My husband has a little saying that he brings up whenever discussions involve “incidents” with horses – he says, “When you are involved with horses, it is not ‘if’ you are going to have an accident, but ‘when’ you are going to have an accident.”
While I think this is a very pessimistic view of my beloved world of horses, I am not in a position to dispute it, as over my lifetime I have had a couple of ‘incidents’ that involved significant medical assistance. Anyone who spends time with me and my horses knows I am very safety conscious and sometimes overly concerned with safety of myself and my equine, yet things still happen that are out of my control.
One issue I am currently dealing with, and I’m sure many of you horsey folks could relate, is how to overcome the fear caused by a serious equine accident. Generally, I suspect riders and drivers experience fear at some point in their activities with horses and it is something that has to be dealt with so you can continue to enjoy the equine activities you love to do. April Clay, a psychologist and former rider, has identified four typical responses to this fear: avoiding the activity all together; ‘freezing’ when attempting to do the specific activity and aborting the attempt; becoming ‘hyper vigilant’ or feeling jumpy and extremely conscious of every move you or your horse makes; or excessive anxiety. So how do you get over this fear? Again, I refer to work by Clay, where she identifies several techniques and suggestions for rebuilding your confidence:
- Take it slow – modify your activities with your horse to the level below where your accident happened (e.g smaller jumps, less speed, easier terrain).
- Build physical strength/basic skills: by building your physical strength you will increase your physical security. This is particularly important in my case – I cannot believe how much muscle strength I have lost since my accident, I still can’t walk well or manage stairs and it has been almost a year.
- Realign your self talk: if that little voice in your head is telling you negative things, change the conversation by thinking, “Stop – I am feeling anxious but that is normal and I can do this.”
- Visualize yourself correcting the problem: if the accident was due to a technical error (your position, something you did with the reins, etc.) then get an experienced person (e.g. coach) to help you physically correct the technical issue then carry on.
- Relaxation training: learn techniques to help you relax the tension in your body; this tension is transmitted to the horse and may be a contributing factor to ‘incidents.’
I thought I was over the mental component of my accident, but it all came back the other day when I hitched up one of my small horses to drive. My first mistake was assuming he was the same horse as one year ago – I should have done some ground driving first to refresh his memory. He stood quietly for hitching, I drove up in to my grass arena and he lost it – rearing, backing up, bunching up to buck! He had never done any of those things before and he had been driven quite a bit.
In the past, I might have just gotten firmer with him, told him to “get over himself” and carried on, but that little shred of fear was present so I did the more prudent thing, unhitched him from the vehicle and did some ground driving (tough for me but good for him).
I will do a few days of ground driving then we will hitch up again. I am sure it will go well (positive self talk), we will just walk (take it slow) and I will consciously think of relaxing (deep breaths). We will succeed!
