First Fall Post-Crash

Check out this action. This is the jump set up for my (and Devon's) lesson on Saturday. It looks pretty cool and a little confusing, and it totally is.

We started out by doing some position exercises--mostly two point at the walk. As the sun came up, we went to trot around the whole arena, and just as we passed the spot where I'm standing to take this picture, Izzy took off like a bat out of hell. I give you this section from Izzy's perspective:

"So I'm totally trotting around with mom bopping along on top of me. I have no idea what she's doing (nor.mal.) so I'm just looking around at these big pretty bushes. Clearly mom has no idea what's going on-she's just kicking me forward and keeping the reins loose. Doesn't she have any idea what -might- be in there???? OMFG GIANT ATTACK BUNNY RABBIT!!! RUN RUN RUN GET AWAY SAVE YOURSELF!!! SADDLE SLID!!!! ZOMFGZFZFZ THERE IS A DERANGED MONKEY HANGING OFF MY SIDE WHERE DID MOM GO MUST GET AWAY FROM MONKEY!!!!#%^#@%!!!"

At this point, I fell off. Izzy stopped a stride or two later and gave me a bit of a look. Her saddle was twisted off to the side. Thankfully my breastcollar kept it from going under her. Nothing like a loose-ish girth and a round horse, is there?

Anyways. There were drag marks in the arena from me. I landed on my butt and my neck and it hurt like crazy.

I got up, rearranged everything, and got back on. After all, I am having a lesson. I'm not going to lie. It was terrifying. It was all I could do to bite back the tears and grit my teeth. I MUST finish. I WILL finish. I hurt, but I will.not.quit. At least, not until the lesson is over.

After all, I still had this to do. (NOTE: video is of Stephanie on Foster. This is to demonstrate the exercise we were doing.)

Do you see the line? Not yellow to yellow. Low yellow to red to red. Three jumps. One stride between each. 45 degree angles. One straight line.

There is no time to make adjustments or use the reins. You have to come in perfectly straight and stay perfectly still.

Izzy and I totally rocked it. I may have been terrified to trot around the perimeter of the arena, but I could canter complex courses. So it goes.

Sunday was not my best day ever. I couldn't turn my neck and I was in constant pain. I opted not to ride, but I noticed that after I came off, Izzy was still super spooky every time we went through that corner. I had to grab mane each time just to keep from hitting her in the mouth.

So Sunday I booted her up and we went to lunge in the scary corner.

Damn, she looks good.

I made use of our groundwork training from this summer, really getting her to be responsive.

I kept her forward, made her stop and reverse directions on command, and let her work the kinks out. All without turning my head. Ouch.

No worries--I am/was the expected level of sore, so nothing is broken. It just hurt.

I have not been back on yet. I was all alone at the barn today and am in process of replacing my helmet, so I decided that plus the residual pain made it a bad idea. Still, I am playing through my head mental video of what happened and trying to change my reactions. I need to correct this 'cling like a deranged monkey' trait. It's really not helping anything.