Working it out

Over the past two weeks I've been easing back into riding with Charlie. If you remember, he'd been somewhat off and I was worried about saddle fit or him having played a little too rough outside with his friends, basically got myself all worked up that he's either hurt or that my saddle is broken, yada yada yada....

What? A growing, healing boy needs sustenance!

But I want to ride my horse, darn it, and all I can see every day is his neck and topline - which I worked so hard to start building up - wasting away even over just the last month (seriously, how can all that hard work disappear so fast???). So I said screw it. I want to ride. And you know what? It's actually been going ok. 

When I flex you can still see my muscles...

Looking back, Charlie started acting out right around when I was finally getting him to start using himself correctly. And then I gave up the basics in favor of doing some fun stuff. This makes me think 1) he didn't like how tired he got when I asked him to actually work, 2) he was sore from using his back and neck in new ways, and 3) I was too eager to do fun things like jump and gallop and neglected to continue to properly condition him because, well, it's boring to just trot trot trot....

So my new goal is to keep Charlie busy, changing it up each day so that both he and I don't get bored, but making sure to focus on some core strengthening too: open lunging, stretching(!), long lines with my new surcingle (thanks, Emily!), and of course some riding.

Long lines one day...

Fun round pen open lunging and playing with tarps another...

Yay! Finally a ride!

Loving the side reins right now!

Definitely going to be doing more of this.

This time my focus is on making everything quality. I'm going to really work to get Charlie long and low for extended periods, correcting him if he starts to hollow out. After all this is a barn, not a zoo; no giraffes allowed. Hopefully it will be something that starts to feel natural to Charlie and after awhile I won't have to work so hard at it. I've never had a horse this long-bodied before and difficult to package.

I think the side reins are going to be my new best friend. After just five minutes with them earlier this week, Charlie's back was lifting, his neck was softening, and we had some glorious slobber going on (only a horse person would be excited about that). Plus Charlie knows open lunging really well, so I can work him in the side reins in the round pen without a line.

He licked a lot of it off but we do have slobber! Success!

I do think there is something up with Charlie's right side, maybe a rib out of place, since he's still more sensitive than usual about being brushed over there, but since I don't have the money to have a chiro out right now I've decided to just try to work it out the best I can with stretching on the ground and from the saddle.

Luckily Charlie tolerates stretching and will let me do all kinds of pulling, pushing, prodding. And he loves carrot stretches. Anything for food. I think I could make him roll over like a dog if I really tried...

Mine!

Aaaaaannd gotcha!

Sneaky carrot, hiding way down there.

Hopefully this renewed focus and determination will last so I can enjoy much more saddle time with a happy, comfortable horse :)

A rare sight: everyone at the barn together, enjoying a ride

Chiropractor, Side Reins and Sunny Days

This week was a busy week for Charlie: chiro on Wednesday, farrier on Saturday and getting used to side reins in between everything else. We also lunged in the outdoor for the first time ever (not his calmest experience, but it was buggy, I'll give him that).

My artillery: a shedding blade, side reins, Sore-No-More and No Bows wraps (to be explained)

I was actually really excited about Dr. Katz's visit on Wednesday, but kept psyching myself out leading up to it because I was sure he would take one look at my saddle and say there was no way it fit and that I have to go shopping for an expensive new one....but he didn't! Actually, after trying many different pad options, he said that although the saddle didn't fit perfectly, it was doable and the Lami-cell pad I've been using was doing the best job of removing any front-to-back rocking. The remaining rock was minimal enough that he said he didn't think it would bother most horses, but Charlie is extra sensitive. He showed me how to use a folded No Bose wrap instead (or a hand towel) to raise the front of the saddle a little and even everything out better than any of the expensive pads were doing. I really liked how Dr. Katz was so down-to-earth and honest; he didn't try to sell me anything or convince me to purchase expensive correction. Instead he worked with what I had and I really appreciated it.

My improvised No Bows pad

Dr. Katz did say that Charlie, with those huge withers, is a nightmare to fit (no kidding) and will probably always need some sort of corrective pads but before we go crazy with that we have to make him comfortable enough to work and develop his topline (Pro: now I have a "real excuse" to buy one of the Mattes pads I drool over; Con: my wallet is rapidly thinning!). He also mentioned trying a fleece girth instead of my Professionals Choice synthetic girth because apparently some horses feel like it pulls their belly hair and so that might be contributing to Charlie's grumpiness. I have nothing against fleece girths, but I really like my Professionals Choice girth....so easy to clean! For Charlie's happiness, though, it's worth switching it up and seeing what happens.

After the saddle fitting Dr. Katz did a full chiropractic evaluation on Charlie. At one point he asked me to take Charlie into the indoor and walk/trot in hand so he could see how Charlie moved (Ooops, forgot about that part of the eval). I had a brief moment of panic since I hadn't gotten to lunge Charlie before Dr. Katz got there and thought he'd go through the roof or run me over or think we were "playing", but (thankfully) Charlie was well-behaved. We stopped just before he passed his "this-is-boring-so-let's-spice-things-up" threshold. Phew!

Overall, Dr. Katz pinpointed some key areas of soreness in Charlie's withers and hind end, but he got some real good releases and said there weren't any true "problem" areas (I have a short video of some of it but it is still processing, I'll have to post later). For the next month or so I will ride with the corrective padding to try and build up muscle and use Sore-No-More religiously after every workout and then we'll see where we stand.

On Friday we started with some light lunge work again. I'm slowly trying to introduce Charlie to the idea of the side reins so for the meantime they're extended from his rope halter with some baling twine so they aren't tight, just so he gets used to them being there. I'm gradually shortening them each time and then will transition to using his bridle. This was taken with them super loose at the beginning of our session; he's obviously not too impressed:

Finally (although you wouldn't know it today) we did have a few really warm days this week and Charlie definitely enjoyed the time out in the sun. Dan and I got to the barn this weekend to find him conked out and soaking up the sun. It was pretty adorable :)

Grazing is good, but it makes the neighbors jealous

Side reins

One of my finds at this weekend's tack sale was a pair of leather and elastic side reins. I knew they were going to be a little short for Charlie, even though they were horse-sized, but for $5 I figured I could make them work. After warming him up I hooked them on. Here's a video of my first time using them with him, jury rigged with some bailing twine to be nice and loose until he gets used to them. He fought a bit at first until he learned that moving forward and down meant no pressure on his face, then he was really good.

Once I got a nice relaxed trot in both directions with the side reins I took them off, had him trot and canter again each way and then got on. We had one *argument* (I think he thought he was done after the side rein bit) but I didn't feel like dealing with that crap so I pushed him through it and and he came back together quite nicely in the end.

This weekend was a rough one for me for many different reasons so getting on and riding today was therapeutic, exactly what I felt I needed to stay grounded. Other than Dan, being around the horses seems to be the only thing that makes sense in my life right now, so I'm so glad that I at least have that. Otherwise I think I'd lose it.