Now Far Ahead the Road Has Gone

What to say about the little bay horse that walked into my life four years ago and rocked it to it's very foundation? 

Absolute Courage, they called him.

And that is what he's been to me. My rock when I lost Cuna. My reason for standing up for myself. My impetus to try and change and grow and learn.

Courage for the big moments, but Courage every day. Courage to see the abuse I was taking and Courage to walk away with my head held high. Courage to find my voice and Courage to see the future.

Courage a million times over.

He's difficult. He's temperamental.  He's sensitive. He's emotional. He's honest. He's brave.

He took me on an unforgettable adventure.

He's made me the best version of myself.

And now, he's going to be Courage to someone else.

Farewell, my friend.

Well This Sucks

We've been not talking about Courage for a long time now, so let's talk about him.

First things first--it's been a process, but I think we've hammered out the maintenance that will work for him and he's sound in work and ready to go. Vet doesn't foresee any limitations in terms of dressage/trails/whatever on the flat. Trainer is putting rides on him and says he feels really good.

(Btw for those of you keeping track--while Alli definitely got the prize for best comment on my last post, the neck twist was a chiropractic issue that has been handled. Quite simple.)

But.

Courage is an all-or-nothing sort of horse.

And while for a long time I've been able to appreciate that or laugh it off or make memes about it, now is not that time. I'm wading through a lot of personal shit and there isn't an end in sight and I can't make it stop.

But it means I can't bring my A-game to Courage.

And that doesn't work for him.

Right now, I need horses to be simple and fun. I need them to bring me joy, not force me to wrack my brain and push myself constantly.

Courage isn't a bad horse. He's a really cool guy in a lot of ways. He never quits trying. He's smart, he learns fast, he works hard. He's gorgeous and photogenic and good to have around.

Believe you me, I wish I could keep making this work. I adore him and he's done a lot for me and I wish there was some way I could keep trying.

It's taking all I've got to deal with life shit and there's nothing left over to deal with Courage.

That's not his fault. It's not my fault. It just is.

Of course, there's this whole giant blog about him and I've been quite public about our struggles, which probably won't help the re-homing process. I don't believe in back editing/deleting that stuff though, so it is what it is. I haven't posted ads at this point because he's a particular kind of horse and he needs a particular kind of person.

So if you or someone you know wants a gorgeous, fabulous horse with some quirks, talk to me. Obviously, there will be full disclosure of all vet records etc. Nobody needs surprises.

I'm not quitting horses and there will be another eventually, but my #1 priority is finding Courage the right place.

And once more, his stupid name is strangely relevant.

Courage

How to Build a Canter (during snowpacalypse while concussed when your friends will kill you if you ride)

This post goes out to the like... two of you who aren't bored out of your skull by lunging and training. But my world is solid ice with 10" of snow on the way and I still can't ride and I want to think about something I don't hate.

I'd be lying through my teeth if I said I was happy that I haven't sat on my horse since November, but our winter of SB crippling out to the barn and putting Courage on a lunge line is having some interesting side effects. See, Courage has a super shitty canter.

whee!

Well. That's not really true. He canters in ONE WAY. He tenses his underline and PLUNGES into canter and moves his body via momentum instead of strength. To me, that's why he can jump beautifully but everything goes to shit in between the fences--his technique is superb, but if he gets an off distance, he doesn't have the physical ability to change his canter to fix it and panics. I cannot say whether the canter is genetic thing or racing thing or a brain thing or what. I can just say that is what I have.

The past few weeks in the Vienna reins have been utterly fascinating for me. Courage is now trotting regularly like this:

omg

I'm not scrubbing the whole video for the perfect screen shot. I'm pulling a ton of screen shots and going "omg how do I choose". To me, this shot shows a moment of suspension allowed by Courage swinging through his whole body. I see withers lifted, topline engaged. I'd like to see more from behind, but this is new for us and that's where he's at. He walks like a panther, his w/t/w transitions are gorgeous, and everything is peachy.

The vienna reins aren't magic--they just set some parameters and allow him to find his balance within a certain range. I keep them adjusted pretty long because I don't want him to feel trapped, though not too long, because they don't need to flap uselessly. Plus, I'm not here for a headset. It's critical that I focus on Courage keeping his hind end moving so he's tracking up (at least) at both walk and trot. That is what mechanically asks him to move his back and use his body. If I let him get "behind the leg" as it were, he'd just be stuck in a pose and dumped on the forehand with his back jammed up.

no pics of that

But what about the canter?

