Tough Decisions…

Horses are a living breathing luxury hobby for most, a business in a luxury market for a few. Either way horses are a luxury lifestyle in today’s economy. Gone are the days (which I was fortunate to grow up) when people actually had a backyard equine pet or two and the majority of owners weren’t housing in stables with barn managers and trainers. No matter the care situation, inevitably there will be difficult, heart wrenching decisions for someone along the way because luxury hobbies are expensive.

When you are a self funded, quasi-rescue operation like the GHLHF, taking in the equine industry rejects, but not actually generating any income, the decisions are tough. I come across animals everyday, I would like to bring home. Alas, we’re at maximum capacity, and I’ve made a life time commitment to the animals on the property. When I bring one home, or in the case of the few homebred animals, I make the promise that I will not rehome them. For a limited few, I will let them go to friends that I know well, and have the ability to check up on their welfare. We do occasionally TIP train mustangs selectively for certain individuals, but in those cases we are not actually the owner of the animal, and the TIP money barely covers their living expenses while they are on the property.

So when we adopted two BLM mustangs in 2019, I made them the promise. When Johnny Cash earned the title of not only one of the most difficult horses I had ever encountered, but also one of the most difficult mustangs multiple Extreme Mustang Makeover Champion trainers had ever worked with, I stood by my promise. Mustang trainers I consider good friends, even advised me to send him back to BLM. I ignored the advice, put in the ground work, and suffered the injuries of working with a difficult animal. Johnny Cash and I settled into an emotionally exhausting love, hate relationship.

When I found out I was pregnant (Surprise!) with my 2nd child at the age of 42, my first thoughts went to Johnny Cash. I realize to a non-equestrian its hard to believe this was my first concern, but this lifestyle is a form of insanity that cannot be explained. Unavoidably, there would be a few months in which riding Johnny Cash would be impossible. As I saw it, there were 3 options…Option 1: Send JC to the trainer that originally started him under saddle for a refresher before I mounted up. Option 2: Send him to different trainers. Option 3: Keep him here and reap the consequences of my decisions when I finally threw a leg over postpartum. Because all of the trainers I trust have more customers than time, I knew I needed to be scheduled on their training books before my first trimester was over.

I feel the need to make the following disclaimer about trainers. I was perfectly happy, ecstatic even with the foundation JC received at the first trainer. The initial trainer was the best person to start a mustang with JC’s issues under saddle. However, now that he’s been under saddle for a while, I wondered if JC might not benefit from a different training style, perspective, and methods to work him through issues I had not been successful fixing. Even sending him to a trainer at all albeit a short period, was difficult to contemplate, because no two people ride or train the same, and even after he was re-backed, JC and I would still need to get reacquainted with one another.

Suffice to say I went with option 2. I explained to the new trainers that expectations of his time with them were low. I just wanted someone in the saddle a few weeks before I would be climbing up there post delivery. I didn’t expect any actual training to take place, but if they managed to work through a few anxiety issues, great. A week later I checked in on my horse. True to form, week one was difficult for all parties involved. By week two, I had given birth and didn’t really have the mental space to consider JC at all. One week postpartum, I was feeling better. Week two I was just getting back on my less challenging horses, and needed to pick-up JC (the trainers are located two hours away) because our schedule was beginning to get extremely hectic with visitors eager to see the new baby (human not equine).

This is where the tough decisions come into play. If you thought choosing between three options, was the point of this post, I apologize because that was all just the lead up. The feedback on JC after three weeks with trainers I trust/know their methods/abilities first hand were not great. I received a quick note from them initially telling me they were impressed I could even ride JC let alone do as well as we had at shows. They were either throwing me a huge compliment or nicely telling me I was crazy for even getting on the horse (I suspect a bit of both). Then a few days later they dropped the bomb. In their opinion JC had lived the domesticated life far too long to still hold the level of anxiety he does, and they suspected an undiagnosed medical issue (either neurological or past injury) causing him to be so difficult. In their opinion, whatever was going on could potentially end JC’s riding career before it had even really gotten started.

I was blown away. Johnny Cash has always been tough, but nothing in his behavior other than personality had indicated pain. My options were have him fully vetted, treat what we found or worse case consider him retired, which in his case would mean euthanasia. That may sound cruel, but with Offspring and Baby Sparkly to consider, I can’t have a dangerous animal on the property. I couldn’t rehome JC, because he’s the exact type of animal that would end up in a situation worse than death. That was not a chance I was willing to take. The trainers went a step further to say even if we didn’t find anything in the initial vetting, some conditions are difficult to identify, and an all clear diagnosis would always leave some room for doubt.

