Guilt/worry, how do deal with it?

I JUST did this an hour ago. It is cold, but the sun was shining. The arena footing wasn’t perfect, so I walked patterns and did different exercises for 25 minutes. I am very glad I tacked up and did this. An added bonus is he didn’t sweat at all. No long cool-out time. :grin: I will call it a productive session.

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Same for people! Good long walks can be as beneficial as running…IF you go longer.

As for winter, it is hit or miss for me. I try real hard not to feel guilty, but sometimes it does happen. I am starting to work on my fitness to be a better rider come spring (pilates), and I watch training videos most days. I read. I am still working on my riding – just not in the saddle. :wink:

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We all have our guilt triggers. I’m in full training so my horse gets ridden 4 days a week whether I’m there or not. But there are winter days when I just can’t muster the wherewithal to get it together and deal with the whole driving through horrible weather to a cold barn thing.

My guilt then centers on not taking full advantage of the training opportunity that I’ve finally been granted after missing out on that for my whole life.

And if anyone asks where I was, I had to work. And I probably did, because I also have tremendous guilt about the things I don’t get done when I go to the barn.

Which reminds me… I’d better go send an email…

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@Lunabear1988

I just remembered something that will likely amuse you.

Last year I started to feel self conscious I was riding too much (an hour or so almost every day). I looked around the barns and only juniors were riding regularly. Our facility has 3 seperate barns, and in my home barn out of 17 occupied stalls, 6 horses are ridden regularly (all have leasers in addition to owners), 4 stalls are race horses on rest and rehab, and 7 are lead and feed, for various reasons, retired, physical or behavioral rehab.

But why I was feeling self conscious was that in our club I’d taken on a bunch of committee work that I just didn’t have the bandwidth for during my teaching semesters. I was feeling guilty about not holding up my end, and started to wonder if people were judging me for riding instead of weeding or sweeping or micromanaging the compost pile. No one ever said anything, this was all in my head.

So I did the smart thing and resigned my committee work, and I feel much better about the place and everyone there.

I also caretake an unbroken horse in another barn in our facility who I do liberty work with. In that barn (20 stalls), it’s about 50/50 adults and juniors. The juniors ride all the time and the coaches and Pony Club make sure they don’t get stuck with feral projects. Out of the adults, half don’t ride anymore, some due to injury or chronic health issues. Plus that barn has lots of nonriding pony moms doing chores.

Across the board, the non-riders are adults, and they are (mostly) getting a lot out of the pet horse thing.

Any how, if you have a bad conscience about something you can feel guilty and judged about anything.

Now at our facility, you or a helper has to visit every day to feed and clean, and the non riders get their horses out for run and buck free longe, or longeline, or handwalk and graze, or liberty or clicker or whatever, as much as the riders ride. So I’m really used to the concept of people owning horses and not riding regularly!

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I had an epiphany a few years ago. I work a pretty stressful job and I’m commission, so no worky, no money. It’s a love hate kind of job.

I realized that the only time I let it fully go was when riding - particularly in a lesson. Literally thought about nothing else other then my position, my horses way of going that day, the length of my stirrups, quality of the contact… and so on. It’s so hard to GET to the lessons, but I learned it is always worth it when I do.

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I think I could write a book on this topic!

Given that I am the matriarch of sorts of a large family that likes to celebrate holidays in a big way, I have long accepted that from about the 2nd week of November until January, the horses are on vacation. I took it a step further this year when I decided (after my sis and I purchased the family farm) to bring the boys to the family farm for a winter vacation November - March. It dawned on me last winter that I was paying a lot of money to have them stand in a muddy sacrifice paddock all winter when I had 2 nice stalls and a 10-acre pasture at the farm. So I made plans to a) have hay made this past summer so I wouldn’t have to buy it and 2) commit myself to taking care of them every day.

It has been working out well but jeeesh, it’s like having kids again! They need to be fed! They need to be cleaned up after! I have to go to the store for them! I don’t have time to ride them even if I had a place to do it (no arena of any sort at the farm) and the weather would cooperate. And you know what? It’s all OK. When they go back to the boarding place in March (cause I really do want to ride and show next year) everyone will be ready to get back to work. I have really enjoyed getting to know them better and I like looking at the clean stalls, hay bags full of hay from my farm, and two happy horses out enjoying themselves in the field. I also appreciate the exercise session every morning aka cleaning stalls that let me eat everything I wanted this holiday yet did not gain a pound!

Throw the guilt and worry aside and revel in the privilege that is owning a horse! That’s the advice from this old fa$t!

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I’m commission only, too, so yeah…

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Guilt is a mental game.

For example, I feel guilt that I go ride my horse, instead of spending that time with my kids.
But then I spend that time with my kids, and feel guilty my horse didn’t get exercised.

You can guilt yourself over everything.

Be happy you got to spend time with family, spend time with your daughter, take the time at home to get better, etc etc.

It’s all about perspective.

