Montee (Part 1)

Montee is a cute, stout little clydesdale cross (T thinks Paso Fino) that came to the farm mid-to-late last year. I only saw him around the farm a few times before he sort of disappeared and I didn't think too much of it, because horses come and go if they don't fit with the lesson program.

Then, several weeks ago, during one of my Sunday private classes, T was asking me what my goals are, what I want to accomplish, why am I determined to push through the anxiety that crops up, when there are easier routes. Do I actually want to jump (which seems to be at least 1 source of anxiety), and if not, that's totally ok, etc -- essentially, she was asking, what my WHY is. Why do I ride? 

I think we've had the conversation before, but she was trying to dig a bit deeper. As she put it, I'm a tough nut to crack and she wanted to check in. 

Long story short, she asked if I thought adding a 3rd ride a week on a horse that required the focus to be on HIM vs constantly working on ME might help. I considered it for a moment and said, I didn't know if it would work, but I was willing to give it a shot.

Then she started to tell me more. 

From the trainer's Facebook page

Montee was coming back from the trainer's soon (she wasn't sure when at that time) and she was looking for someone to kind of be his person and work with him so he could have some consistency. She said he was lovely to ride, but she thought he was mishandled quite a bit on the ground and as a result, he was pretty scared. She said she had been pondering and praying about who she should ask to work with him and every time, she came back to me. 

He came back about 2 weeks after that conversation, wide-eyed and nervous. I didn't have time to work with him that day, so he was turned out and allowed to decompress for several days. The following week, before my group lesson, she mentioned he was in the barn if I wanted to mess with him for a few minutes. I asked if I could borrow someone's brushes and then slowly went into the stall. 

I spent about 15-20 minutes with him, talking to him, slowly brushing him, scratching him. His eyes were huge and worried the entire time. When he finally took a breath, I praised him and left the stall. 

Before class, she asked what I thought of him and I said, it really hurts my heart when a horse is that scared of people, but he seemed like he was smart and wanted to do the right thing, he just wasn't exactly sure what the right thing was.