It's ironic that I have been saying for some time now that my life is boring and slow and not much happens in it. And yet here I am, finding it hard to get in a ride almost every day. It's frustrating that since Thursday I haven't been up on Honey. Weather, swimming outings, and other excursions had prompted my visits to the paddock to be brief, filling up water or mucking out before leaving for another outing. It's become odd to feel this way, and hopefully adding the gym back in this week won't make the time shorter. I think the last few days, or should I say I hope, have been a little out of the ordinary and will settle back down this week!Today I woke up with all the intentions to ride Honey, but I'll admit it, I wanted to get truly stuck in with her, and I wanted ground support with me. I'm not exactly cured from my nerves with my sudden confidence, and after our last ride, yeah, I think I've lost my brass balls. Sadly my friend who has been helping couldn't come out. In a sense, it's been a blessing in disguise though.
Honey's a little sore. It had to be expected she would start to show signs, I mean, she's spent months off and now had a week of riding! She's unfit, and feeling muscles she didn't feel before. And so through her shoulder on one side in the trot, she's stiff looking. It looks like the leg is a little stressed/tired. She's not unsound or anything, but I think that's possibly the reason why when its on the inside that she couldn't pick herself up to trot correctly the other day. It's not horribly painful, she was happy to trot around on the lunge in the newly made larger riding area, and when she trotted out more actively, it was barely noticeable. It was just in her lazy trot.
When she was first put under saddle, for a few weeks she was going really well. But before I grew the confidence to take her out into the back paddocks that are bigger, we did ride in a small space with lots of corners/circles. Rider error, I helped her shoulder get sore then too. In the end it was ran out of her by a capable rider, who just got that leg fully stretching and working. Sadly three days or so later I fell off her and shattered my leg. Anyways my point here is that because of circle work, her shoulder can get stressed. And whilst I made a point of making my riding area bigger than it used to be when I was nervous, it's to be expected that she would start to feel the impact again. I've been as careful as I can, and because I felt like I needed to accommodate her shoulders more, I changed the riding area today, and then found out she was already feeling it. I believe it doesn't help that the saddle is forward and I feel I'm too close to her shoulder. I'm rectifying this as soon as I can, in getting a longer girth and trying to push her saddle back, where it belongs.
So I feel a little bit frustrated. It's a situation where, I know what I've done wrong, but feels inevitable at the same time. I'm not some rider who can go out into a big arse paddock and ride around on the buckle. I've improved from before and made my riding area bigger, but I know straight lines are the key here. So thankfully with the expansion again, I should be able to improve our straight lines. I am trying so hard within my own boundaries to keep pushing. It just sucks that I'm not able to be like my friends, who don't batter their eyelids at what size of an area they're riding in. Who can balance and control better than I can. But I can't sit here knocking myself either. I'm weak physically myself, but I'm striving for a better rider every time I get up on my horse. I'm asking more of myself than I thought I would at this stage. And I'm achieving it. I guess this blog should be titled "Impatience". I want so much, but have to wait for the good things to develop.
Tomorrow I plan to ride Honey. I'll see how we go now with more space, and how her leg is with trotting. The big canter she did on the lunge today (I made my circles so big they followed the outline of the riding area) seemed to help it immensely. So hopefully we'll see some results. Until then, I'll try and get a new, longer girth in the next week or so, and then getting that saddle back ought to help too. I know stopping the muscles after awakening them is the worst thing I can do, so even if I just walk her around, it'll be better than nothing!
And I think she has lost a little weight already, and so have I... we're building ourselves up on the right path now!!
Chelle x
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