Be honest, who’s fallen off and NOT hit their head

Yes, I've probably hit my head more than once in falls, even if I've landed on my back, but ! always wear my protective head gear. Actually, I'm thinking of wearing my hard hat 24 hours a day after recent experiences.

I currently have a very real vested interest in this topic .... as I am currently into week 3 of recovery from a substantial subdural haematoma caused by a (none horsey) fall at home, where my bare head came into hard contact with carpeted floor. I have had 4 days in hospital for my pains. And I'm here to tell you that this is no fun guys ... so if you do hit your head, and feel even remotely off colour, get thee to A&E asap!!! ..... (Don't do what I did and "leave it to sort itself out" for several days before going!!!). I am incredibly lucky to be relatively unscathed by the experience, but it could have been much worse.
 
Yes. Using what is known as the involuntary dismount. In my early days of riding, I was going down a steep hill.The path wound down but the mare I was riding headed straight down and I slid forward and off over her shoulder, as in an involuntary dismount and landed on my feet standing at her left shoulder. Later, riding in the Rocky Mountains I was taught how to ride up and down hills and I noticed with approval that when my grand daughter went for her very first lead out pony ride she was taught how to sit going up and down banks.
Apart from that early fall of mine, I have rolled backwards and hit my head every time. Worse that that is my neck. Toppling backwards stresses my neck and it still hurts after my fall last January.

Greylegs said:
so if you do hit your head, and feel even remotely off colour, get thee to A&E asap!!! ..... (Don't do what I did and "leave it to sort itself out" for several days before going!!!)
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Absolutely. I too left it a couple of days.
 
Elf On A Shelf said:
The slow motion ones where you know gravity is in control, you are going down and there is nothing you can do about it but you aren't going down fast enough are frustratingly funny ?
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That was me in the summer when baby cob did a tiny spook and his feet hit a divot which was like concrete. I thought he was getting his balance back but there was a slo mo fall to his knees and I gently ended up sitting next to him.

I think my bum weighs more than my head. Often hits the ground first. Well padded though.
 
I had a couple of falls without hitting my head. Only retired the helmet after the most recent fall. Don’t remember hitting my head, but the mud on it said otherwise and considering I couldn’t walk properly for a week with a presumed slipped disc, it seemed time to stop using it.

I just use it occasionally for lunging now. Too pretty to throw away.
 
Greylegs said:
Yes, I've probably hit my head more than once in falls, even if I've landed on my back, but ! always wear my protective head gear. Actually, I'm thinking of wearing my hard hat 24 hours a day after recent experiences.

I currently have a very real vested interest in this topic .... as I am currently into week 3 of recovery from a substantial subdural haematoma caused by a (none horsey) fall at home, where my bare head came into hard contact with carpeted floor. I have had 4 days in hospital for my pains. And I'm here to tell you that this is no fun guys ... so if you do hit your head, and feel even remotely off colour, get thee to A&E asap!!! ..... (Don't do what I did and "leave it to sort itself out" for several days before going!!!). I am incredibly lucky to be relatively unscathed by the experience, but it could have been much worse.
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Crikey Greylegs how dreadful for you. I do hope you are soon feeling very much better.
 
Once - horse tripped over his own feet cantering away after a jump and I flew over the top in freefall skydiving position - midsection landed first, and I was winded and several ribs broken. i was wearing a body protector as well. My chin did plant into the arena, but as my gut took the brunt of the fall nothing happened to my head/hat...
 
Yes, just once. I had fallen the previous week and banged my head so when I was coming off I distinctly remember thinking 'oh no my hat is new'. I folded like a deck chair and my lower back took all the impact. Two bulging discs and a tilted pelvis. Would have preferred to land normally ?
 
As a child definitely lots of slipping off the side/over a shoulder etc, sometimes landing on my feet, at least initially. My parents were very good, and did take me to get my hat replaced when it made significant contact with the arena fence, though!

As an adult, definitely one occasion where I landed on my arse- which was probably worse in terms of pain! My most recent fall, my head definitely touched the ground, but my shoulder took all the impact. I'm still using the same hat, which I suppose is probably a risk, but there wasn't any significant impact, and I landed in the hedge, anyway.

