Glad you took the day off. Anniversaries are hard. *hugs*
How were you emotionally on Monday? Maybe it wasn't something in the air...it was something in your body language. Is it possible you were less 'there' than you've been for the past month? And so he was less 'there' too? Obviously horses have their own moods and bad days, but I know sometimes when Sage is 'off' its more to do with me than anything. I totally get what you mean about just giving up when pushed over the edge. Definitely him giving you a polite sign to slow down and get friendlier, or work on something else and come back to it another day. Sage hates sideways game too. He definitely feels like it impacts his manly pride to move over for me like that. :-)
Zahra has been scaring the crap out of me lately. :-( It started last Sunday when she tried to bolt and even though I handled it really well, it shook my confidence again. Bah. :-(
he freezes, his muscles become rockfuckingsolid, he blanks out, and you have to wack him over the head HARD before he'll even blink. he pays no fucking attention at all to me as his his human & just focuses 1000% on the shifting air pressure.... then, he PANICS and will do what he can to escape - rear, strike out, airs above ground, try to bolt etc.
it's fairly crazy.
over the course of last year i started to figure out his signals before he tipped over the edge, so we could do some games & lateral work & take his brain off of whatever was FRYING THE FUCK out of it. sometimes, he'd go from fine, cruisy beejah to picking up a onewayexpressticketnopassinggo all out wacky adventure to beejyland within the space of METRES. very crazy.
he hasn't done that in a very long time tho (touchwood) so i am really proud of him.
parelli helped, regular bowen therapy (his therapist is also an animal communicator, so she helped open up the lines of communication - which he NEEDS because he is a very verbose horse and feels shut down if there is no communication) and his calming supplements (chamomile/tryptophan herbal combo). he also gets a vit B supplement as well in his minerals.
all of those things helped immensely. he's not on the calmers anymore, and we aren't getting regular parelli/riding instruction at the moment either (too broke). but he's improving a lot.
So we might do it off a circle, which can sometimes be a little easier- you get your circle and then you just ask the shoulder away by pushing on it with a little energy- for example I might hold up the rope in both hands and asking the head slightly in with the lead hand and have the tail in the other hand just swinging in time with the outside forefoot at the same time. That should take you onto three tracks from where you can work up to sideways fairly easily.
I just wonder if building up to it like that might give him smaller steps he can understand a little more easily. Some of the pictures on my last horsey post, particularly the ones of Small, are kind of working on that stuff.
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How were you emotionally on Monday? Maybe it wasn't something in the air...it was something in your body language. Is it possible you were less 'there' than you've been for the past month? And so he was less 'there' too? Obviously horses have their own moods and bad days, but I know sometimes when Sage is 'off' its more to do with me than anything. I totally get what you mean about just giving up when pushed over the edge. Definitely him giving you a polite sign to slow down and get friendlier, or work on something else and come back to it another day. Sage hates sideways game too. He definitely feels like it impacts his manly pride to move over for me like that. :-)
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Zahra has been scaring the crap out of me lately. :-( It started last Sunday when she tried to bolt and even though I handled it really well, it shook my confidence again. Bah. :-(
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it's fairly crazy.
over the course of last year i started to figure out his signals before he tipped over the edge, so we could do some games & lateral work & take his brain off of whatever was FRYING THE FUCK out of it. sometimes, he'd go from fine, cruisy beejah to picking up a onewayexpressticketnopassinggo all out wacky adventure to beejyland within the space of METRES. very crazy.
he hasn't done that in a very long time tho (touchwood) so i am really proud of him.
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all of those things helped immensely. he's not on the calmers anymore, and we aren't getting regular parelli/riding instruction at the moment either (too broke).
but he's improving a lot.
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I just wonder if building up to it like that might give him smaller steps he can understand a little more easily. Some of the pictures on my last horsey post, particularly the ones of Small, are kind of working on that stuff.
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