Why is this fun??

Toffee44

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So we:

-easily spend £200 (min) a month on our hobby

-we ruin our cars going up farm tracks, getting muddy etc

-we make the front of the house muddy and cannot open the front door without mud, horse smell or have easy access because a line of boots its blocking the door.

-pick up poo and put it on a pile which most of us have to pay to be taken away

-we become obsessed that our geldings bits and pieces are clean

-spend £20-£80 every 8wks or so on shoes etc (not for us)

-walk through muddy fields in the dark sometimes in the rain, snow

-think of cunning ways to keep taps defrosted

-spend our days worrying if an animal is ok in a field when its snowing

-get excited about buying a rug thats gonna get covered in mud and s*&t

-we live in tightly fitting trousers no matter what our clothes size is

-most of our income during the winter is spent on dry grass and then worry if we have enough

-our hands and lips are chapped and sore as we are out in all weathers twice a day

-we have a whole wardrobe of clothes for our hobby depending on season and what we are doing on that day

-if we can afford to go on holiday we worry if our animal is going to be ok in someone elses hands

-we plan our lives around this hobby on a daily basis which sometimes means going to parties later so you can tuck our animals into bed and make sure they are fed


But for some reason despite all of this it is soooooo worth it!!!

Pointless point but my friend said this when her horse couldnt be assed to come down the field to come in because she had turned up 45 min earlier than normal!!!! It was dark, muddy and blooming freezing.

Can anyone think of any more? If a non horsey person saw this they must think we are crazy lol.
 
I don't find it fun! I am just compelled to do it for some reason.

It's like heroin. It's expensive and you know it's bad for you and your life but you can't do much about it.

Or at least that's how it is to me. I've had a pony since before I can remember so it's almost like it's part of my personality. I'm not me without a horse.

Still don't enjoy the mud, poo etc though!
 
Forgot to add:
-that we have at least one A and E admission/injury in our lives because of this hobby and we always "get back on" :D

-We get kicked, bitten and barged through and feel compelled to "work through it" and we find this rewarding

-we make sure our animal has a dentist check every year but we havent been for 5!!!
 
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Of course it's not fun, it's an illness, I am completely certain of this. No-one would go to these lengths unless it was some kind of illness compelling them to do so! :D :D :D And as far as I can see there is no cure!
 
i dont do any of that as my horse is on full livery while im at uni so i can write boring essays but i do see her everyday and my boyfriend says he hates me smelling of horse :).

horses however no matter how bad they get and how hard they are. (shes not always been on full livery so i know how u feel). they are wonderful and magical
 
Sooooooooooo true absolutely everything you've described.

you missed . . .
making sure the horse has total sunblock on pink bits all summer whilst sporting the most painful sunburn !! lol
 
I dont know about anyone else but being around my horse brings me back to being a child again. There really is something 'magical' about them (as another poster said) I feel like Im living my childhood dream everytime i see my horse. I just remember the days when i would look at all the 14hh ponies at the riding school and dream of what it would be like to own one. Now i do- but Im 26 and my horse is 16hh :-) when i was little, if i saw someone out riding on the road or on the beach i was absolutely captivated- now im the one on the horse and it is just such a privilage, we really are such lucky people!
 
But at the end of a cold mud filled day when you lean on the stable door watching your horse standing on his/her lovely deep bed, rugged up and munching on hay it all seems worth it

I miss my horse :-(
 
I dont know about anyone else but being around my horse brings me back to being a child again. There really is something 'magical' about them (as another poster said) I feel like Im living my childhood dream everytime i see my horse. I just remember the days when i would look at all the 14hh ponies at the riding school and dream of what it would be like to own one. Now i do- but Im 26 and my horse is 16hh :-) when i was little, if i saw someone out riding on the road or on the beach i was absolutely captivated- now im the one on the horse and it is just such a privilage, we really are such lucky people!

you are so me lol i feel every word you said apart from in 20 but my pony is 16hh and we even did pony camp this year because now i can
 
I do so relate to your post! I spent thirty years looking after horses - nearly twenty with the one in my avatar and I can truly say that every time I went to see her I felt like a child let out of school! Nothing was ever a chore, never a bore.

I'd often be the first to the yard and the last to leave, my hacks were legendary in scope but I'd be just as happy sitting in "her" box in awe.

Yet, what is it about horses? The world is neatly divided into the Horsey and the Nonhorsey. Thank goodness I belong in the former.
 
