Horses - what have you learned from falls?

3 worst falls. They go in order of pain.

1, least painful of the 3 - Most recent. I passed out off my horse into a fence. I woke up still holding onto his reins in a death grip and my ribs were bruised. Being the idiot I was I got back on and rode for an hour later then went to the hospital and found out I had a severe kidney infection.

2 - I was 10. I my mare took off and I passed out off her at full out gallop. I fell right under her and got ran over. Apparently if the ground wasn't soft I would of had my rip cage crushed.

3, most painful - I was trail riding on my six yearold horse. She was pretty calm but something flipped in her brain and she reared up and went over. We landed on a fence and broke it. I let go when we hit the ground , but didnt get out of the way fast enough beacuse she went up and came back down on my leg. I rode her home with my leg that was numb. I didn't break anything but I was bruised for six months after. That was the worst because I didn't faint and was awake to experiance it.

I've had so many other fall of stories that are pretty funny. Like when I was eight, my pony spooked and I came off sideways and landed in a ditch. I'll try and remember some others.

I've fallen off more times than I could ever count. The good thing is once you fall off a few times, you learn how to do it while limiting the amount of pain and damge to your head, by either rolling off a shoulder or landing on my fatt a$$! ROFL

My worst falls:

1- Don't know what happened, but suffered from a 3rd class concussion. We *think* that Riley decided to try and take a bounce as an oxer and fell, crushing my head somehow some way. It actually wasn't that bad when I think about it. He wasn't hurt, and I don't remember being hurt!

2- When I had just got Riley, I was 9, he was a bucking bronco. He sent me flying into the stratosphere and I landed RIGHT on my behind, my tailbone more specifically.

Those are the *only* times I've ever fallen and never got back on. The uncountable other times I've fallen, I haven't really hurt myself, usually it was either doing something stupid, like attempting to jump backwards and bareback, or after hanging off a green spooked horse, finally giving up and jumping for the dirt. ROFL

Actually now that I think about it, more of my "incidents" with horses has happened on the ground. All of the older horses the ranch got from the auction usually kicked me once or twice. My horse kicked me a few times as well.

The sayings I've experienced most about falling:

If you've never fallen off, your not challenging yourself enough

and of course,

If your not at least a little bit scared about falling off, your gonna LOL

Hmm interesting topic-- I guess if you have been into horses long enough you can just start categorizing your falls--funny, painful, memorable...

Let's see the fall that caused the most damage was more than 23 years ago--one of my first times on my first horse, riding around bareback. He did a simple spook and I landed on my arm and broke my wrist. After that fall I have some how learned to never land that way again--wouldn't think you could always control something like that, but some how I seem to avoid catching my self that way.

One time the horse I was showing literally stopped over the jump--he had his front end over the jump and his back end still on the other side--then he violently kicked his back end over an sent me flying but somehow landing on my feet before falling on my butt---that and several other falls have tried to break me of getting ahead of the horse over fences --but I know I still do it...

One of the funniest had to be when I was riding a very green mare and we were relaxing and walking on a really loose rein--I kicked my feet out of the stirrups and went to gently pat her on the butt to tell her she was a good girl, which spooked the crap out of her and I fell off....another time as a young teen I was trail riding around the farm by mylself and was playing at riding side saddle--I some how lost my reign and my horse started barreling down the trail back towards the barn--I was hoding on for dear life and then had to decide if I wanted to be seen in such a position runing full tilt out of control back to the barn or bail and come up with another story...I bailed!--what I learned form that was...a...just don't do that!

My grandfather used to tell me I couldn't be a cowgirl until I had fallen off at least 6 times.

Most of my falls are completely embarassing because they were all due to my stupid ideas

My first pony was the sweetest, calmest pony that I have ever come across to this day, and he was also the horse that I've had the most falls on, lol.

The first time I fell off I was riding through a field of tall grass and a bunny jumped out and spooked Sprinkles, and he took off. We were headed towards the woods behind the barn and all I heard was my grandfather screaming for me to jump off , so I half jumped half fell off.

The second time I fell off Sprinkles I was standing up on his back in socks (b/c my sister and I had watched a TV show and there were vaulters on and they looked like they were wearing socks, so we decided to give it a try). I was standing up and Erin was leading Sprinkles around and she decided we were going to go down a steep hill. My socks slipped, I landed with a hard smack on Sprinkles' behind and bounced off, lol.

