve out time to go ride! :-)

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  2. He loves you so much! We all have those days. It's okay, and I think you two look awesome together!!

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