I don't find it fun! I am just compelled to do it for some reason.

It's like heroin. It's expensive and you know it's bad for you and your life but you can't do much about it.

Or at least that's how it is to me. I've had a pony since before I can remember so it's almost like it's part of my personality. I'm not me without a horse.

Still don't enjoy the mud, poo etc though!

This! I just looked thorugh my clothes tonight and wondered why I bother keeping them all when I live in jods, jeans and crappy t-shirts!
 
We have a mantra, to be chanted when we are out in foul weather, stupic o'clock etc. It is 'This is our hobby, we do it for pleasure'.
Why it should be is still beyond me, after too many years of horse owning to contemplate, I still do not know why we do it, but can't seem to stop! :D
 
So, so true! Also our beloved will, at a whim, deposit us as a sacrificial offering infront of horse eating flowers (that colour was not there yeasterday!)/wheely bins/plastic bags etc!
...And we still love them totally! If any person treated my how my mare did when I first got her I would soooo not be friends with them anymore, let alone happily plan my life around them and regularly empty my bank account on their behalf!
 
I dont know about anyone else but being around my horse brings me back to being a child again. There really is something 'magical' about them (as another poster said) I feel like Im living my childhood dream everytime i see my horse. I just remember the days when i would look at all the 14hh ponies at the riding school and dream of what it would be like to own one. Now i do- but Im 26 and my horse is 16hh :-) when i was little, if i saw someone out riding on the road or on the beach i was absolutely captivated- now im the one on the horse and it is just such a privilage, we really are such lucky people!

I can so relate to this, i was a pony mad child but my parents could not afford to get me one, was not their fault and i don't resent them for it, was just the case, i spent my childhood helping out at the local riding school working all day Sat & Sun for no payment just one ride down the lanes. I used to sit in my bedroom dreaming of owning my own one day, after life got in the way abit (as it does) the day arrived when i was 30 years old and i have been seriously addicted since. Every morning i wake up and so look forward to seeing my mare, i don't mind the hard work, expense, mud, smell and yes i have had an A&E incident (as well as other less serious falls) and still keep getting back on, madness.....
 
Its an addiction, like heroin only worse because there are clinics to help you with heroin addiction.No idea why we do it really except that when its good, (those few minutes each year!!) there is nothing else to beat it.
 
It's more of an affliction... I have EquiSyndrome. It affects all of my family and friends. It's a debilitating condition and costs thousands. It can be inherited, usually a recessive gene and many people are carriers and symptoms can appear at anytime.

There is no known cure. There are no known charities to help. However, support groups exist in the form of RC's. PC's for the young. There are other various discussion groups worth seeking out depending on how badly affected you are. Insurance is available unlike other syndromes.
 
And does your heart sink when you look into the stable in the morning and it looks like 20 river dancers have been at it all night! aided by horse poo and pee, but you still clean it all out after getting over loosing your will you live and take great pride in the deep tidy CLEAN bed with all its straight corner and near perfect banks, arhhh a work of art hahahahahahahaha!!!!!!
 
I dont know about anyone else but being around my horse brings me back to being a child again. There really is something 'magical' about them (as another poster said) I feel like Im living my childhood dream everytime i see my horse. I just remember the days when i would look at all the 14hh ponies at the riding school and dream of what it would be like to own one. Now i do- but Im 26 and my horse is 16hh :-) when i was little, if i saw someone out riding on the road or on the beach i was absolutely captivated- now im the one on the horse and it is just such a privilage, we really are such lucky people!

"" This, definitely. I'm 26 too and my pony is 13.2hh!! I've even bught him reindeer antlers this year because I can, and when I was 12 all the liveries at the riding school I was at used to dress their ponies up for xmas. I'm 13 years late but it has to be done! :D
 
Forgot to add:
-that we have at least one A and E admission/injury in our lives because of this hobby and we always "get back on" :D

-We get kicked, bitten and barged through and feel compelled to "work through it" and we find this rewarding

-we make sure our animal has a dentist check every year but we havent been for 5!!!

LMAO
I love this post. Having recently returned to work after this years A&E visit I was asked by one of my colleagues if the horse had now been put done as it had injured someone (obviously comparing to a violent dog) I was like eer no I continue to own and ride it. Now I laughed at him asking me such a question but I bet he laughed at me in turn.
 
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