The last incident with Sprinkes, I didn't exactly fall off Spinkles, but he was involved. My sister and I came up with the genius idea that we were going to hook Sprinkles up to our bikes and he would pull us. So we got out our Barbie bikes, put 2 leadlines on his halter, and attached the other end of the leadlines to our bikes. I'm not sure how, but eventually we got Sprinkles moving and then Erin and I ran into each other with our bikes and fell off (going about .5 miles an hour, lol).

I've fallen off other times, but those were my most memorable. I never really learned anything from them though, other than maybe it's a little harder to vault then it looks.

Some pictures of pictures of Sprinkles:
When we first got him (I'm on the left w/ short hair)


A family walk (I'm in the middle)


A few years later (I'm in the back)

I love the name Sprinkles! How sweet is that!

The things you do when your a young horsewoman eh? The "ingenius" ideas you come up with! LMAO

Now the barbie bikes, that's something I don't think I'd even have the gall to try! ROFL

One of the worst incidents with my horse, was I was trying to do the run up from behind and mount. You know the move you always see in those western movies. The problem was, my horse was over 16h and I was about 4'8, ROFL. So I had placed him on a hill. I ran full tilt, and when I was about 5 feet away a gust of wind blew my jacket (it wasn't buttoned up) and Riley spooked, kicking my directly in my hoo hoo and my face.

To this day I'll swear up and down, getting kicked in the hoo hoo was a MILLION times worse than getting kicked in the face.

It's funny how the old horse people always make comments like that. They wear the times they've fallen off like a badge of honour. The more times the better. But, if you really hurt yourself it counts against you! LMAO. You have to know how to fall off, not hurt yourself and you get extra points if you fell off doing something stupid! LMAO

I remember when we first got Riley, I was so young, it was a family thing to get him tacked up and ready to go. I had just got a brand new english saddle, girth, stirrup leathers etc, and was taking it all out for the first run.

Don't ask me how, and I don't remember who was in charge of doing up the girth, but as I was cantering along the saddle began to slide. Somehow, someway I landed on my feet, and Eddy, the man who had previously owned the horse, a "rough western" rider, couldn't have been more impressed!

"You looked like one of them fancy ballerinas the way you landed! It was awesome!"

Of course my parents were in shock at what had just happened, but I seem to remember being pretty pleased with myself! LMAO

My sister did a cartoon type sculpture for a foxhunting club. They had a different way of electing their club officers - whoever fell off first in the season was president the following year, the next was vice president and so on down the line. They said it got to be such an honor that folks were parting company with their horses in record numbers. Lol!
Somewhere, Sis has a pic of the sculpture she did - I'll see if I can find it and post it, it's pretty funny.

I'll never know how we never got caught in all of our adventures with Sprinkles, if my grandparents had found out half the stuff we'd done we probably never would have been allowed around a horse again, lol.

Although I don't think they saw Sprinkles as much of a threat to us, a lot of times we'd let him out of his stall, with no halter or anything, while we played by the house and he would just hang out and follow us around. He was more like a dog than a horse. Dang I really miss him.

LOL, I have a similar story. My grandfather would always tell us about how he used to mount (I've seen it a few times in old westerns, it's where you grab hold of the horn with both hands, get the horse galloping while you hold your feet up in front of you, then you bring your feet down and the momentum kicks your legs over the horse, anybody know what I'm talking about? lol).

Well, I just thought this was the neatest thing EVER!! (I wanted to be a cowgirl so bad!) I attempted this many times with Sprinkles, I would take a hold of his reins and start running and eventually he would reach a slow trot (his max. speed most of the time ) then I would run back and try and grab the horn, but by the time I had done that Sprinkles was usually stopped again, lol. I still have dreams of doing it, lol, but now I can actually see how risky it would be, not to mention hard, lol)

OMG! I want to laugh at that b/c of the mental picture, but on the other hand...OUCH!

LMAO@Snark! It's soo true though ya see! ROFL

I know what your talking about corgi, the vaulters that we spoke of earlier do that a lot! ROFL

I can see a young girl, with the lovely ponies, that at you said normally only have a top speed of a relaxed trot (LOL) trying desperately to reach a gallop! LOL

That was one of the first 5 times I ever had to go to the hospital, how embarassing having a doctor touch you down there! :O

My number one choice of show-off mounting, was the bareback side mount. For me, at 20 not being over 5'3 it's pretty difficult. The grab the mane, stand facing the back end of the horse, getting as far with your behind to their head and running and swinging up off their mane. It took me years to master it, and for Riley to figure out what the heck was going on! LMAO

Well I have had horses buck while I was on them but I havent fallen off. A lot of people say that your not a true cowgirl until you fall once.... but I dont believe them. lol

Lauren