A low point followed by a string of highs

In retrospect, adding trot back in under saddle on a lesson night where there were a ton of other horses crowded into the covered arena was not the best decision I could have made. I don't think that ultimately I harmed our progress physically, but it did not give me the space mentally to do so. I can see that now that I have temporal distance. 

Cassie's back though! 

It also meant that I asked Chriss to ride Gwyn for our next session so I could also make sure that my judgement of the situation had more than one data point. I do not regret this because it gave both of us more information! Chriss says a lot that Gwyn and her gelding Quinn are very similar. They have the same kinds of evasions and conformation struggles. When she got onto Gwyn, she was able to confirm this thought and feel what I'm feeling and working against in the saddle. 

Gwyn 'hleped' her organize. 

The biggest thing we learned is that when I describe Gwyn as dropping her shoulder and falling in, it's actually her haunches that are forever trailing to the inside. The horse is not straight. Chriss immediately got to work on a boot camp session to straighten her out. Gwyn was 

After this lesson, Chriss 'prescribed' a couple weeks of me really focusing on asking her to straighten her hind end and travel straight. In just the few rides I've had Gwyn has immediately picked up on me asking. I've not only been trying to correct her biomechanics here, but also my own. So asking with inside leg when I start to feel things shift out and if she ignores it, tapping her hip with a dressage whip. 

After the intensive with Chriss, the next time I rode it still took a few times using the whip as a reminder, but she started correcting off of the leg first by the end of the ride. In my last ride, I barely touched her with the whip. It was amazing. She's traveling much straighter and requiring less reminders about it as well. 

I also had a lesson with Emma and we worked on under saddle trot again and wow. Making sure Gwyn has impulsion to move forward is a current solution. She's really been offering a floaty trot when I get her straight, and using that haunches cue is now starting to transfer to the trot as well as the walk so she's carrying herself even better under saddle. 

Today I had to be out for my appointment with my hoof trimmer so I opted to long line Gwyn prior to the appointment to get some brain work in for her, but also limber her body up prior to the appointment. Firstly, Gwyn was a spicy meatball. Wow. But also WOW. She cantered, not initially because I asked, and she was reaching underneath herself with her hind legs and not bunny hopping in the back end. She was reaching into contact on the lines at the walk and the trot. She looked FANTASTIC. 

You guys, she held this stretchy trot for SEVERAL CIRCLES

When Corrie arrived we were back in the barn and decided to see how Gwyn did without hay as a distraction from her balance and her body. She was stable and balanced through the WHOLE trim. I'm so thrilled we're seeing progress in all these different areas. The rehab has really been great for the both of us. 

Corrie keeps cookies in her pockets and Gwyn KNOWS

All the equine clients had to pose with the reindeer antlers

I'm tentatively penciling in show dates for 2023. I think we're heading into a really really good place. 

Back on Trails in November

 I had a frustrating moment in a lesson where it seemed like all the work we'd been doing was for naught and Gwyn was still lame under saddle and it really sent me spiraling into some self blaming places. Regardless, I knew that mentally I would benefit from a change of pace where I knew I couldn't go wrong. The solution was, of course, a trail ride at Bridle Trails. The trails are all wide, well manicured, and I planned to remain at a walk and not be out longer than the length of the work Gwyn had been doing so far in lessons. Typically lessons are around an hour if you include the long lining, but this would be the first time I'd bump up the under saddle time since rehab began so in the manner of Long Slow Distance, we kept speed and distance low for an increased ride time. I just wanted her relaxed and stretched out over her back in the walk. 

Gwyn loaded like a champ. She'd been off property twice at this point since the injury but we'd done minimal things. Either way, this horse loves adventure and it was promising to be a nice day for adventure. I extended an invite to folks at the barn but no one ended up taking me up on the offer, which turned out for the best, I think. I got a late start and since we'd recently had the time change, I was running out of daylight. Arriving at the parking lot of the state park, a park ranger verified that I knew the park was closing at dusk, i.e. 5pm. I assured him that was fine, I wasn't planning to ride for long. There was one other trailer in the lot.

