"Dressage is a marriage ruining sport.", says dressage judge Janet Foy.

[Color_of_Light]

My, that’s a very broad statement, Janet. Is dressage really a marriage ruining sport, or did the husband or wife involved with a dressage person that later lead to a divorce turn out to be a poor choice in a spouse? Marriages fail all of the time for all kinds of reasons, not just due to dressage or horses.

Is the really a marriage ruining sport? My answer is a big fat NO. There are too many other factors involved in a marriage to blame the failure of a marriage to a dressage rider on the sport of dressage.

" Achieving Balance

A movement has commenced towards mindfulness and balance within all aspects of Australian dressage community life.

Ӣ How have you managed to obtain personal balance between dressage and the rest of your life, and why do you think it is important?

I didn’t for many years; this is a marriage ruining sport. To be successful you must work all day every day with horse shows or judging or doing clinics on the weekend.

And you need money to buy good horses, as no one wants to take lessons from someone who is not successful. It’s a tough sport. Now that I don’t ride or own a barn anymore my life is much more balanced. However, coming into Tokyo I am traveling a lot to Europe to judge large shows; 2020 is not a restful year!

Ӣ Have you convinced your husband that horses are not really that expensive yet?

Well, I only had one horse when I married Michael, and sold her after 2 years. He is a retired orthodontist and enjoys my horse friends but we would never have been married if I still had my stable. "

http://eurodressage.com/2020/03/08/janet-foy-dressage-marriage-ruining-sport

[NotGrandPrixYet]

I can see that for a lot of marriages. However, if you have a spouse who enjoys having a highly motivated, independent partner and likes animals, there’s a marriage that is not threatened. I have travelled extensively and not seen my husband for weeks, just to be home for a weekend and be jetting off again. We have a really strong and loving relationship. But I support his hobbies as well. You have to find the right spouse and be committed to each other’s happiness, and show a true interest in each other every day, even when apart. We have strong ties to each other’s family and friends.

[J-Lu]

I’ve done clinics with Janet and she pretty much knows what she’s talking about. Riding and excelling at the level she did can very much tax a relationship, I’ve seen that firsthand. For one partner, its about a huge amount of time and money, for the other partner, they can’t understand why their partner isn’t at home and why they can’t excel just based on their skill/time involved. Why the H*ll do they have to go to so many shows? She’s training to be a judge, why does she have to keep riding up the levels? Why does she need to get x scores at high levels just to be a judge? That’s just stupid!

Yes, this is what I’ve heard. It’s a “first world problem” but a problem nonetheless for many.

[xQHDQ]

She should have said, “Dressage CAN be a marriage-ending sport,” not that it definitely was. Anything that takes as much time as riding and is as expensive as horses can put a strain on a relationship. But that’s also true if one person is a shopaholic or is addicted to playing golf, or is a marathoner, or has a boat, or…

Of course, if you don’t care about being competitive, you can just do it for fun and you don’t need to become a judge. The sport is what we want it to be. You can never have it all. We compromise everywhere in some regard.

[CanteringCarrot]

@xQHDQ

She should have said, “Dressage CAN be a marriage-ending sport,” not that it definitely was. Anything that takes as much time as riding and is as expensive as horses can put a strain on a relationship. But that’s also true if one person is a shopaholic or is addicted to playing golf, or is a marathoner, or has a boat, or…

Of course, if you don’t care about being competitive, you can just do it for fun and you don’t need to become a judge. The sport is what we want it to be. You can never have it all. We compromise everywhere in some regard.

Yes! This is how I see it.

[mvp]

A marriage in which a career in sport is considered optional and not, say, the equivalent of a different, very consuming career was doomed from the outset.

[MorganSercu]

Sounds like this husband is better prepared for the time it takes than her first (?) husband. It really helps to already have your career established and any horrible loans retired long before.

I have no idea what her first husband did for a living - I’m speculating.

[Lucassb]

@mvp

A marriage in which a career in sport is considered optional and not, say, the equivalent of a different, very consuming career was doomed from the outset.

Bingo.

