Thanks for sharing the article - will read through it!
She actually did have anesthesia as a late weanling (I almost forgot about it)…she had an umbilical hernia that had to be repaired. Oddly enough, as I think back to that…the vet clinic that did her umbilical surgery loved her as she was so easy to deal with. Which is so opposite of the horse I have now…as a foal she was relatively easy about stuff (sensitive but not explosive or reactive the way she is now).
Critter… seriously could write your posts. My girl was the easiest foal.
I wish I had one thing I could point to that you could snap your fingers and fix. I do hope you find something; keep me posted if you do.
For my horse, it was so many little things that would pile on. She is sensitive and freaks out when she isn’t feeling 110%. Maybe one day I’ll find a single source of all her sensitivity. In the meantime, I’m having incredible luck with listening to her, keeping her feeling good, and removing things that upset her no matter how stupid it seems.
And when I say removing stuff, I mean things like jointed bits or fuzzy boots that are not necessary and have alternatives… I don’t mean we are living in avoidance of basic things a horse should handle. Mane pulling is maybe the only procedural thing we “avoid” because she acts like I am pulling teeth, not hair (back to that sensitivity)… so we use a solo comb.
I wrote a sappy post a few weeks ago about our month of June, where we did so many fun things that would have never been possible even just 3 years ago: cantering around Pimlico Race Course, XC schooling on a whim, pony rides for my nephew, winning at horse shows, fabulous lessons… it’s not that all that stuff was totally new in June, it was just probably the first time in our lives that I didn’t have a care or concern in the world when deciding to do those things. The dread of her losing her marbles has finally faded.
ETA: One more thing I haven’t mentioned yet was how my emotions played into her sensitivity. I learned about mindfulness a couple years ago, right about the time we were getting back into it. As a lifelong horsewoman, I am very comfortable working around difficult horses. Yet it took me years to realize how the situation with her was affecting me, and in turn adding to the problem. I took a long time for me to learn how to change my thinking and energy when dealing with her. No, it wasn’t the whole problem; it wasn’t even half the problem. But with my horse, it was one more thing that would pile on to send her over the top.
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Critter,
You have gotten lots of good advice here, I’ll offer my experience.
My current horse was well-bred, well raised, well started and was a screaming mental mess as a 4 year old. Vet, chiro, nutritionist, etc. He ate a ton of grain because he burned through a ton of calories and was very skinny.
The best thing I did was sent him to a NH trainer who was riding with a very well known dressage trainer (she recommended him to me). It took a while, but he taught my very reactive, fear-based horse how to think through a situation rather than react. Look at “adverse” situations as puzzles that he can figure out the right answer to. Years later, his lifestyle fits his personality more (he’s out 24/7 in his own 1 + acre pasture with neighbors and a run-in mate, so he’s always able to move unless it is raining-he’s a wimp), he’s relaxed enough that his metabolism is low and I keep him on pasture and balancer only, and I learned how to train him according to how he processes information. I don’t let him slack at all with training and he appreciates the “hand-holding” because he’s insecure. I’ve purposefully put him in lots of situations where he is not comfy but I had to teach him to look to me for security. It wasn’t always pretty!
Now we’re pretty solid partners and he enjoys working with me. I really suggest a quality trainer who can help your horse approach life in a less intimidating way, and help you learn to help your horse.
I’m an n=1, but this trainer works out of my barn and I’ve seen him help countless horse and rider combos that sound much like you. Sometimes, it’s not health issues, it’s between the ears.
Good luck!
J.
This. My thoughts exactly.
Oh boy, do I feel your pain! I bought a new horse in January. I did a stupid thing and bought him sight unseen from a high volume horse dealer in western Pennsylvania, who I had been told by an acquaintance had sold good school horses to a stable in her area and people liked him there. Well, after I got my (crazy!) horse and did more research, I found out that this seller was mis-representing horses to people outside his area left and right. I was told this horse was well broke, super gentle, everyone in the family could ride him, etc. The horse had been owned by a friend of his in Kentucky who trail rode him all over the place for over a year and was just downsizing, etc. etc. His sales video backed up the “he’s gentle” talk, but it was very short and I’m sure highly edited. The horse I ended up getting was far from this video and description–not even close! To make it even more interesting, the Coggin’s I got with the horse was from 4 months prior, from an auction barn, and the buyer was named as one of the biggest kill buyers in Kentucky, who is friends with the seller. I’m sure that’s who he bought him from. What a lie I was told about the horse’s experience and history! Of course, I will never buy a horse in this manner ever again.
I decided to board him at a small, quiet stable with an indoor arena, planning to ride him there to get to know him better over the winter until spring arrived when it made more sense to bring him home. That didn’t go well. He was actually fairly calm for a few days but still had freak out moments where he would go from zero to 60 on the anxiety scale very quickly over next to nothing, depending on what was going on around him. Things only got worse and I decided to bring him home early February because he was so anxious in the stall at night–fine when out on pasture during the day–that he crashed down a stall gate.
