So what was the dumbest way you hurt yourself around horses?
I just hurt myself picking out his hoof. I was just twisting a bit to clean his hoof and felt my back suddenly go"out". Very painful and had trouble standing up. Tried to walk it off but not entirely successful.
So as weather may finally get warmer, I am on pain killers, muscle relaxers, and heating pad. Please amuse me with stories of your unexpected injuries!
I broke my leg just above the ankle while hopping over a TINY ditch in the pasture checking on a new horse. It was a bit slick and i slid and came down and heard pop, pop. Super smart.
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Ouch!
My dumbest injury around horses was back when I was a groom. I was giving my rider a leg up on hot jumper, and when the horse when to step off, the rider kicked out and nailed me in the faceā¦knocked me down and gave me quite a black eye for the rest of the show! I also used to regularly skin my knuckles doing caulks.
On a different vein, a client had a bit of a fall from her horse. a few days later she was sore in her groin but thought it was appendicitis. Went to ER to be x-rayed and the x-ray found lung cancer before she had symptoms and before it became serious. So now we joke her horse is a cancer diagnostician. (tumor removed and she is 100% fine - but what a fluke discovery!)
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I was lifting a bag of feed out of a bin, and didnāt realize I had grabbed the tag with one hand instead of the bag itself. When I lifted (hard, because I was trying to clear the bin), the tag ripped and I punched myself in the eye. I burst the blood vessels in that eye and had a lovely purple eyeshadow bruise for weeks!
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I am so sorry Solar Flare but that really did cause me to LOL.
I can remember the terror on a new worker when feeding out the horses with a tractor and I was on the trailer. She ājumpedā the tractor as not used to it and I was thrown onto the ground from the trailer. I was okay though.
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Solar Flare - ah yes, btdt. The worst one of those I did was lifting the box I thought was very heavy that turned out to be quite lightā¦heaved it up so hard I bashed myself in the face with it and broke my nose.
Funniest horse related injury: I was buckling my horseās fly sheet so I was bent over and he decided to bite at a fly or something. I bent over at the same time he turned his head and we cracked each other so hard. I sat down and literally heard birds and saw stars. He turned away and was working his jaw back and forth and rolling his eyes at me. We must have really clobbered each other. I still have a mark on my left forehead from his teeth.
My trainer was assisting one of her students to mount from the ground by doing the hoist up from bent knee thing. She hoisted at the same time the student decided to really give herself a big olā heave-ho. Result: trainer flings student over horse, student lands on head, horse goggles, trainer goggles, student stays quiet for a minute then bursts into laughter. Nothing injured but pride but it was really really funny.
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Well there was the time I tried to shake an extension cord loose from its coil down the barn aisle, somehow let go of the plug at the end of the cord, and managed to clock myself square in the eye with itā¦THAT was a fun one to explain!!
Or the time I was crouched next to my horse putting on his boots (like I do every single ride) and he went after a fly with his hind leg. I wasnāt underneath him or anything remotely dangerous, but he managed to (gently) kick me in the head somehow. Had quite the headache after that :o
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I am with you on the back thing. I was unloading shavings bales (smallish ones maybe 20 lbs) in late October last year and one bounced and headed off the tailgate. It is a freaking bag of shavings. The worst thing would be having to rake them up if the bag busted. But noā¦reflex dictates I twist and catch it. Back started to stiffen up immediately. Within a week or so, horrible sciatica down my left leg. Worked on it with chiropractic, weekly massages, e-stim and ultrasound with the first round of PT. Betterā¦not in tears when the sciatica sets in but went back to the doctor and got and MRI. Two bulging discs impinging on the nerve roots
:mad:. 5 months has gone by and I am doing my second round of PTā¦this time in the pool. At least in the pool without so much weight on my poor skeleton, I can exercise pain free. I have to take ibuprofen and/or Tylenol about every 8 hours around the clock or I am not a happy camper. Off to see the neurosurgeon in a couple weeks. I hope I donāt need surgery but I am just not making any progress with the sciatica.
Back injuries seem to be so stupid. The last one I had (which resolved without surgery:yes:), my friend and I went and bought some ābargainā hay. Nice and green with nice pockets of foxtail that you couldnāt see on the outside. After picking it up out of the field and stacking it at home, I bent over to pick up a hose. Pop goes the disc:eek:. Not only that but to add injury to injury and insultā¦my friend and I had to haul both horses to the vet to get the buckets of foxtails out from under their tongues and where they were shoved into their gums and cheeks. The bargain hay was thrown away:disgust:.
Susan
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Two childhood episodes come to mind for me.