I always find it fascinating when people treat professional equestrian sports (and the dedication they require) differently from say, rising to the top on Wall Street or becoming a titan in some other industry. Hell, why would it be different than excelling in another sport? Do the top tennis/hockey/football players not practice pretty much obsessively?

My first husband loved the idea of horses and showing. His idea of the perfect day was hanging out in the VIP tent schmoozing and trying to network while I rode. He absolutely hated the reality of it, LOL. However my fabulous and adored DH, who was a nerdy tech guy when we married, has become a fantastic partner in my horsey adventures. He drives the truck, makes the feed store runs, reads a test better than anyone I’ve ever met, caters our shows with wonderful snacks and hand crafted margaritas, and obsesses about the quality of our pastures, which he manages with a high degree of attention and expertise. He now refers to himself as “Farm Ops” - the perfect horse husband!

[MorganSercu]

@Lucassb

However my fabulous and adored DH, who was a nerdy tech guy when we married, has become a fantastic partner in my horsey adventures. He drives the truck, makes the feed store runs, reads a test better than anyone I’ve ever met, caters our shows with wonderful snacks and hand crafted margaritas, and obsesses about the quality of our pastures, which he manages with a high degree of attention and expertise. He now refers to himself as “Farm Ops” - the perfect horse husband!

He sounds like an awesome person, Lucassb!

[Shagyas_Rock]

Lots of things can threaten a marriage - the most common of which is putting something else ahead of the marriage.
There are a lot of ways of doing this and the way one couple prioritizes may not look the same as the way another might
But for marriage to work - it has to be the priority of each spouse.

[2DogsFarm]

I can’t agree with Foy’s blanket statement :no:
My own (sorely missed) DH was a Total Cityguy.
He started riding at 56yo & progressed to showing Hunters, Dressage & low-level Eventing with me. He was 64 when we bought him his own horse, after a couple shareboards.
We also rode trails.

Even if he’d never thrown a leg over, I am confident he would have supported me in my pursuit as a re-rider. He supported everything else I did in our 31yrs together.

[Lucassb]

@MorganSercu

He sounds like an awesome person, Lucassb!

I have no idea how I got so lucky but he really is. <3

[JustTheTicket]

Any sport (or career, for that matter) can be marriage ruining if it becomes all-in for one person and the spouse resents it. My chosen sport these days is marathon running- it takes up a lot of time training and I’m not even remotely close to being a pro. I’ve had boyfriends who resented the fact that I really needed to get my training runs in instead of getting a drink with them.

So, yeah, I can see how it ruined Janet’s marriage if she was with someone who couldn’t wrap his brain around the lifestyle. But if both people are on the same page and have some concept of balance, it can work out just fine. It’s the ones who say “horses always come first!” who will have problems, especially if they’re ammies. It is a bit different for pros, but again, work life balance will solve a lot of those issues.

[BigMama1]

They asked a personal question about her personal experience, and she answered candidly. I do think it was a bit of click bait to run that quote as the headline, since the article is about so much more.

[mvp]

@Lucassb

Bingo.

I always find it fascinating when people treat professional equestrian sports (and the dedication they require) differently from say, rising to the top on Wall Street or becoming a titan in some other industry. Hell, why would it be different than excelling in another sport? Do the top tennis/hockey/football players not practice pretty much obsessively?

My first husband loved the idea of horses and showing. His idea of the perfect day was hanging out in the VIP tent schmoozing and trying to network while I rode. He absolutely hated the reality of it, LOL. However my fabulous and adored DH, who was a nerdy tech guy when we married, has become a fantastic partner in my horsey adventures. He drives the truck, makes the feed store runs, reads a test better than anyone I’ve ever met, caters our shows with wonderful snacks and hand crafted margaritas, and obsesses about the quality of our pastures, which he manages with a high degree of attention and expertise. He now refers to himself as “Farm Ops” - the perfect horse husband!

I think it’s getting better, with young men catching up to-, even embracing the reality-- of their wives having careers that are as consuming or “important” or as lucrative as theirs. But I think there was a long window when the expectation that 1. The man had a career and a woman had a mere job, if she worked outside the home for their whole marriage at all; and 2. That “of course you’d follow the man’s career because it was the one that paid better.”