This is what is the most interesting for me. Canter is and always has been a hot button issue for us. The transitions are bad and the canter itself isn't better. Under saddle, the standing martingale has limited the leaping and bolting, but not stopped it and we haven't been able to change it.

So basically we have two isssues:
1) Courage doesn't understand how to step up into canter the way he can walk to trot and
2) Courage doesn't understand how to push from behind, lift his withers, and canter correctly

We can only address one issue at a time, because reality. However, this is a serious chicken/egg issue--you can't really canter well out of a bad transition, but you also can't really get a good transition to a bad gait. So.

The past few weeks, I've intentionally set Courage up for the best transition possible t/c, then just taken what he's given me and worked the canter itself. That brings us shots like this:

up transition shit but oh well

Again, this was very intentional. I needed Courage to find a good canter that was balanced and comfortable. I had to play with this A LOT to get there.

I'd assumed that because his balance was not good and claustrophobia is his go-to, that we'd do big circles and go freely forward, but no. What I found was that if I kept Courage on a 10-15 meter circle and VERY engaged, I could get a few strides of the canter in the picture above. As soon as I got those strides, I'd ask for a downward transition or if he lost his balance, just let him drop to trot and reorganize. This actually makes sense--I'm asking him to change his whole way of going and to do that, I need to make a difference every stride, not just let him cruise around.

balanced and moving forward softly

It took a while, but Courage was starting to get where he actually had a semi-decent canter. He couldn't hold it long and his upwards transitions were not good, but he was starting to have consistent, good downward transitions and was able to make a couple 10-15 meter correct canter circles.

But transitions are important.

And again, doing the same thing wasn't working. No matter how well I set him up, the best transition I could get was this:

not attractive. video here if super interested.

 We got it down to one or two strides of blast off and way-less-blasty-blast off, but even with the small circles and extra transitions and good canter, we weren't breaking through to the next level. The only way Courage understood to get to the canter was to drop his withers, invert, and lunge.

The vienna reins do set parameters, but I didn't want to crank them in and force a headset to get my point across. Besides, if there's something Courage is the best at, it's bracing on the least resistance possible. So. Crank him in, create a new fun version of this problem. Whee!

So we tried another different approach.

I hooked Courage up in the vienna reins like usual, but instead of my normal "walk til he's soft and reaching, w/t/w transitions on a small circle until he's soft in the body, gradually move him out to a bigger circle and ask for more trot etc etc etc", I immediately put him on a small 5-8m circle and asked him to reach for the contact from the lunge line.

then this video

IE, instead of maintaining a position through his own good graces, I wanted him to actively seek what I was offering. I didn't care what gait and we definitely had some frenetic "omg wtf you crazy human i must leave" moments, but every time he backed off, I asked for more. Every time he hollowed, I made his circle smaller, and when he took an honest contact and went forward, we gradually moved onto a bigger circle.

As he began to understand the question, I started asking for actual gaits. Same as with his downwards though, I let him give me what he had and there was zero pressure or punishment if it wasn't quite right--we'd just do it again. Think ask for canter transition, but as long as he thinks about trying, don't ask again or push or punish. Just keep going, because Courage is enough of an overachiever at this point that I absolutely respect his try and don't want to frazzle him.

Our first videoed transition looks like this:

hmmm

Yeah it's not great, but what I see is lifted withers and an honest attempt to step up, if somewhat mediocre execution. But instead of star gazing, he's a little bit thinking about the contact.

And then I had this canter:

mmmmmm

Withers lifted, hind leg stepping under, topline engaged.

And he even offered me this moment:

oooooo

 It was half a stride, not a circle, but Courage offered a stretch in the canter of his own accord, which means he felt balanced and comfortable enough to experiment with his frame. I'll take it.

 We kept working the transitions and by the end, I had this:

mmmmmhmmmmm

I don't see this frame and think "omg pirouette canter", but I don't care. What I see is a horse that's giving me his best shot right now. Instead of launching his front end and leaving his ass behind, Courage is stepping up into the canter, he broke at the poll, and he's thinking very hard about using his topline. I mean. Look. That underneck is almost slack. Yeah, I'd like to see him lift his withers and be a little more uphill, but that will come.

It's a long, slow, tedious process, no two ways about it. I am absolutely fascinated by figuring out ways to break this down for him and I love watching it start to come together.

Now someday, I need to be able to actually get on the damn horse and see if any of this pans out under saddle.

this one time, i put tack on him for no reason

C'mon SB's body. Get it together.

