1st day of Libby Clinic

Okay, so in trying to stay positive I'm going to say that I'm glad I listened to the vibes I was getting from Chance and didn't ride. If I have learned anything from this horse it is to listen to him and go with my gut. Found another sticky spot. I couldn't come up with a really good reason not to ride him, just that he didn't feel okay. He was giving me lots of sutle clues and like I just said, I have learned to listen very closely. So Libby was watching me do my ground work trying to find what was wrong. He was light, responsive but off. So she asked me to walk quickly infront of him and he responded by staying with me with slack in the lead. She asked me to get quicker and he did the same. This is when I usually stop and go on to something else, but she asked me to run and his response was different this time. We found the sticky spot. Speed. He had a full blown nutty. So this is what I worked on for 2 hours. Asking him to give me speed and be okay with it. He had lots of nutty's in these 2 hours.

Now not only was he having this new problem but I was making it worse because I was becoming totally discombobulated. I would end up chasing him, or getting too far in front of him or too far behind. So I slowed things down to get myself back together but had to be careful that he was not getting into a shut down trot. At the end of the 2 hours Libby took him, did a few things with him and said he felt better, which made me feel better.

I am trying not to be hard on me. We had such a good day at the park on Thursday and today was a complete mess. I am grateful that he showed me what is troubling him at Libby's clinic. A told me that we need to have the good days to build our confidence to prepare us for days like this. I did hold it together when he was falling apart and he was able to look to me for help. That was big. I will hold on to her words for tonight which gives me hope for tomorrow.

Now I'm going to eat, have a BIG glass of wine, a shower, put on my jammies and sleep.