Gwyn calmly exited the trailer and looked around briefly. I unloaded her as the other rider returned to their trailer. She only glanced at those horses before standing quietly on the opposite side of the trailer. She clearly knew where we were, she did check when other vehicles drove in, I think looking for Cortney's rig, but was unbothered that she was alone. She did creep on me when I went to the porta potty though. 

I opted to ride her in my hackamore. It was going to be a low pressure ride and I didn't anticipate control being an issue. We rarely use the hackamore, but again, she took it all in stride. I hopped on and we headed out on the trail near the arenas. She was a little sticky to start but soon found her rhythm. We needed a reminder that she is quite capable of walking up the tiny little hills at Bridle Trails but it didn't last long before the enthusiasm of being in a forest again overtook any muliness.

I mainly wanted her walking without her head in the hair and we achieved that for basically the whole ride. 

There were happy ears the entire time. 

And a squirrel posed at the top of the tree, with the sun illuminating the forest like magic. 

When we'd gotten back to the arenas I took her into them to practice a little of what we'd been doing in lessons just to practice what I needed. She was not as amenable to arena work but I kept expectations and the ask low and ended on a good note before either of us got too frustrated. 

I did wrap her hinds with a bit of support for the ride, because I was so fucking paranoid. Did it do anything? No idea. But it didn't hurt. I also had her BOT saddle pad, again, just in case, since we were changing up the work demand. 

She actually was sweaty after this ride, which was significant considering we only walked AND it was cold out. But we did do a slow 3 miles over 1 hour, just about, which is the longest she's worked since rehab began.

She was very good though, and we both appreciated the change of pace. Plus I got a beautiful view of a winter dusky sky as we headed back to the barn. And after this, I've gone on to have some amazing, amazing lessons and I'm feeling much better about the direction we're going. 

We've got a lot of work left to do through the winter, but I feel so much better knowing that the trails are an option again and will be beneficial for us both, mentally and physically. We'll stick to Bridle Trails for now, with minimal hill work, and increase distance. Then add in hillier places where I won't feel the sunk/cost fallacy in traveling there for a shorter ride like Bracken, Moss Lake, or Lord Hill.

August Vet Recheck

My lessons have been mainly working on long lining with Gwyn and really honing in on tools that will be able to translate to under saddle work eventually. 

She tries really hard but I do think that she's getting bored with the long lining. We did do the circle of death in the lesson, on long lines, which was REALLY hard! 

Most of this media is with Trainer C. She has better feel for things but I'm learning loads. And she's really praised me for how well I've gotten Gwyn working on long lines. 

I had a bit of a snafu this week though because I was supposed to have the Vet and Trimmer out at the same time so they could confer and make sure everything is copacetic biomechanically for Gwyn. But the day I had in my books got close and my trimmer pushed me to the afternoon, which I couldn't do because I had on site meetings for work. No worries though, I thought, the vet will be out. So I head to the barn and set up my cell phone as a mobile hotspot so I can attend the 2 hour block of meetings I had in the morning. Vet doesn't show, I call the clinic and they had me down for the NEXT DAY.

So I repeated the process the next day, but at least each time I got to start my day at the barn. 

OH NO. Horse snot across my arm and on my work shirt. How terrible. 

That's okay, we still took cute pictures while waiting for the vet. 

I trotted Gwyn for the vet, who was only slightly delayed thanks to a diaper blow out, which I fully sympathize with considering my car was the site of car sickness over the weekend. Ah. Parenting. Vet was SO pleased with how Gwyn looked. We are sitting right around 3 months after injection with PRP which is when you start seeing more improvement. 

We're now cleared for 15 minutes of tack walking, where she wants Gwyn really stretched and low and heavy in the bridle to help build up her topline. She asked about nutrition and recommended we add in a touch of protein to what I currently feed so now Gwyn is getting just a fractional flake of alfalfa and I'm sure is ecstatic. 