What's Up With Courage

Lately, this blog has been mostly SB having meltdowns and stress shopping, which is pretty good entertainment I think. But hey, my wild-mustang-dressage-stallion is still burning hay, so I thought you might want to know what's going on with him.

rawr

When we (more or less) left off, he was in pro training 2x a week and I was riding the other days. Then BAM no riding for me. Between the godawful weather and Courage being a "challenging" horse, trainer said that riding him 2x a week was a hazard to everyone (she's not wrong) and we agreed to pick up again when I'm back in the saddle.

tail straight in air=no fun for anyone

Courage was essentially untouched for the month of December. It was mostly because I was at home in crippling pain, but Lindsey made me feel good about it by saying he probably needed a brain reset anyways and maybe a month to himself would give us more information and let him de-stress a little.

all wild mustangs wear blankets. yes.

Welllllllll let's just say the information I garnered was that Courage does really, really poorly with time to himself. The horse went feral. He was uncatchable. Un-handle-able. Unlikable. He spooked at everything and the few times I saw him, was a complete idiot. Like. Let's not talk about the night it took me 45 minutes to catch him in the indoor and then he soaked through two coolers. (And made me late on pain meds and omg that night hurt very very much).

horse shaming has it's own billboard

I'm finally starting to feel human again (many thanks to Ashley the Ninja Goddass, aka my Physical Therapist), so Courage is going back to work. Auntie Crystal recommended vienna reins for him, and despite my initial misgiving, these babies are life changing for Courage.

um hellooooooo

However, godawful weather has been a constant around here. Not a joke--we're breaking all the records since before they started keeping records. Which is stupid. But regardless, between me feeling like a steaming pile of poo most of the time and the roads being somewhere between "dangerous" and "terrifying" for most of the past few weeks, I get to the barn about three times a week.

who recognizes this horse? i do not

We're just lunging in vienna reins, which is actually super interesting to do with Courage, but not super interesting to talk about doing. For example, Courage physically doesn't understand how to step up into the canter like a dressage horse--he just tenses his underneck, braces, and flings himself. The shit transition translates into a shit gait and the whole thing is a shit show.

what? no. surely not this horse!

So. Since I can't ride, I've spent lots of time experimenting with how to explain to Courage that he can step up from behind and stay soft in his body. We do lots of spiral in/spiral out with w/t transitions until he's forward and through. And then we do trot/canter transitions with the same idea and just stay calm and patient.

withers lifted, hind legs stepping through. omg.

See, most of you checked out already because lunging is massively boring to do, much less to talk about doing. BUT. You'll notice that is a canter picture. And I don't usually post canter pictures because canter is not our thing.

i made a trail of shavings over the ice!

The Ninja Goddess says riding is 1-2 weeks out. The realist in me says riding a certain Wild Mustang Dressage Stallion with no turnout in a spooky indoor with snow sliding off the roof in subfreezing temps is not a great idea for a recent neck injury, even when one has a brain injury to impair one's judgement. The weather man says we're in for a deep(er) freeze.

this is why you have no friends, weatherman.

But spring is coming, I will get better, and someday, I will sit on my horse again.

Dammit. Just you wait.

Like Father, Like Son: The Story of a Courage

Emma got everyone talking about Thoroughbred pedigrees again, which is super cool. I really, really wish I was the pedigree queen who cared about breeding and shit, but I'm not and I don't. I do, however, have friends that are SUPER into it. So I coast on that.

My one friend who ought to blog and doesn't made me this. It's Courage's pedigree with photos of all the relatives she could track down, which is pretty cool.

His sire is Lord Carson.

def didn't get chrome from daddy

Courage was born 2005, so bred 2004. Per this article, Lord Carson's stud fee was 10k in 2002, 5k in 2003. Lord Carson won 12/27 races and made over 600k, so a decent stallion but not what you'd call "royally bred" or anything, other than his slightly pretentious name.

Oh and this. This TOTALLY sounds like Courage: "Grade 2 winner LORD CARSON (Carson City) died on March 16 due to head injuries he suffered while in the breeding shed. " Dramatic freak breeding accident? Yup. I can see that. Courage isn't even a stallion and he'd like to have one of those. Furthermore, depending on who you ask, that was either a totally random whoopsie or HIGHLY correlated with his rapidly plunging value in the breeding shed with an insurance renewal coming up. 

