I was one of those horse crazy girls you heard about. I started at an early age as my favorite toy was always the horses and horse toys. I am also one of those that has started on a new journey with horses as a senior. There were many ups and downs in the years in between.
I did not actually have a horse until my 20's but I worked for and borrowed horses from the time I discovered Pony Club in my area at the age of 13. (First rule of PC at the time was you must have your own horse). I can never fully thank the people that helped me ride at that time as they gave me an outlet for the passion of horses and a haven away from the bullying and stresses of school at that time. My family could no way afford to have me in horses but these people saw my passion and helped me be able to learn and do things with the horses that have been there for the rest of my life so far.
Like many, I worked and lived for the horses, sometimes working 2 or 3 jobs to afford. There were breaks in between when I could not afford or my life was on a different path, but I always returned to the horses. I did the small horse show circuits, hunter classes, 3 day eventing and eventually started doing Dressage. I helped at shows, volunteered, worked for Spruce Meadows in the office, took the Horse Husbandry course at Olds College (Now called Equine Studies) and have continually found that my happy place is always with the horses.
It was not until one of my own horses developed issues that I started down the path I am now on. His behaviour changed and we could not figure out what was going on. To help both him and myself I started looking for help in doing ground work, behaviour analysis, and in-hand work. I did have some ideas on these but struggled to find help in the technical one the proper way to work. Being in North America there are quite a few "natural" horsemanship professionals that I looked at, and while I liked some of the work they do there was just something that did not seem to fit what I thought needed to be done with my own horse.
His turned out to be a physical, biomechanical issue and to understand what needed to be done. I turned to some of the methods for straightness training and biomechanics taught in Europe. At the time I could not find much on this approach here in Canada.
Since then I have been on this unbelievable journey had have met the most incredible people from all over the world. I thank them all. (I will have many of the links to them in my mentors page). I am continuing to take courses and do webinars with the help of my greatest mentors - Thirza Hendriks and Tina Snyder-Watkins.
For the future, I am looking at working on being able to help others with some of the issues I have had. A link between the professionals and your time/knowledge to help your horse. Doing the rehab exercises and k-taping as required to ensure that you and your horse are on the road to where you need to be.
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