It is a good point, though- I've always taken it as you should replace your hat if there's a significant impact with something solid, rather than just if your head hits the ground?
 
I landed sat down once, whilst cantering without stirrups, the pony spooked at a moving shadow from the floodlights in the wind, he then decided to go around a jump wing in the middle of the school. Unfortunately I didn’t ;)

It made a change as normally I land on my head!
 
Folks, please learn from my experience. I had the most innocuous of involuntary dismounts as horse stumbled cantering away from a cross pole. Slid down his neck while the horse’s nose was on the floor. I honestly didn’t think my head had touched the floor, but the piece of wood chip on the cover said otherwise. Champion examined the hat for me, and I was shocked by how much the hat structure had compressed.

Please, replace those hats that have come into contact with anything.
 
Yes, I have landed on my bum once. Still have no idea what happened - and nor do any of the witnesses. I was mounting one of the most reliable horses in the yard in order to take a nervous adult out on a lead rein walk in the forest when I found myself sitting on the ground with this poor horse looking at me as if to say WTF?

Fortunately, my nervous adult thought it was hilarious and we had a good chat and even managed to get a couple of brief trots in!
 
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Fell off on the beach once, Lucky spooked at seaweed as we were mid gallop and off a 17.2hh onto the sand, mostly hit my back.
thrown off my mare Lucy 16.2hh who was a psycho, dragged me along the ground for a wee bit on stones. Scraped my bum legs and hips.
Fell off BB he refused a jump one day ? i got tossed off the side. Head did hit that time in the arena on sand carpet mix
 
Friend came off after her horse did a eeek and wild spin into a ditch, friend came off flat on her back on the track with her head hitting the floor with a fearsome whack! So she got up and said at least I didn't hit my head, her hat was damaged and she had slight concussion. I had to tell her several times that yes you did hit your head!
 
Falls at speed, canter and gallop, i’ve usually just gone *splat* on the ground because of the speed velocity throwing me and head did usually make contact with ground.
But falls at trot/walk im better at somewhat preparing how i fall, and often land on my bum!

Refusal of jumps would make me be thrown like a ragdoll, if i thought the horse would go for it and it suddenly refused. I hated that with unknown RS horses. Landing on jumps is so unpredictable how it will end up. The over the neck falls i never liked…always preferred being lobbed out the side!
 
Landed on my back and bum and sometimes feet many a time. Can't recall hitting my head when falling but probably did, and certainly my face once when the pony put in a last minute dirty stop.

Worst incident involving my head however wasn't a fall. My horse tanked off with me in a field at a rapid rate of knots and I had absolutely no steering.

Hence when he decided to shoot under an electricity pilon, I had no other option but to duck as low as I possibly could and hope for the best. My head still wasn't low enough and hit the lowest horizontal bar of the pilon as the horse dived under. The hat was a write off. Other than quite a nasty headache for a couple of days I was unscathed. I was very, very lucky.

Everytime I drive past that field (now 30 years on from that incident) I look at that pylon and wonder how the heck I got away with it. That lowest horizontal bar doesn't look high enough for a pony to get under, let alone the 15.2 I was on.
 
fetlock said:
Landed on my back and bum and sometimes feet many a time. Can't recall hitting my head when falling but probably did, and certainly my face once when the pony put in a last minute dirty stop.

Worst incident involving my head however wasn't a fall. My horse tanked off with me in a field at a rapid rate of knots and I had absolutely no steering.

Hence when he decided to shoot under an electricity pilon, I had no other option but to duck as low as I possibly could and hope for the best. My head still wasn't low enough and hit the lowest horizontal bar of the pilon as the horse dived under. The hat was a write off. Other than quite a nasty headache for a couple of days I was unscathed. I was very, very lucky.

Everytime I drive past that field (now 30 years on from that incident) I look at that pylon and wonder how the heck I got away with it. That lowest horizontal bar doesn't look high enough for a pony to get under, let alone the 15.2 I was on.
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That sounds a sore one ?
 