So that's kind of interesting. Definitely theatrical.

fabio-approved

Courage is a pretty unique guy--I was initially attracted to his confidence and calm and when further poking around Lord Carson lore (who knew?!), I found these quotes about the plain bay stallion:

"The first time I got to ride him was in November of his three year old year and he was already built like a six year old."

That checks out. C has always been BEEFY. Like "his race trainer put him on a diet" style beefy. He's built and he's not ashamed of it.

"And he had the body awareness of a mature horse too. And confidence. He was a bay horse and he had a swagger. He walked slowly, purposely, with the confidence of a lion and a kind demeanor."

Dying laughing here. Check, check, and check. Courage believes in Courage and Courage does what Courage wants. He always takes care of himself, isn't racy or quick, and goddamn he's an incredibly confident horse. He's scared of nothing.

"Lord Carson showed speed and used it tactically as a weapon. He didn’t need to go as fast as he could and he clearly wasn’t running scared. Other horses didn’t intimidate him and he used his speed wisely and with intimidation. He was just so damn cool."

Yeaaaaaah pretty much. He's totally unbothered by other horses and actually tends to do things just to get under their skin.

And then this: "It was in this moment that I saw another side to my kind, confident, friend He was pissed!" and "As soon as I lowered my body a few inches Lord Carson accelerated and his stride lengthened so far and so powerfully that his body literally lowered four or five inches."

Emotional and overly sensitive? Hm who does that sound like?

not courage!!

It's all from this article, which is super entertaining if you're obsessed with Courage and his quirks.

Other horses in his past are either so far back I just can't get excited or are super hard to research on account of being named after American State Capitols (I'm looking at you, Carson City). Or you know. Never did anything interesting or were super important to anyone (cough Lori Gail wtf woman).

Courage is a genetic dead end due to the whole "gelding" thing, but it makes me laugh to know he comes by it all honestly.

racehorse courage!!

Hills and Valleys

Courage has not been on his A game lately. It's not exactly his "bottom of the barrel peace out yo" Z game, but riding has been more an exercise in mental gymnastics and patience than any sort of so-called "progress". 

did i mention it got cold? it did

I had a lesson in which we either EXPLODED FORWARD and basically ran down an (imaginary) hill or SLAMMED ON THE BRAKES and tried to reset. It was not pretty or fun. During Trainer's next ride, Courage was perhaps better, but I about gave myself ulcers watching him go around.

Then we added one last minute ride in a clinic because I don't know, I make good life choices. I lunged Courage in the outdoor before our ride time inside and it was... well... there was a lot of bolting and one time he ran backwards into the fence, but we did come to some sort of accord so that's good I guess.

Then I got on and the clinician asked how he was. I was like "omg hurray we're going the direction I picked!"

it's something

But apparently there's more to riding than that. The clinician pointed out that Courage was just sort of bracing his back and neck and turning his head without every actually yielding his body.

She put us right to work--overbend with him really deep in the neck to position his body to show him how to use his back.

And damn girls--when he got it, it felt good.

things are moving

We did not always get it. In fact we did not get it a lot more than we did. And even when we did get it, it sort of all fell apart when I tried to change directions without losing it.

But.

We did a lot of counterbend around circles with LOTS of bend, and Courage didn't check out. We asked him to really sit and push from behind, and he stayed with me. We did some GOOD changes of direction maintaining that loose, moving back, and he was right there.

So yeah, at about the 30 minute mark in a 45 minute lesson, Courage decided his brain was done and started running sideways and I made Trainer get on and she was like "he's legit done for today guys", but you know what?

little bay horse <3

This was good. Not in a "hip hip hooray such a fun day" sort of way, but in that Courage was able to accept and process and learn concepts that are legitimately hard for us right now and even when he got overwhelmed and needed to be done, it was a discreet "exit stage left" versus the full-on-flail that y'all know and love.

the wheels, they are turning

Oh and the kind auditors at the clinic took like 18 minutes of video for y'all but I was mid phone changeover and it all got wiped off the phone memory so all that remains are a couple still shots. Sorry not sorry.

The Art of Weightlifting

Courage is probably the most challenging horse I've ever owned, and that includes the bitch mare that tried to kill me on the regular. I mean, he only has one move, but she only had one motive. He flails. She would rear, buck, bolt, leap, stop or go as it suited her in her quest to be rid of me. Courage is never trying to get rid of me, but that actually makes him a lot harder to deal with.

Because I'm not (always) the problem.

It's not "if I ride better" or "if I don't piss him off" or any number of easily fixable things with Courage and it rarely has been. If I put a pro on the mare, she quit all the shenanigans and minded her manners.

