care to share motivational stories about regained confidence?

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JadeWisc

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Would anyone be interested in telling their story about getting confidence back after losing it with a certain horse? Did anybody have a bad experience (or experiences) with a certain horse and lose confidence riding them yet manage to get it back with that same horse and go on to trust and become partners?
 
Well 4 years ago i had a bad fall which resulted in me breaking my ankle. My gorgeous mare Willow (tbxWelsh) is the first horse i have ever had. I was 16years old and i was hacking out on my own and i was galloping down a grass straight which i have always galloped down. I was going along looking around and all of a sudden i saw a family with a little girl standing next to the bushes on my left. The girl had ahuge stick and whacked the bush. Willow shot to the right and i went the other way and under her. The last thing i saw was Willows bum flying round the corner at the end of the stretch. I woke up surrounded by dog walkers and i tried to get to my feet several times before i finally made it up but my eyesight had gone. I could only see shapes and i panicked. I couldn't ring my mum who was at the yard because i couldn't see my phone to ring her. I walked to the car park and i was screaming for Willow but they told me they couldn't catch her and she had gone up the road. A dog walker gave me a lift to the yard and on the way my mum rang me to say willow was at the yard but asked where i was. I got to the yard and there was willow standing there sweating. I tried to get my boots off and it was stuck on my right leg. My mum sorted willow out and rang my dad who came to look after willow while i was up at the hospital. My eyesight came back when i got to the hospital. I was in hospital 10days becaus ethey couldn't operate due to swelling and bruising. My mum had my riding hat to show me what the damage was, It was a brand new jockey skull and it had cracked from front to back. Then i had 2 screws put in my ankle bone and a plaster cast. I went to the yard and willow was terrified of me and i was so angry i hadn't stayed on her. I went up there the next day and i said i wanted to sit on her so my mum gave me a leg up and i walked around. I was shaking when i got off because i was so scared and i was angry because i was scared. It took about 6 months for me to feel confident on her again and i wouldn't have been able to do it if it wasn't for my mum. I got the courage to go back down the straight but i just walked, I was so nervous. I know it was a bad fall but it was just a freak accident and now me and willow are stronger than ever and i have become a much better rider and i am full of confidence but i am not cocky i know things can happen. It was the worst fall i have ever had in the whole 7years i have owned horses. I know you probably think i am mad.
 
I am suprised to hear that you had to walk back on your own! What happened to the family whos child had the stick? Did they not stay to help you????????
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Very inspirational story though!
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I had to walk to the car park with a dog walker who gave me a lift as i was in the woods. I never saw the child with the stick or their family. They obviously didn't care. I was so worried about willow and thank god she got back ok and she managed to open a 6 bar gate. I am thankful to the dog walkers who helped at least someone cares.
 
4 years ago my beloved Sullivan had to be pts. I bought another "confidence giver" (coz I'm not a brave rider) off a now discredited dealer. He was a perfectly likeable Haflinger but a confidence giver for a nervous rider he was NOT. Long story but eventually he had a mega rodeo-style bucking fit in the middle of a group lesson and I was taken to hospital with a suspected broken neck. I went sailing through the air off his back and landed on my face with my body jacknifed up behind me. The hospital said it was a miracle I survived. I remember coming down towards the ground and seeing a jumble of horses legs and thinking I can't survive this. But I did. Anyway, the Riding Shool Owner/YO came to see me when I was out of hospital and said that she felt I shouldn't ride my Haffie again. Well, as if she needed to tell me that! I'd pretty much worked that out for myself. YO said she had a safe (knackered!) school horse which she would swap for my Haffie - she said give the Haffie to me for 6 months and he'll never buck again! She said the school horse was the perfect horse for me and in all fairness, she knows her horses AND her riders. I vaguely knew the school horse she meant - he was emaciated, weak, couldn't canter any more, totally exhausted from being overworked, presumably because he was a safe ride, poor soul. And so I met Sunny.

I went to see him when I could drive again and - natch! - fell in love. After a week or 2, I booked a lesson on him and because YO had said he was perfect for me I trusted her, got on Sunny and cantered round the school. No-one could believe their eyes coz they thought I'd never ever get on a horse again, far less canter.

Well, we did the swap. I started properly looking after Sunny. I got his weight back on (he's a Section D) and helped him rediscover his delight in being alive and loved and happy. Thank god I bought him when I did coz THREE WEEKS afterwards, the problems with his eye started. After a long, long battle, he had to have it removed. We have moved yards now and he is happy and adored and glossy and content. He is the safest hack at the yard and he looks after me. He can jump 2ft 6 and has helped me come first in our first ever walk and trot dressage competition. He has special privileges at my new yard and mooches about the yard loose, eating down the grass verges. When he's full, he mooches back to his stable and boxes himself! The only thing you have to watch is that he is a master at the advanced dressage movement Turn On The Feedbucket and if he spots a stable door open where there is a full feedbowl inside, he reckons it's his by default!

