Cool to read this. Congratulations on figuring out a way through this with your filly.
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Ohhh I love when you can find a solution by thinking outside the box and taking the individual personality into account! Well done! Also, just from descriptions, I adore your filly, she sounds like my type of horse 
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If the trainer brushes you off when you detail the flipping behavior and what you’ve done to correct it, I suggest you take the horse home immediately. If the trainer provokes the flipping by accident… things could go badly very quickly and the behavior could be cemented instead of eradicated.
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I hope this trainer will continue your great work on this flipping shenanigans without changing your formula.
Or, what Redhorse said.
.
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This trainer is well aware of her habit and is actually taking her as a full halter restart. She’s pretending she’s never been handled at all and taking her back to Square 1. That way, we’re not going backwards to fix holes… we’re just pretending she’s a clean slate and she knows nothing about the halter.
This particular trainer has an entire program designed around babies and getting them super handled on the ground, starting at halter breaking and eventually working up to taking them on walks around the property, off property, over and through obstacles, etc. Ground driving is another facet. Her goal for all her training babies is to create willing, soft horses that are exposed to everything and have a good foundation leading to saddle training in the later years.
Right now, the goal is to send her for a month or two for extensive ground work. That’s about how long her friend will be at another trainer’s for saddle introductions. Both horses are also super herd bound, so this worked out well to get their brains focussed elsewhere instead of one freaking out that her friend is missing. They’re both going to haul together, one will be dropped off at the first trainer and the second will continue down the road to the next trainer.
Once the two months is passed, we’ll evaluate and see how she’s doing. If she needs to stay another month for ground work, then she will. Both trainers are close enough that I can check both horses regularly and make decisions based on their progress. The one being sent for saddle training will be coming back after 30 days, unless she’s really doing well and then she’ll stay for an extra 30 days at the most. I want her to have a light start and then she’ll get kicked out again until next summer when she’s 3.5 years old. The younger troublemaker - there’s no time limit on her. If she has to stay at the trainers for 6 months, so be it. LOL.
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So our little filly has been with the trainer since the end of July. On her second day there, the trainer wanted to see exactly where her thresholds were and the filly flipped over twice. The triggers were pressure she didn’t understand. So the trainer decided to treat her as if she had never been touched before.
We also had chiro out, who found she was tense in her poll and a touch bit sore in one shoulder, but not to the level anyone would guess based on her somersaults. The chiro was actually surprised that the filly was flipping so often, because she wasn’t as tense or ouchy as most horses would be.
I also have an animal communicator friend that came out and told us our filly was showing her pictures of something grabbing her above her head when she was very young, still with her mom. She wasn’t sure what it was, but it hurt and it made her very scared when anything pushed there. It made her feel panicky and she would pull back and sit down, but by the time she realized she wasn’t going to get hurt, she was already too far gone and would end up falling over. That’s why she stands up right afterward and continues as if nothing happened. Communicator has been doing reiki with her since, to help her release that trauma. Now, I know people are skeptical about this, but I’ve had this friend read multiple of my horses and I can’t discount the results I’ve seen after it. According to the communicator, the filly doesn’t want to keep doing this, but doesn’t quite know how to fix it, but showed that she liked the trainer and she’s helping. She also didn’t understand why the farrier got so angry at her and pulled on her face so much and she got scared and didn’t know what she was supposed to do.
Fun fact: that farrier actually reached out to the trainer after she posted some progress videos and said some not very nice things.
That was her first week at the trainer.
Since then, this filly has learned to tie and will stand for hours patiently, by herself and while other horses are being worked around her. The first time, she sat herself down and the trainer had a belly rope around her. The filly didn’t somersault, just sat back and waited. She kept it taut and the filly eventually figured out that when she gave to the pressure, it went away. After that, she didn’t try to pull again.
She also learned to give to pressure all over, she leads, and she’s graduated to ground driving. She hasn’t somersaulted since the first week. The trainer is beyond impressed with her and has been slowly adding more and more pressure to help her thresholds increase. She says the filly is extremely smart and willing, and she gets softer and softer the more she understands.