In the academic world where I was, it was clear before I moved to the Other Coast to go to grad school that I’d have to put my own career first after I was done with my PhD, too. I guess that profession (as well as the way I was raised) made it clear to me that if the careers of both partners couldn’t be accommodated by living in one place, then just how the family chose a plan would have to be negotiated not assumed.

I see the specialty requirements of being a professional rider as just has hard as being a profession or some other kind of specialist where you have to go where the jobs are. It might not be the more lucrative of the two jobs, but it is probably the one would be more badly scuttled by a partner that would go along.

So if you had a partner who had that old-fashiond view or marriage or the purely economic one where the best-paid spouse calls all the shots, I could see how that kind of marriage could be “ruined” by being a professional rider.

And a PS-- now that I’m 50 and see that I have a limited amount of time left on a horse, I feel like the stakes would be even higher if I were married. I feel for the 30-somethings of today who have a long financial climb ahead of them. We all get only so much time as good athletes, no matter what.

[meupatdoes]

Marriage isn’t just about having a partner, it’s also about being one. If you’re constantly away and focused on your career, be it in Dressage or on Wall Street, why be married?

It’s like getting a dog and leaving it at home 16 hours a day because you have to work. What’s the actual point? Just be single then if you don’t want to make time for another person. It’s a perfectly reasonable life choice.

[NotGrandPrixYet]

@meupatdoes

Marriage isn’t just about having a partner, it’s also about being one. If you’re constantly away and focused on your career, be it in Dressage or on Wall Street, why be married?

It’s like getting a dog and leaving it at home 16 hours a day because you have to work. What’s the actual point? Just be single then if you don’t want to make time for another person. It’s a perfectly reasonable life choice.

If you have two people with demanding careers, you are going to say that they shouldn’t get married at all? In my case, we both are best friends and look forward to growing old together at the same home base. And neither one of us feel like ever retiring. We have lots if interesting talks about each other’s daily lives. and we thoroughly enjoy each other’s company when we are together. We love the friends we’ve met through each other’s lives and careers, and we both love each other’s family.

I’m sure we are an exception, but it goes to show that it can work if you are committed.

[mvp]

@meupatdoes

Marriage isn’t just about having a partner, it’s also about being one. If you’re constantly away and focused on your career, be it in Dressage or on Wall Street, why be married?

It’s like getting a dog and leaving it at home 16 hours a day because you have to work. What’s the actual point? Just be single then if you don’t want to make time for another person. It’s a perfectly reasonable life choice.

Yes, but with the divorce rate being above 50%, I think one would be hard-pressed to ask one of those partners to sacrifice a career or opportunities to invest instead in that relationship. Now, if one could be sure that one’s partner were as docile as that dog…

[angelssix]

@meupatdoes

Marriage isn’t just about having a partner, it’s also about being one. If you’re constantly away and focused on your career, be it in Dressage or on Wall Street, why be married?

It’s like getting a dog and leaving it at home 16 hours a day because you have to work. What’s the actual point? Just be single then if you don’t want to make time for another person. It’s a perfectly reasonable life choice.

This is exactly correct. People disassociate the reality of what a marriage is meant to be. It’s easy to neglect someone or something to the point of losing it if you are inherently narcissistic and selfish.

[meupatdoes]

@mvp

Yes, but with the divorce rate being above 50%, I think one would be hard-pressed to ask one of those partners to sacrifice a career or opportunities to invest instead in that relationship. Now, if one could be sure that one’s partner were as docile as that dog…

I think the logic you’re looking for here is that if either you or your prospective partner, or both, does/do not have the time, willingness, or ability to make time for a relationship, probably skip trying to have a relationship with them.

“I want to spend 70 hours a week working and riding horses and spending 40% of my take home on hobbies at the expense of saving for retirement or doing activities together” is a perfectly valid choice, and it may well make you a very good rider, but it doesn’t make anyone a good romantic partner.

So…just be single if you want to live like you’re single.

Some people want to make choices like they’re single, but then someone else to help pay the bills so they can afford their extravagant, luxury pet infused single lifestyle better I guess is nice to have around too.