Brought him home and pastured him with my senior QH mare who is the epitome of trusting, cool, and calm. He also had a run-in situation so he could be out all the time, which he much preferred. He calmed down nicely during the first couple of weeks and I thought things were going to be OK. When I say “calmed down”, he was never actually calm; just calm compared to “crashing down stall gates in a panic.” He still had spooks over nothing and became nervous when stalled for more than eating his small amount of grain.
Fast forward to now. He is much calmer around the barn and is bonding with me. Progress has been very slow. He still has days when he just can’t cope with much and is so keyed up that he can’t concentrate on simple ground work exercises and starts to panic when he finishes his grain and wants to leave the stall. Next day, he may be significantly calmer–calm when I’m grooming him and able to stand stalled next to my mare for an hour or so. He is usually pretty calm in the pasture where he is familiar with every inch of the land, but take him even 50 feet outside the fence and he can get back into a completely anxious, nutty state. He’s not doing dangerous things like rearing and taking out fencing, thank God, but it’s next to impossible to do anything productive with him and he’s definitely not safe to ride because he spooks and jumps at everything.
Backtracking a bit–He’s been ridden a few times–twice by me (he spooked big out of no where ride #2 and I fell off and got banged up pretty bad and didn’t feel comfortable riding him again. A trainer at the first barn rode him a few times after that and he was all over the place, but I will say I thought she was too rough with him and increased his anxiety. He is very cooperative with the ground work I’ve done with him and is the sweetest thing on the face of the earth.
I have found a come-to-the-farm trainer who has worked with him several times recently. She’s very good and really “gets” him. He is wonderful when she works with him in the pasture, but outside the pasture–same old thing as with me. Some people had told me that he just needed a super confident handler and all would be well, but I never believed that. I live with this horse day in and day out. They don’t. Not every horse’s problem lies with the handler. I have been around the block and am pretty good with my ground work. I’m older now, been through some medical problems, and not as confident in the saddle. But on the ground, I’m still able to deal with most things a horse can dish out and I’m pretty good at reading them and responding appropriately. Judging by his same level of reactions with the trainer, I don’t think it’s a “me problem.” Unless he is having a calm day, his attention span is that of a gnat because he is looking for the sky to fall and the world to end. He behaves as if he has no faith that he can get through a stressful situation–and stressful to him is very minimal compared to the average horse. He’s not afraid of people–he’s more afraid he’s not going to be able to handle life. Behaves like a green horse that has been pushed into things way too fast and they kept pushing him even when he said it was too much, and that only made him fear the worst even more.
My new trainer’s focus is to work on his ability to learn to cope with life–not by shoving a lot of scary things in his face, but just doing simple ground work exercises while gradually increasing his exposure to areas that make him nervous. She could get on and ride him in the pasture tomorrow–he can do that because he feels safe there–but that won’t address his actual problem. If he can learn to calm himself, the riding will just fall into place. He’s green under saddle, but he will ride the same way he handles on the ground. It’s all dependent on where he is and what’s going on around him.
I’ve had this horse on a Smartpak calming supplement, CBD, Via-Calm supplement, and a high quality magnesium supplement pretty much the whole time since bringing him home. I did stop the Smartpak supplement after 3 months because it was expensive and I didn’t think it was doing anything. I think the CBD helps him the most. The magnesium does nothing. Via-Calm … still on the fence about whether I think that helps him more than a little, but it’s cheap so I keep him on it.
I’ve treated him for ulcers just in case and had a vet exam for general problems like vision. I haven’t had him tested for Lyme, so I may do that. He never shows any signs of pain or physical discomfort with anything.
The trainer’s evaluation is that he has been very messed up by previous handling and will need a LOT of time and patient handling. She thinks it will be another year before I will know what he is really like.
I’m at the point where I just emailed my vet to ask her to consider prescribing some type of anxiety medication to help him. Just like with people who have high anxiety, I just don’t think I’m doing him any favors by allowing him to just keep freaking out. He is so uncomfortable in his own skin. I’m hoping it will help him like it does a super anxious person who can finally breathe when they find a good anxiety medication that helps them.
I feel much like you–I can’t sell this horse for fear of where he will end up. Horses like him generally don’t have a good outcome because people underestimate the time and patience needed to rehab them. I don’t want him on a trailer bound for a Canadian slaughter house or with someone who just loses it and gets rough with him because he’s not progressing as fast as they would like. He deserves better than that.
He is my only riding horse and he isn’t what I thought I was buying, so it’s frustrating to me to have a horse I can’t ride safely when I want to be out trail riding. I may end up getting a cheap older horse that can still do some light trail riding to tide me over until I find out if he is going to settle down to be safe enough for me to trail ride. He’s only 7 years old, so he has many years ahead if he can finally work out his fears and insecurities. This is his only problem–but it’s a big one.
I wish you well with your situation. It’s a tough place to be in. I tell my boy all the time that he is safe here and he can have a pretty cushy life if he can just learn to calm himself and trust that he is safe. I wish there was a better way to get through to him, but I’m told horses like him take a LONG time. Sigh …