She will stay there for another month and a bit and then come home until next spring when she goes back for more ground work before potentially being started under saddle. She hasn’t flipped since the first week.
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Sounds like you picked the perfect program for her - great job! And good luck to filly and you OP, for continued success!
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Teach her how to move her hind legs sideways. The more she becokes aware of them the more she can use them.
Butt rope…some horses are just better with pressure from behind.
Bucket of grain -use food as a motivator to go forward.
Teach her how to lunge- whip behind = go forward.
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Yikes
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Trainer checked in again - continued work with ground driving, saddling, dragging logs and now learning to park beside a mounting block. No actual mounting or riding, but teaching her the cues. She jogs and lopes in the round pen, but has to be really pushed because she’s super lazy.
She had her feet done and got a bath. No flipping or even attempts to set back.
Her new habit is trying to walk off when she doesn’t want to do something, but is easily brought back. I’d rather that over the somersaults.
The general consensus is she’s a lovely, willing filly and it looks like her flipping was massive confusion. Now that she understands, she’s improving leaps and bounds.
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Great update!!
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We had a slight setback - she’s been doing great, tying everywhere on the farm, ground driving and being ponied down the trail, hauling, etc. No somersaults or even putting her head up to signal that she might sit down. She’s been standing tied for hours and hours while the trainer works horses around her with no issues.
On the weekend, her trainer hauled her to a local arena for a change of pace. The filly stood calmly for the entire duration, until just before they were due to leave. Then she popped her front feet up, slipped and fell down. She ended up scratching her face and getting some rope burn before the lead rope was cut. She didn’t struggle or anything, but the lead rope got too tight to release the quick release. Lead rope was cut, she stood back up and the trainer checked her over and retied her. Then the trainer left her tied for another 15-20 minutes without issue, before loading her up and taking her home.
Since then, she’s had no other set backs so I’m not even sure this is truly a set back or a simple “babies will be babies” moment.
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Doesn’t sound like a problem if she stood tied after the hiccup.
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It sounds like she’s in good hands and sounds lovely!
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That’s what I figured. She hasn’t had a problem since, but the trainer has recognized that she’s not as settled while hauling as originally thought, so the next plan of attack is to take her for lots of little trailer rides until she feels super confident. She loads and unloads really nicely, stands tied inside, but gets anxious at new locations.
Today, she’s on a trail ride - trainer is ground driving her while her assistant rides another horse.
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I think that for many horses they mask their feelings until it’s too much. We humans might think oh they are really coming along until stumble/fart/explode happens then there’s confetti and feelings all over the map, and good luck putting them all back in the can. My husband’s gelding holds his cards close, my other two are expressive as all get out and they absolutely comport themselves differently. Great of your trainer to really be ‘on’ with this filly to say you know what, you’re going to town and back today just to go.
I chuckled that her new nope is walking away, funny girl.
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Your trainer sounds fantastic, honestly. I’d leave her there for as long as she needs and you can afford.
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Sounds like a good trainer
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Originally, the plan was to leave her at the trainers until the end of October, when she shuts down for the winter. However, the trainer suggested taking her home at the end of this month and handling her on our own to see how well the training sticks. That way, the weather is still decent to work with us and her (I’m in Alberta and our winters can be volatile) if her training doesn’t stick as well as we anticipate. If the training seems to stick, handling wise, she’ll get the winter to relax before heading back to the trainer in the spring time. The trainer doesn’t foresee an issue with starting her to saddle in her two year old year now that we’ve identified her triggers and the filly has started thinking scary things through instead of simply giving up. She’s a very large filly already (larger than my 2.5 year old) so we’re anticipating that a very light start in her two year old season will be beneficial for her since she seems to enjoy learning and using her brain.
This same trainer just took my 2.5 year old on for 60 days of saddle training. This filly should be a nice, clean start since her biggest issue is a bit of impatience when tied (no pulling, just busy feet) and some minor spooking if she can’t try to eat the scary thing first.
Overall, we’re exceptionally happy with this trainer and will likely be putting her kid through college from all the training fees. 
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I agree, it sounds like she reminded herself, “Oh, right, that tantrum isn’t a good idea. Maybe I should just stand here after all.”
