Bad backs and bad horses

To say that I have had to throw out my lesson plan with Walker so far would be an understatement. I have been driving back and forth between home and here for appointments and weddings and birthday parties and I haven't had longer than a couple of days straight with Walker. To add to the problem, I still haven't managed to get Walker back up to snuff after his five day interlude and so every ride, however short and precious it may be, has been a fight. Now I have a sore back.

I have always had back problems and I have a touch of scoliosis which, although it is not operable, is enough to cause me a great amount of discomfort. In fact, when I started riding again more regularly, I was throwing my back out almost every week and being laid up in my bed. In a way, riding has been good for strengthening my back, but when I hurt my back outside of the barn, riding is usually the last thing I need - especially with a horse like Walker.

So this past weekend while I was away and Walker was enjoying his weekend off (coming on the heels of his five days off pretty much), I ended up hurting my back. So then when I got back I was unable to ride him Sunday as planned and was only able to ride him today. Then tomorrow I'm back home for another appointment. :s

To make matters worse, the footing in the arena was terrible because it had rained so hard here and Walker tripped and spooked himself. The jolt from his spook went up my tender back like lightning. So I decided to stay to the corner of the arena where it was not so slippery and muddy, which just happens to be the corner that Walker and I fight in the most. He also did not seem impressed that I was making him jog such a tiny circle and every so often he'd try to bolt out of the circle across the arena.

Bolting seems to be our new problem, but then again, we accumulate problems like nobody's business. I bought the standing martingale that my instructor suggested but it was way too short. Instead I rode him in a running martingale which didn't really seem to have the effect that I wanted. Whenever Walker bolts, my instructor always tells me to use a lot of leg and push him over but Walker seems to ignore my leg as much as possible or else I worry about him jumping up and/or rearing.

I have become obsessed with rearing. He hasn't even done it with me but I guess the notion that he has reared my trainer off was enough to plant that inkling in my head. He's starting to fall apart again (misbehave since he hasn't had regular rides) and so I naturally assume that's on his misbehaving list. As I'm sure you've figured out by now, I have some trust issues, not to mention a bad case of the bad past horse experiences. I think it will soon be time for another private lesson with my trainer who can hop up on him and kick his butt into shape.

Since the horses were inside today due to a pending lightning storm, I let Walker run around outside for an hour while I puttered around the barn and took some pictures:

Walker doing what he loves best - eating

My sweetheart coming to check out why I was sitting in the grass paddock with him

After contently discovering that I was not bringing him in, he went back to his business