The barn was being whitewashed by the ābig kidsā (teenagers) up on jaw droppingly tall ladders. I stood, open mouthed, looking up at their daring. A big olā glop of whitewash landed right in my face and eyes. Blinded and burning, I turned and ran for the nearby hose. Just then a hundred pound bale of hay fell from the conveyor. It knocked me flat, knocked the wind out of me and ground my face in the sharp gravel. There I was, trapped, unable to breathe, bleeding from nose, chin and lips, still with burning eyes. I was 10 and really adored those teenager cowboys, le sighā¦ I was mortified.
The second time, I was peeling chestnuts on my horseās front legs. I must have leaned in too close to check my work. He kicked his girth area with a front hoof for flies and clocked me fight in the face. Cut my eye right below the eyebrow and gave me my first concussion. And of the course the gorgeous cowboys saw the whole thing.
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Hurt my shoulder in a wheelbarrow accident. The ramp used so you could dump manure into the spreader was notoriously slippery. One of the gals slipped, fell and broke ribs. I slipped coming down and went head first while holding on the the wheelbarrow and hurt my shoulder.
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Stupidest was when I was in a hurry & shooed the TB from his stall so I could pick w/o his āhelpā
He kicked back at me & grazed my wrist - tingled for a bit, but TG nothing broke.
Now, grab a cup of coffee & settle down for my Latest Escape from Disaster aka That Was Your Free Pass
About 3 weeks ago we had a gorgeous Sunday - at least 50F, no wind & sunny.
Ground was dry enough so I decided to see if my 4-in-May Mini remembered how to drive.
Last time I drove him was October.
The Smart Me harnessed him in my sacrifice paddock so if he freaked he would be contained & probably someone on the road would see my inert body :rolleyes:
My horses are loose in this area, free access to stalls or pasture from it.
He was dandy - even when my big horse came over to sniff him as I harnessed.
Miniās attitude was āHey! Cant you see Iām working!ā
Soā¦ I got in, we drove in the area & All was Good - except where we had to turn was soft & deep so he struggled a bit.
I decided my gravel paths just outside the paddock & possibly the asphalt road would be easier - road is closed to through traffic for repairs now, so less cars than usual & mini is fine with cars passing.
Hereās where the Stoopid Me took over.
Usually I harness outside the paddock & take mini out to the cart through my small field where I can close a gate between him & loose horses.
But he was already hitched, so I decided to go out - cart & all - through my main gate.
Mistake the 1st.
Gate is 12ā. so I was able to walk mni & cart out.
Problem #1: 2 large muddy ruts left by shoer & hayguy driving trucks in, softened by recent rain.
Problem #2: Horse sees us going out & decides āThat looks like a good idea. I believe Iāll go tooā
So Stoopid has mini (attached to cart) in one hand, trying to simultaneously close gate & shoo horse back with the otherā¦
And I slip, going to my knees in the muddy ruts.
In my mind, I am leaping to my feet instantly.
In my Aging Body it goes not so fast.
Horse pushes past me, mini geeks at loose horse & there is NWIH I can hold 200# mini.
So heās OFF! & I have time to think - as he trots down the road - āGee, he really is a cute moverā
Followed shortly by horse, who is also moving nicely at extended trot.
Reflexively I holler āWHOA!ā to the mini. And same to the horse/
Mini miraculously must have made a sharp left - going into the ditch and then the cornfield next to me, cart following.
All I can figure is when mini disappeared from sight, horse thought āWTH???ā & turned for home.
He came pelting up the road, down my drive & past me through the gate I was holding open.
Horse contained, I go to look for the mini.
Nothing on the road.
I pray the orange barriers stop him before he gets to the not-being-repaired&thus-busy-road perpendicular.
No sign of mini on the road, then I see something shiny in the field.
It is the cart wheel.
Mini made a 2nd sharp left, headed for home & ran into stickerbushes.
Instead of going the longer. unstickery, way to get to him, I fight my way through the stickers, praying he doesnāt take off againā¦
When I get to him, he is not even breathing hard - more like āThis is your fault, Lady. Now get me the heck out!ā
One of the lines is wrapped on the hub, so that might have helped stop him too. But honestly, this baby is acting like he has all the right in the World to be there & it is my job to untangle the mess.
Which I did, then led him back through the boot-sucking mud.
When we got back on my property, he was still so quiet I tossed Fate to the Wind & got in the cart.
Drove him the last 150ā back to the gate, baby acting like this was par for the course.
I got him unhitched/unharnessed & settled, hosed mud off the cart, then sat outside & cleaned harness with baby assisting, calm as could be. Only damage was a flat tire on the cart.
When I got in the house I discovered I was scratched in places I could not imagine. Both arms, my stomach & hands were a mess.
