[QUOTE=MadisonPark;8327321]
Hi everyone. I’m a long time lurker on this thread, but thought I would finally post. I’m 31 weeks and due right before Thanksgiving with my first. I haven’t ridden since about 14 weeks with the summer heat and hip pain.
Since I stopped riding, I’ve been wrestling with the thought that I should sell my mare and was wondering if anyone else had or was going through the same thing. Prior to pregnancy, we had just moved up to the low A/O hunters. The mare is big, beautiful and only 8 years old. She should be able to do the first years next year and is scopy and brave enough to jump around the derbies. Although she hasn’t always had the most ammy-friendly temperament, we finally found a dose of Regumate that works for her. She’s been kept in work since I quit riding with some short term show leases to a junior who just left for college as well as pro rides. What I fear is that I won’t be able to ride enough to keep her going on my own and that I can’t find another ammy at my small barn to help me flat her correctly without spending a fortune on pro rides. Although maintaining her care is within our means after the baby, I don’t think that there will be enough energy or money for me to keep showing her apart from on the local circuit, which maxes out at 3 feet. It will likely take me a few weeks to months to build up my strength enough on a different horse to safely stick her spook and her jump.
Is it selfish to keep around a promising horse that won’t be shown to her potential? She’ll be a competitive 3’6 horse but will not be a winner in good AA company. Selling to a good home now would allow me to reinvest the money in a lower maintenance horse when I’m really up for riding again. But, my husband would have a very hard time agreeing to purchase a show horse in the future, especially since I got a great deal on this one when she was green.
Are these crazy pregnancy hormones talking? I love the mare dearly and really miss riding and am afraid I might deeply regret selling her. I likely won’t ever be able to afford something so nice and athletic again. FWIW I still have my old jumper who at 24 is sound to flat so I would be left completely horseless, just a little bored if I do sell. Thoughts?[/QUOTE]
My first thought was one of Denny Emerson’s fb posts yesterday–
““I don’t do this horse justice.”
How often have I heard someone with a nice horse say something along those lines—“My horse could do so much better if he had a more (talented/brave/ambitious/younger) rider, blah, blah, blah.”
Do you really think your horse cares for one fractional nanosecond how many blue ribbons he wins, or that he sits at night worrying about how you destroy his dreams of winning a USET gold medal?
The LAST thing your horse “wants” is to be owned by some ambitious, striving kid, because that is exactly the kind of rider who is going to make him work hard! He doesn’t want blue—He wants green, as in GRASS.
Sure, if you gallop him all over hell, or sit lopsided and give him a sore back, or yank his teeth out with bad hands, he’d “prefer” you were a better rider, but a horse has no interest in his “destiny”, so if you have a nice horse, and can afford to keep him, even if people are trying to buy him out from under you, just ride him and enjoy him.
I heard a great answer to this 50 years ago. Someone said, after a not so shiny show jumping round, “My horse deserves a better ride than I can give him.”
The response—“By that standard, the only four riders in America who should jump a horse are Bill Steinkraus, Ben O’ Meara, Frank Chapot and Kathy Kusner. Shut up, enjoy him, and do the best you can.”
Amen to that.”
If you are worried because you don’t think you can safely handle your mare, or that you are planning on selling in the future and would rather sell when she’s still in work, then selling might make sense. If you are simply worried that she may have more time off than would otherwise be ideal, but she’ll be cared for and at some point you’ll get back to riding and enjoying her and admit getting another horse like her would be difficult- keep her and just let her be a horse for a while! Can you put her out on pasture board? She’d probably love just being a horse and grazing all day.
I did sell my motor baby (big lifted wrangler) in order to get a family friendly car (and maybe because I couldn’t actually jump up in it anymore…) It seriously kills me every time I see one drive by now. Sigh.