So literally two days (3 weeks postpartum) after bringing Johnny Cash home, we were standing at the equine vet clinic going over all the bases. I had scheduled the appointment jointly with the vet and equine chiropractor I trust the most. I relayed JC’s history and most recent trainer feedback to both of them. I told them, the issues we suspected as most probable, and asked them to look at anything else we hadn’t considered. They poked, prodded, and worked him over. At the end the vet said, “What can I say? Your horse is sound. I can run more tests, but nothing indicates pain or a neurological issue to me.” The chiropractor followed up with some additional insight regarding adrenaline regulation for high anxiety animals and said “My advice is to quit taking him to trainers. He’s probably a one person horse and trusts you. You’re the one that will need to work through it.” Both strongly felt it would be a waste of a good horse to consider retirement or worse euthanasia.

In some ways the diagnosis was a relief, in others it left more questions than answers. What if there was a weird undiagnosed issue that only occasionally caused pain at the most inconvenient (dangerous) moments? Could my horse really just respond that badly when faced with new handlers/environments? I suspected the answer to that second question through my experiences with JC’s first trainer. Would I be crazy to continue riding this unpredictable/yet predictable animal? Predictable animal, as in no matter how good its going, always be expecting the worst. Ok so “am I crazy?” was a rhetorical question. I know the answer to that one.

I was too far down the rabbit hole at this point. The amount of emotional capital invested in this animal was too great. I made the decision to trust my gut and the equine chiropractor’s final words of advice. Trusting Johnny Cash with any other person may never be in the cards, but when it comes to equestrian goals, momma didn’t raise no quitter. So at almost exactly 5 weeks postpartum, I was beginning to feel more confident in the saddle. It was time to pull on my big girl breeches (literally and figuratively since I have baby weight to lose) and get back on that horse.

I walked out the door wearing my new UV long sleeve riding shirt (birthday present) and lovely lemon colored riding tights. Darling Husband told me long sleeves would be entirely too hot. I did NOT tell him the slightly deranged reasoning behind the outfit. If I died it would forever be my ghost outfit or I was transported via ambulance after this ride, at least it would be in my cute riding clothes. Then the groundwork began. I put Johnny Cash through the same routine I had originally used when he first came home after being started under saddle and was still semi-feral. JC was perfectly delightful. Much better than before I quit riding him. He was fine being tacked up, and when I half mounted the first time and the saddle slid off because the girth wasn’t tight enough, JC stood there patiently instead of freaking the F**k out like he usually would have.

Second attempt at mounting, and finally aboard, Johnny Cash stood there as calm and relaxed as my mare Odessa would. He stepped off calmly and was supple/flexing at the walk. The anxiety built slightly as we trotted in the round pen, but that was me as much as him. I hate the small space and the high solid panels that I know (from experience) will not give if he jumps into them. So after a few passes in each direction I decided to head over to my neighbor’s cutting arena, because the footing in our round pen was shite, but the neighbor has eight inches of soft fluffy conditioned sand and buffalo which does up the JC anxiety level a bit.

True to form, Johnny Cash was on high alert in the neighbor’s arena. He wasn’t a complete statue when I mounted, and when we stepped off, my “in case of emergency” spectator said he looked like a powder keg ready to explode during the first five minutes (which is normal for Every. Single. Ride. Ever on JC and therefore not scary at all). Then, we got down to work. We bent and flexed, I pushed his head down and into the bridle with my leg. We changed direction, ALOT. Johnny Cash was rusty and out of shape, but so am I. The ride began with the expectation that this first one would be some nice walk/trot work, I wouldn’t push my luck. BUT…if you’ve ever read my past posts, you know pushing my luck is my MO. I wouldn’t even be on this horse five weeks postpartum if pushing my luck wasn’t a huge character flaw. So, following a few of the most lovely floaty trot strides, I slid back that outside leg and off we cantered!

After that, there isn’t much to tell. I didn’t die. No one had to call an ambulance, and I was extremely proud of my little range rat. I’m cautiously optimistic (ok not that cautiously) about his future. Now that the first ride in relatively controlled spaces is over, we’ll move out into my pasture and see if JC’s old nemesis, the white vinyl fence, is still as terrifying as before. If not, I’ll say the trainers worked some miracle voodoo magic in the short time they had him. If he still bolts anytime there is the slightest noise as we walk/jig down the fence line, I’ll know we aren’t any worse off than when we started!