Lesson Learned: NO SHORTCUTS. EVER! :ambivalence:
And mini is worth his weight in Uranium. :love-struck:
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Oh, these are all terrible and painful and funny at the same time! I had just finished a 50-mile endurance ride. I was fine, horse was fine. Rested a few hours, then loaded horse in trailer, went to walk back to the truck. Stepped wrong, horribly twisted my ankle, fell to the ground. No holes to fall in, just flat ground. Hobbled to the truck and drove home an hour. Barely able to walk, put horse away, went home to be miserable with badly sprained ankle next 3 weeks. Of course everyone assumed I hurt myself during the ride, nope, just by walking!
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Not long after I got Alex, I walked into work one morning with a huge shiner. Weād put a stud chain on him so heād behave a bit better for the farrier. He jerked his head up at the wrong moment and the chain caught me right across the eye.
No one believed that black eye was from my three-year old Thoroughbred. (Actually, they did, but the laughter went on for so long I prefer to remember it otherwise.)
Then there was the totally stupid broken arm - I was in sixth grade, and fell of a single bale of hay. Onto loose hay. And fractured my arm. I still feel stupid about that one!
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Iāve done this too! Hunched over picking hooves and got nailed on the top of my head when the horse kicked a hind hoof at a fly at its girth. Thankfully no one was there to see me sit there, dazed, and a bit dumbfounded. Iāll be fly spraying before I get down there the next time!
My most recent stupid injury was a month ago when I dropped a solid wood jump rail on my head.
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Mine is fortunately pretty tame. I was moving the portable mounting block out of the arena so it could be dragged. My buddy was on the 4 wheeler w/ the drag and we decided to have a merry old game of fake āIām gonna get youā and after running about the full length of the arena I tripped and fell flat on my face. My youthful shenanigans resulted in a huge hole in my breeches and a very bloody knee full of gravel.
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The latest dumb oneā¦last fall I was feeding (in tubs in the field, two mares who just get a handful). I feed baby mare and turn to leave. I go about 10 ft and a deer pops up, filly whirls and takes offā¦right into me. She tried to swerve but shouldered me good and hard.
She didnāt hurt me but I hit the ground so hard on my elbow I broke 2 ribs. Yeesh. Then she trotted up while I was still on the ground balled up, to apologize I am sure. all I could do was throw a grain bucket at her and threaten her if she got a single step closer! My glasses were a solid 20 feet away.
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When I tell this story, all my horsey friends understand completely what I was doing. My Dr and medical friends look at me and roll their eyes and wonder what in earth!!!
I was working with a young horse, on the ground in a round pen. Walking backwards leading him, watching him - as you do!! Tripped over a rail on the ground, landing on another and breaking ribs across my back. It was EXTREMELY painful!! Iāve broken ribs a number of times now, but always across the front - these back ones were waaay worse. Iām not sure the Dr actually wanted to believe me, but she knows I have horses and all my friends were teasing me about yet another injury!!
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I know Iām not the only one to have done this. I was picking out a hoof that was packed solid with mud and raked the hoofpick right up the inside of my arm, leaving an angry gash. Go to do the other front hoof and do it again on the other arm :eek:. Now I have perfectly matched gashes up both arms. No big deal, Iāve done this before, if not as spectacularly. Except non-horse people donāt understand the explanation and start asking me in concerned tones if everything is alright, do I need to talk about anything etc. OMG they think I did this on purpose! I find it hilarious because horse people inadvertently self-multilate and inflict terrible damage on ourselves as we spend blissful moments in our happy place.
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I have a big knife in the barn that I use for cutting carrots, shavings bags, twine, etc. Itās really sharp and it has a long, thin blade.
I also have those āwaveā pitchforks. The tines clip together kind of like Lego pieces. If they pry apart while you are mucking, you can get bedding into the hole and then it wonāt clip back together (yes, major design flaw and clearly a horse person who mucks 10+ stalls a day did NOT have any say in the design).
You see where this is going. Holding the fork steady with one hand, I am digging the stuck bedding out of the hole with my handy extremely sharp knife. Literally AS I AM THINKING āhmmm, this is a bad ideaā the knife slips and I stab myself in the thumb. Lots of blood, but luckily a fully stocked horse first aid kit is nearby, so I clean it out with Betadine, bandage myself up and get on with chores. Not directly horse related (no horses in the barn at the time) but still stupid.
I also had a horse spook while I was leading it and try to bolt, but she stepped on the heel of my boot at she did and I tried to pull it away, fast, to get out of her way, but couldnāt because an 1800 pound draft cross was holding it down. Felt a pop and was ālameā for a bit and everyone made fun of me for it, but healed okay from that too.
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Whilst helping a trainer clip a horse cross tied in the aisle (cross ties being attached to screw eyes with baling twine for safety), horse spooks and pulls back. Neither the halter, the cross tie or the baling twine break. Neither did the screw eye break. What did happen was that the screw eye gave up the fight and brought with it a 1" x 3" board (that was attached to the post with nails) and my face and head caught it. Lesson learned - make sure that screw eyes are actually anchored into an anchored post and not just screwed into surface board!
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