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So very true <3

I’m glad that I grew up and live where it’s normal to turn the horses out for the winter, feed them, check them and catch them up in the spring. We’ve turned ours out onto sections to just do winter and run them in in the spring, we have ours at home now in pastures and fiddle with them here and there but nobody is working, we’re all just surviving our winters. Our horses live ridiculously long lives and are sound and sane through it all. I’d love to ride more in the year and have that focus but honestly it’s just not in our cards so we hunker over winter. In my world, that’s a good thing. Maybe think of it that way instead of a grindstone?

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I have a lot of guilt and anxiety about my horse due to past issues with other horses whether I owned them or leased them.

Please note that everyone is different, so what I tell you works for me, and it might not work for you. What helps me is that I see a counselor because I have pretty severe anxiety. I also take anti-anxiety. I also have outside forces that exacerbate my anxiety. I’m also patient with my horse, who I started myself from the ground up.

I try to remember that horses exist in “horse time” and not our time, which helps me.

Lastly, my last horse also had a health issue that was helped by physical exercise, and there were times I couldn’t exercise her. I just had to be patient with my horse and myself. I’m not good at being patient with myself, though. That’s why I started seeing a counselor.

Again, this works for me, and it might not work for someone else.

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I like this idea in theory, but if someone has showring goals I don’t understand how it works. Shows usually start in May… if you’re lucky you can ride again by mid April… that doesn’t seem enough time, especially if you’re working on specific issues/goals.

But maybe I just don’t see how it could work. If April rolls around and I haven’t ridden since November, I feel pretty defeated trying to put anything in motion for May.

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If they have lots of turnout and room to walk (aka not outside for ‘full day’ turnout at 2-3 hours per day), easily done. I’ve done it.

End of February/March - start walking them under talk. Within 4 or 5 weeks, you’re trotting and working on the flat consistently. As long as your horse has been trained to jump, you’re fine to refresh the buttons and start showing, though I’d personally go down a level or so to knock the rust off before ramping back up. But to be honest, I’d do the same for the first show of the season regardless as it is hard to get competition fit without actually showing.

Some great sample (eventing) guidelines from Equestrian Canada’s Return to Competition Guideline (pg. 17):

Zero Fitness (missed 12+ weeks or 8-12 with additional health or age risks):

The basic premise for a reconditioning program will be covered in this section. You can step into this program at a level that is consistent with your horse’s current level of fitness.
A sample reconditioning plan at this level would be:

• Start with walking 10-20 minutes daily and increase by five (5) minutes every few (3-4) days until you are walking over 30-45 minutes under tack;

• Then, start trotting 3-5 minutes a day and increase by five (5) minutes every 4-7 days depending on the previous level of fitness;

o Break this trotting up into 20-30 second intervals;

• Once you have been trotting 15-20 minutes, you can start cantering for a few minutes each day in a similar time frame and interval as the trot conditioning;

• Begin to add in lateral work, ground poles and gymnastic exercises; and,

• After a few weeks of pole and gymnastic exercises, gradually start jumping, increasing height at safe and appropriate increments.
Once canter conditioning has started, it is time to start doing more lateral movements, ground poles and gymnastics. After a few weeks of gymnastics, gradually start jumping, increasing the heights at a safe increment.
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But the ground isn’t rideable in February if it isn’t rideable in December. I think that’s where it loses me. Good footing returns at precisely the same time the shows start, lol.

I don’t mean it’s a bad idea, I just haven’t figured out how to out it in to practice. Now road conditions are better by March for the most part, so you could start hauling out to an arena then to do the legging up. I’m unfortunately not brave enough to ride on the road (though hoping to fix that)

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Well, I’m in Ontario where it’s currently -10C with our neighbours just north getting 3 to 4 feet of snow in the last 12 hours or so. Ground is frozen so good enough to walk on, often nice enough to trot and canter as well. But of course that depends on if you feel comfortable going out… if not, then no, that won’t work for you! I’ve legged horses up on the edge of a gravel drive as it had a nice baby hill for them to get stronger … clearly I’m not very fussy! :laughing:

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Lol. I’m your neighbour to the north, haha. I’m just going to have to make use of the damn driveway i guess. That’s a lot of out and backs :smiley:

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Well I was supposed to have a lesson today. I forgot my daughter didn’t have school today but no worries she can ride her lease horse.

Well, I thought she was almost better from the cold/virus she had (We went out to the barn just to check the horses yesterday.) Then last night she started acting more sick, really congested, nasty barking cough and we all barely slept at all.

Poor thing. What an end to Christmas break.So I’m hoping my trainer will ride my horse or at least lunge him today for me.

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Healing jingles for your daughter.

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I have 6 horses and only myself and my niece (who can only come once a week) to work them. Have any of them ever gotten worked 6 days a week? Nope, not even close (and I’m not a big believer in 6 days a week anyway). Are they fed, cared for, seen twice daily and turned out 24/7 in big fields with forage and buddies? Yep. They are just fine. No guilt necessary. One of my guys just got a whole year off because I didn’t compete this year. Planning on bringing him back to work this month or next. I seriously doubt his vacay was worrying him

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Thank you, I’m shocked as I thought she was nearing 100%! These dang viruses, whatever it is, are so tricky.

At least my trainer is back in town…

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