Claustrophobia and My Mare

I really enjoyed Michele's post and your comments on animal communicators. In fact, I've been planning a book in which the heroine is an animal communicator. I think it would be a hoot to write.

One really good book I read on the subject is called "Spoken in Whispers" by Nicci Mackay.

For those of you who've asked, my mare, Gailey, is finally getting over her cellulitus. This weekend was her first turnout weekend. The picture above shows my hubbie hand walking her Thanksgiving weekend. As you can see, she's lost a lot of weight.

On a personal note, I did have the misfortune of tripping across an animal communicator whom I didn't consider legitimate. I went to her for acupressure on my horse, not for her opinion on my horse's mental state and didn't appreciate her grandstanding at my expense in front of a bunch of spectators.

Don't get me wrong, I do believe there are people who are in tune with animals and can communicate with them. I also believe there are plenty who take advantage of the human owners. This particular person was quite arrogant and made me feel about 2 inches small. She treated me like I didn't know my mare, while she had her figured out. It didn't set well with me, but I gritted my teeth and kept my mouth shut. People who truly have these gifts are usually much more humble.

I do know this horse. I've owned her for 11 years. We've been through hell and back together. Many of you have read my old posts on her, including our trailering issues.

So this woman proceeded to tell me the mare was being belligerant, and she could get her to load in the trailer frontwards (I load and haul her backwards).  She also said she could "fix" her because the mare was a bully (she can be) had my number (only when I let her). She volunteered to have her husband assist me as he was a disciple of a well-known horse whisperer. The minute she said that, I knew I had her. You see, the man who told me to NEVER load my girl frontwards because of her extreme phobia regarding hitting her head happened to be her husband's mentor. I informed her of such, which rendered her speechless and her spectators in shock. I politely thanked her and left.

Which brings up the real subject of my post this month. My mare is claustrophobic to the point of it being a severe phobia. I've learned over the years to work around it. Unfortunately, not everyone who handles her understands her like I do.

If you knew her history, you'd understand where all this originated. As a youngster, she grew fast. As a result, I don't think she realized how big she was. At a few years old, she was being led into her stall. The barnworker didn't bother to open the stall door completely, and he left the latch sticking out. The latch embedded itself between two ribs and almost punctured a lung. She still carries the scars. Six months later, she was caught in a fence at the same boarding stable. She still has those scars, too. Add to that, a trainer who wenched her into a too-small trailer a year later and a broken nose from hitting it on the trailer.

I worked for years with natural horsemanship trainers to cure her issues to a point. I've outlined most of those experiences in past posts, so I won't bore you with any of those details.

Here's the problem. During her recent two-month convalescence and confinement to a stall, her claustrophobia issues have come back. It's really odd, as I'm the only one handling her. She balks coming in and out of the stall. Normally, I don't have problems with her unless someone else has scared her by yanking on her lead rope until she throws her head and hits it on the stall door.

Currently, she has been leaping in and out of her stall, after balking in the doorway. Not exactly a safe thing to have a 1500-pound horse going in and out of a stall like a horse breaking from a starting gate.

To handle her fear of stall doors, I don't turn and face her and pull on the lead rope when she balks like most people would do. I've learned that I need to stand at her head facing the same direction and walk out with her. I repeat until she follows me calmly. I've been working on this for the past month, yet she still leaps in and out of the stall door. It as if she believes a troll is hiding on top of the door to smash her on her head. I'm puzzled because she hasn't had any episodes that I know of what would have triggered this reaction. I don't understand what's going on.

So I, too, have been entertaining calling a animal communicator. Michele's post was quite timely for me. I'd be most interested in hearing anyone's theories as to what may have dredged up this old behavior.

My Misadventures with Gayliena, Continued

First of all, a big thanks to our guest blogger, Laurie R. King.

I left off a few weeks ago with Gailey being hauled in a trailer with a wasps nest in the manger--unknown to me. I was at a horse show. When I tried to load her, she was having none of that. Finally I looked in the trailer and found the nest, but it was too late. She'd once again found reason to believe that the trailer wasn't a good place to be. It took me three hours to load her that day.

I'd entered her in another show in Oregon a few weeks later, and she actually loaded in about a 1/2 hour. When it came to time to load her after the show, it took over six hours! She'd try to go in then she'd get scared and throw her head backwards then hit it on the trailer. By the time she loaded, I was in tears.

So it was back to the horse whisperer. For six months she stayed at his farm in eastern Washington. Finally, he called to tell me that her trailering phobia seemed to be insurmountable and dangerous to her and him. He wouldn't work with her anymore, as she was too nice of a horse, and he couldn't live with her possible death on his conscience.

By that time, I'd bought a newer, BIGGER trailer for her, thinking that would help matters. It didn't. I was at my wit's end. I had an expensive show horse that I'd mortgaged my house to buy, and I couldn't haul her to shows. My dream horse had turned into the biggest nightmare.

In desperation I asked if he'd tried to load her backwards. He hadn't thought of it. A week later he called back. The mare was loading backwards without hesitation. That was five years ago. To this day I back her into the trailer and haul her backwards. I haven't had a problem loading her since thanks to the persistence of a that trainer.

So now you know the rest of the story.

(Photo by Showcase Imagery)

My Misadventures with Gayliena

First of all, I'd like to thank Marilyn for guest blogging with us yesterday. I hope all of you will check out her book and her website.
__________

I promised last time that I relate some of my trials and tribulations with my first warmblood and a mare, at that. I bought Gayliena, AKA Gailey, as a barely broke 3-year-old with an attitude. She didn't haul in a trailer but we managed to get her in and haul her straight to a trainer's. After a recent injury on a horse, no way was I breaking a young horse, especially a HUGE young horse.

Six months later, I brought her home. She still didn't load. In fact, her trailing issues had turned into a full-blown phobia. Even worse, the only way I could ride her without her balking and threatening to go up, was by begging my daughter-in-law to stand in the arena and hold a lunge whip. As long as Cindy held the whip near my mare, she'd move forward. So that's how our summer went.

I couldn't haul her to lessons because she wouldn't load. To make matters worse, she'd chase me around her paddock with her teeth bared or turn and try to kick me. Yes, it was the summer from hell. I can't tell you how many times I sat down and cried regarding my supposed dream-horse-turned-nightmare. I couldn't even sell her because how can you sell a horse that won't load? I'd ridden horses all my life, but they'd always been dead broke and safe about about 4-5 inches smaller. This mare was way beyond my abilities at the time.

Realizing I wasn't getting anywhere on my own, I enlisted the help of the first in a long line of cowboys (horse whisperer types) to help me. After a year of working with the first cowboy, I had a mare that no longer chased me around, and was actually quite personable and sweet under her alpha mare exterior. We could "join up" and trot and canter safely around the arena.

One problem, she still didn't load. He tried everything, then conceded that he didn't know what to do. So he referred me to his mentor, a man who was a disciple of Buck Brannaman. Off she went to Greg's place. In two weeks he had her loading.

Life was good. I was hauling to lessons. We were finally on-track. In fact, I learned a very important lesson that summer from my dressage trainer. The mare was a bluffer. If you called her bluff, she'd back right down. She was also a little lazy and bucking and rearing were way too much work. Once I realized that she was actually quite safe under saddle, things improved in leaps and bounds.

Until the day that I hauled her to a horse show with an undetected wasps nest in the manger area of the horse trailer, and we were back to the drawing board.

To be continued...