Whatever I have done for Sunny is nothing compared with what Sunny has done for me. He has restored my confidence AND increased it. He has made riding and owning a horse fun again. He has shown me how a horse will give you all he has to give if you only treat him well and let him know he's loved. He has shown me how you can take a tired, worn out, worthless nag of a riding school horse and turn him back into a plump, glossy, active, happy, safe ride just with the right management and relationship.

As you probably realise, I adore him, one eye and all!
 
Box_Of_Frogs: Oh bless what a lovely story he is so special. Glad you didn't lose all faith in the horse world what a nasty accident. Hope you and sunny have many happy years
 
Haffie still bucks occasionally lol! But he has a huge teenage fan ckub and the ones who like that sort of a horse beg to ride him in lessons! None of it was his fault. He just didn't want to be loved and cuddled - he wanted to be a horse and gallop with the big boys. He has to work hard for his living now but I think he's ok!
 
I lost a huge amount of confidence in the first 2 years with Gem, it felt like a constant uphill battle to get her round to my way of thinking and 90% of the time she won. I bought her when I was 14, having just outgrown my slightly neurotic 13hh New Forest pony. The step from 13hh pony with a typical ponyish attitude to a 15.2 chestnut mare...with a typical chestnut mare attitude was more of a leap than I was expecting, and looking back now I can fully admit she was not the right horse for me at that time, but now I would not change her for the world (remind me of this next time I complain please!)

I was in tears countless times because of her behaviour in the first two years of owning her and was very close to selling her at several points. I could only walk out on hacks, anything faster reduced me to a nervous wreck; I honestly never thought I would canter her on a hack, let alone consider doing any xc, jumping was terrfiying and it was a matter of point and hold on. I remember one day when a friend from my old yard came to visit Gem and I, and she set out a 2ft jump, and I refused to go near it and burst into tears.

3 and a half years later I have learned to trust her and my riding has come on a lot from the tense, terrified little person I was when I bought her. I will happily jump a reasonable sized course with her when she is sound enough and there is nothing I enjoy more than a good gallop out hacking. I never ever thought I'd say that.

I think all the box rest that Gem has had has really strengthened our relationship and made me realise how special she is and in turn we learned to trust each other. That isn't to say she doesn't still have her chestnut mare moments, but she wouldn't be Gem without them and I now know how to ride her through them a lot better than I did back then (well... when I first got her it wasn't a case of 'riding through it' it was a case of burst into tears and cling on!!) I am sure Weezy can vouch for how nervous I used to be, after I spent a week on her yard with Gem a few summers ago!!
This was us today... 3 years ago I wouldn't have even dreamed about being able to jump on a hack without having neurotic chestnut mare on my hands!
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Sorry for the long ramble!
 
When I was 12 I got Boo. I moved from a 11.1hh ancient mare, to a 14.2hh tank like welsh cob.

From day 1 Boo was awful. She barged, she galloped off when I brought her in from the field. She'd tank off everywhere with me.
If I tried to school her she'd gallop to the gate and either leap it or slide to a halt and refuse to budge till I took her in.

At shows she'd tank off across the show ground, buck, bronco, leap out of the ring over the rope, crash through fences.

For a summer I trotted her over little more than poles on the ground, I hacked her only a 5 minute circle as if I tried to do anything else she'd nap, spin, bronc and terrify me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2rkbtAfjSY
(If you can be bothered watching it). A vid of me successfully getting her round a course.

In early 2004 she came down with laminitis and nearly died. This was out turning point.

She has been lame more often than she has been sound in the 5 years I have owned her, but she went from that beast who took advantage, who used her strength against me, who would not want to help me as a rider, who tanked off with me on our first beach ride, galloped thru picnicers and dumped me on the green and galloped back to the lorry.... she changed from that into the pony I know and love today.

I trust the most nervous of riders on her and I know she will look after them.

She was the one that gave me the confidence to ride a 5yr old Friesian stallion whose history I had no clue on.
She inspired me to take on two problem ponies for an owner unable to ride and bring them to the competition stage and for them to be sold for three times what they were bought for.
She gave me the trust in myself to help fix a 17hh WB who didn't know how to enjoy life.

She is the pony that changed me and shaped me into the more confident person I am today.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3WJwzMbiKI

I do hope you take a moment to look at both the videos.

The first year I wanted rid of her. Since then, I can not imagine being the person I am now had I not persevered.
 
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