But not Courage.

When Courage flails, it's not because he wants me off now or even usually because I did something wrong. He flails to protect himself.

Almost 100% of the time, it's because he's in a situation that overwhelms him and he doesn't understand and his only defense mechanism is to leave, so he has a huge physical reaction. If you've been around Courage, you've seen it. It's actually quite dramatic.

And when he has these huge physical fear-based reactions, I have to 100% keep myself from reacting to him. He's not doing it to be naughty. He's doing it to survive.

And that's hard to deal with.

It's taken a long time to suss out with him because it LOOKS like naughty behavior and people like to treat it that way. But it's not and if you punish him, you scare him and that makes it even worse.

The other approach people like to use is overloading--just hit the the trigger over and over and over until it's not a trigger any more. But like. That works if you're a rational human being with a moderate trigger that isn't life threatening and you can sit there and say "totes cool, not actually going to die here", but not so well on a non-rational prey animal with years and years of baggage and trust issues.

Don't get me wrong here--I really and truly do not believe Courage was ever abused. I don't. I think he has had lots of good handling, which is why I think I can reverse this at all. Had anyone ever laid a hand on this horse, I don't think he could come back.

He's just deeply intelligent and highly sensitive and when he doesn't understand, he's afraid.

and has great outfits, but who's counting?

It is changing, very, very slowly. At home, we almost never have an incident with him any more. He's started to trust me and he's learning to trust my trainer in the saddle, and when he trusts his person, he's a thousand times braver.

So at the show, I had a horse that trusted himself and trusted me enough to be successful at the walk and trot.

But canter is hard for him--it's a gait he's spent a lot of time in for his previous life and that means I have years of muscle memory to retrain. So when we got to canter, it was a bridge too far and he left to protect himself. The fact that he did come back to me in the walk and trot tells me that he's still mentally with me, when he can be.

I'm a highly analytical person, so I can sit here and explain to you my plan of action--build more trust and more strength and more muscle memory at home and prep him better. Overloading for the sake of overloading breaks down his trust rather than builds it, so I need to be sensitive to his mind each day and only work within parameters he's comfortable with until he's ready to move forward again. I can tell you that a running martingale would shut down his expressions sooner rather than just limiting their scope, but he also has a lot of history with them and not only does he know how to brace on them, but they also tell him to run.

But see, in addition to being a highly analytical person, I'm also deeply emotionally invested in this situation. It takes two to tango if you will, and Courage is the one I'm tangoing with. Rationally, I can tell you that if show success was my motivator, this isn't the horse for me. But I like this horse and I'm willing to work with him.

And really--despite all the high drama theatrics, Courage honestly doesn't scare me. It's more and "aw shit here we go again" sort of thing. That's the nice thing about him only having one move; I know I can ride it and I know we'll survive. It's not my favorite thing ever, but I'm far more worried about running up on another horse and scaring it than I am about anything that might happen to me in the saddle.

I really think the part that's the hardest to deal with is accepting other people's reactions without internalizing them.

See, in order to get Courage past this, I have to 1) not punish when he appears to misbehave 2) not bring up the issue on days he can't handle it and 3) accept and encourage even when he tries and fails. If you've read this post, you're nodding along with me. A trust and balance issue, not a behavior issue.

But if you haven't read this post and you see my horse go leaping and bolting across an arena, then see me drop the reins, pat him, and not readdress the problem, you probably think I'm a shitty incompetent adult ammy rider with sparkles in my eyes and one of those maddeningly stupid imaginary "majikal" connections with ponykins that ruins horse after horse.

You respond to me in kind--you lecture me on how to handle my horse, you make an example of your horse, or you even give well-intentioned, sound, and logical training advice THAT TRUST ME I HAVE TRIED, and the net result is that everyone I talk to thinks they know better than I do how to train my particular horse, who again, is anything but easy.

And just as I can analyze and understand Courage, I can also analyze and understand the motivations of well-intentioned help. I get it, I really do. I'm sure I've been that person. I know they don't mean to sound like they're attacking me (usually), but that's how it comes across. It takes a really strong person to take that sort of criticism every day from every corner, know that no matter how it's delivered, it's still wrong, believe in my own methods, and continue to treat my horse in a way that encourages his trust instead tears it down.

If there's one thing I'm learning from this horse, it's strength of character.

It's not always fun. It's never easy. It's definitely getting worse before it gets better. I don't know if there's a light at the end of the tunnel, but I know we need each other right now.