I've recently started jumping again and on a few occasions been on the school's 'devil' pony. I'm one of the few adults small enough and light enough to ride her, so she's use to getting away with murder with the children. She has a bad habit of jumping, landing, stopping and dropping her head. A couple of times now she's done it with me and I've just slid off down her (virtually nonexistent) neck and crawled off on all fours! I don't think it really qualifies as a proper fall though!

I did come off her the day after I bought my body protector, landed on my shoulder and bounced back up onto my feet. My back protector was quite mucky, but there was no sign of my head hitting the floor.

This pony, when she's in the mood, has a fantastic jump.
 
I have. Many years ago I’d just got on a young horse when it bucked and landed in front of the saddle on the next buck I just leap frogged over his head and landed on my feet. I was on a concrete yard so I was lucky.
 
I had a lot of falls from the first and second horses I owned. The first would get scared, panic/shy, spin and run off. The second had a buck like a trebuchet; from both of them I would somersault and my shoulder would break my fall and my head would be unscathed. On a couple of occasions I landed on my feet.

The most frightening fall was (I presume) after being fired from the trebuchet, but I have no memory of that day until a friend was taking me to hospital. Someone at the yard had seen me riding in the fields some way away (hadn't seen the fall), so somehow I had managed to ride home including crossing a main road, untack, feed the horse and make repeated calls to my friend asking for help all without a properly functioning brain. Apparently I kept ringing my poor friend saying 'I've fallen off', hanging up and then ringing her again and repeated until she arrived. I felt sick for a few weeks but luckily no other problems.

The second worst fall is the only time I've landed on my bottom, it shouldn't have been a bad fall (was in trot, horse made a sharp turn and I lost my balance) but I fractured my pelvis. That horse was a sweetheart so the fall was entirely my fault, and very, very painful for quite a long time. Still managed to untack, load up, drive home, sort the horse out, and unhitch the box on my own though. TBF the paramedics (it happened at a show) had said I was fine, turned out not to be the case when I had a routine x-ray (had an appt with the hip surgeon for a different reason) the following week!

Thank you OP for starting the thread, it has reminded me that my current hat is a few years old now so needs replacing :)
 
When I first got my mare she was a spooky beggar and I fell off all the time. I can't remember ever properly walloping my head, but if I'd played it safe and got a new hat every time I'd come off I'd have had to get a new one every couple of weeks... So I didn't ?

I did once have my head stamped on when I was wearing a hat, that one DEFINITELY got binned and replaced!
 
Yes, both times Rooni slipped over. Once I stayed on but the other I threw myself clear but rolled onto my side. My hat was the only thing not covered in mud ?
 
In most cases I honestly don't know. The last fall I had was caught on film so I know my head didn't make contact with the ground, and that fall was fairly typical of how I hit the ground - clean on my side sort of half in a ball. So maybe I don't hit my head that often in a fall...?

The previous fall to that was more of an unplanned dismount in that I was too far gone to save myself but was able to slow the horse to a walk before sliding off onto my feet.
 
[Touches wood] I've never hit my head when I've fallen off.

But I do remember once feeling a bit dazed after falling off my horse when she shied at someone's foolish husband who had been taking photographs (of his wife riding, I suppose). I was (surprisingly) going to jump a small jump when this turkey jumped off the thing he was standing on right near me and my horse. Horse shied. I fell off. Riding instructor came over and lead me away towards the stables and said something about not worrying about getting back on, and I was wondering what he was on about, of course I wouldn't be riding...

So maybe I hit my head a bit. Or maybe I was just in shock. Who knows. Can't remember any ill effects.
 
PurBee said:
Falls at speed, canter and gallop, i’ve usually just gone *splat* on the ground because of the speed velocity throwing me and head did usually make contact with ground.
But falls at trot/walk im better at somewhat preparing how i fall, and often land on my bum!

!
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Exactly this. I usually only come off at speed, usually flung off. And the forces at play seem to make you hit your head in some way or another. Even if you don’t “land on your head”.

the times ive come off slowly and I’ve attempted to get landing gear out and I usually come off worse.

honestly if you are being flung I think the weight of your head and lack of control of the speed if you can’t get your arms out then you might rattle your head slightly.
 
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