I'm thrilled I can get back on my horse, even if only for a little bit. Now comes the slow topline slog, but at least I can do some of it with a between the ears view!

In which I don't do well with repetitive things but do need guidance

It's been hard to write about handwalking. Because that's pretty much all I've been doing. About a month ago we had a vet check and got clearance to add in 5 min and then 10 min of trotting, so that's been nice, though Gwyn definitely thought that if we were trotting, then we were allowed airs above ground, which is NOT conducive to healing. 

After her initial ultrasound where we saw the strain, her left hind swelled up and I spent each day going to the barn to change her standing wraps and walk her a bit.

I guess it had been a good thing I'd recently attended the unmounted Pony Club meeting about how to do the various wraps. On the advice of some old acquaintances from the LJ Equestrian days, I bought some ceramic wraps that are part saratoga bandage. Once the swelling went away though, I abandoned bandaging, even for our walks. It seemed to add too much heat and I wanted to keep her legs cooler. I did add in some cold hosing if there seemed to be any puffiness.

She's been looking pretty good overall, though I know that she's bored out of her mind. I tried getting her a hay ball but she doesn't want to try and puzzle the hay out of the holes so it just sits in her stall. 

I did add in some long lining to try and mix things up for her brain. More on that. 

Super spicy for the vet recheck. At which point Vet Claire went, "I think you're good to add in trotting." Gwyn responded really well to the PRP injections and those may be our go-to type for annual maintenance since she did so well.

More long lining and working to prevent her from turning too tightly, especially at the trot.

Gwyn gets massages from me while Corrie trims her feet. 

And definitely feeling TOO GOOD during this 5 minute trot session one evening.

A giant honking bug bite that would have prevented me from riding if we were even allowed. It was so swollen and right under where a saddle would be. I chose not to use a surcingle because of it and just lunged that evening. 

And then just not bothering to remove her fly leggings while lunging because I was having a hard time just feeling engaged enough to get to the barn. 

Hazel came with me this day and helped me groom and fuss over Gwyn. We all played in the indoor (it was a bit rainy) and Gwyn was very polite on the line and we even played with the giant ball together.

This was a super hot day, which apparently makes for polite ponies who do not try to buck or canter when asked to trot. 

All that to say, we finally got Chriss back out for lessons and I hopped on that train super fast. Chriss has great groundwork advice and we've made some good progress with her prior to the diagnosis. Work is low key enough that it would fit into the handwalking and minimal trotting prescription from the vet. 

We started with walking over some low poles at the walk in hand. Chriss' big rule is that the horse must not push on your space.  So in the case of walking over the poles, straightness is key, but also impulsion in the hind end to keep her from swing her hips out and pushing in with her shoulder. As I'm walking I need to be mindful of where she's looking and preparing to correct the push, which gets more subtle the more we work, but I'm also getting better at feeling it the more we work. 

It was harder to do going to the right, which made sense to me because that's usually where I struggle when riding to have her really filling my outside rein, she likes to collapse to the inside. The same was happening in hand. It took a lot of effort and work to get her thinking straight and maintain control of her hips and shoulder. 

From there we moved on to long lining. Again the goal was using the long lines to encourage her to bend and really step under herself with her inside hind leg. I found feathering the inside 'rein' while using the outside line wiggle to encourage forward so her outside hind couldn't swing to the outside to have amazing results. There was a balancing act and I was starting to get a good feel of asking for the forward would require immediate reminder to ask her nose to poke in just the slightest. I need to keep shoulder fore in my head. We even worked at a trot and I'm pretty sure I got her working in the best trot ever. She was practically floating across the ground, working evenly and through her back and hind. 

AHHH! This lesson really upped my game with the long lining and I'm excited again about our 'hand walking' because now it's things we can work on to keep both our brains engaged. 

Vet recheck friday, fingers crossed we get approval to add more work back in.