Cold-backed

I really had no idea of what this meant when my trainer suggested it. She explained it, I did a bit of research, it seemed to fit. 

This conversation came about because, Promise's behavior was steadily getting worse. To a point, anyway. She was really evolving on the ground - and her true sweet personality was definitely emerging more and more. She was becoming a social butterfly - although she was still very untrusting of men, I had managed to mostly circumvent that. My vet was a man, but for how often he was needed, she dealt with him well enough. My farrier was a woman. She was a strange woman, lol - but she was very, VERY good at her job, and I liked the way she handled my horse. She was as tough as she needed to be to not take any crap, but there was a softness to her manner that - considering her look and general relations with people - was incredibly surprising the first few times it was witnessed. I miss her - not that I don't like my farrier now.

Anyway. Promise had really started acting up when I was saddling her. And even more so when I mounted. I know now, that her saddle truly didn't fit. We did what we could to alleviate that problem. But honestly could not afford to be buying a new saddle every couple of months when she outgrew the last one. She grew until she was 6 and then started to fill out. 

I tried a variety of things, from changing up her routine every day so that she never quite knew what to expect as her next task - for example, one day I'd graze her for 30 minutes, then free lunge her, then graze her, then tack her up and get on her; the next day, I would brush, tack, lunge, ride, like normal, etc. Anything I could think of was not too crazy to try - some days I'd long-line her for 30 minutes, with the lines through the stirrups, before getting on. Whatever worked - but that didn't work for long. She started to catch on, and soon it didn't matter how the routine changed to try to throw her off, it only succeeded in throwing me off - literally. So, I went to making a more exact routine out of our rides - I brushed her, stretched her legs when I picked her feet, brushed her mane and tail after her feet were done, wrapped her legs before the saddle went on, etc. etc. etc. ad nauseam. I still pretty much use this routine today, although not *as* strictly as when I was trying to stop her from being a jackass seemingly hellbent on killing me. 

She developed bumps on her back from the saddle. The vet said that they were probably  collagen bumps, and a cortisone injection to each one might help - and might not. We gave it a shot (no pun intended, honest) - even though she was young, green (and often dumb as a brick) and this would mean she'd be on stall-rest/hand-walking for a month, and then turnout/hand-walking for another month or so. She was laid up for 2 months, no riding. Fun fun fun. But, the bumps began to slowly dissolve. They scarred, but even now, they have not reappeared. I guess the vet was right.

When I got back on again after the lay up - she was perfect. No girthiness, no crow-hopping when I asked her to walk off on the lunge line and she didn't move when I mounted. She did tense, but didn't try to buck. I'll take tense walking off rather than bucking, any day. That lasted a couple of months, I think, and then she started bucking again. 

Through the years, I've had more people tell me to sell Promise because, apparently, they thought I couldn't handle her behavior. Sure, a few of them were legitimately concerned about my safety, but most probably just thought I was stupid. Thing is, I believed in this horse, and I knew, even then, even though I didn't quite know what else it could be - that it went a little deeper than her being bad. She was fine once I was on...in fact, most of the time, she was amazing once I was on. And she wanted to work, she wanted to please me. Sure we fought, she had temper tantrums, but she was very honest. It wasn't just bad behavior. I admit, I was extended a little beyond my means, but I learned to deal with my horse in the best ways I could think of (by this point, my trainer was 2 hours away and I got 1 lesson a month, if that) - and I learned about her, and myself in the process. Most importantly, I learned to listen to my horse. 

I grew tired of having to lunge my horse before every ride. It gets old, real quick. So, I started working on weaning her off of it. A normal day with 15-20 minutes of lunging, followed by a day when I simply led her to the arena on the line, walked her around once so tighten her girth, and then removed the line and mounted. Eventually, I started giving her a mint as a reward for standing still. This really worked great - although eventually led to her turning her head to my foot every time we stopped. So, I have since evolved it so that she gets a mint before I get on the block - she's still chewing when I mount, and she no longer turns her head to my shoe seeking treats. 

I learned the hard way to listen to her when I had that gut feeling that today was not a day to skip lunging. It only took three times of me telling myself, she'll be fine, she was fine yesterday - and landing on the ground as a result - to realize I knew her better than I thought. Simply the way she walked out of the barn toward the arena was enough for me to know - today, I need to lunge. What she did yesterday doesn't matter.