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From there, we alternated periods of attempting to ride her and pasture time. I
wouldn’t have minded just letting her be a pasture horse, but it was
pretty clear that she was not able to be a pasture horse either. She is very thin skinned, and doesn’t grow a winter coats. She needs to be blanketed, and supplemented so as not to drop too much weight over the winter. She
gets really bad cases of mud fever, and her legs needs to be kept warm
and wrapped in winter to prevent stiffness from arthritis in her
joints. I was stuck as to what to do with her. I
tried everything to help her: physical therapy, massage, acupuncture,
holistic body work, herbal supplements, homeopathy, just name it. It helped some, but I never got long term result. Riding her was always an adventure: no matter how much lunging I did, or how long I would ride her, she was always high strung, pulling like there is no tomorrow, and I never felt like she got actually trained. I heard everything: that she was crazy, she was too far gone and I was wasting my time with her; that I was making her neurotic, and on the lighter side, she was nick named Speedy Gonzales and we’ve been called the wild women from Borneo. I also had someone asking me what my riding style was, as it was hard to tell from just watching me ride her. I answered that it was the flying buttock riding style, and that I was surprised she never heard of it before. Boarding her turned out to be a challenge too. She scared people, and her pacing, and tantrums would make people very uncomfortable. I always said that if the drama queens would go on as parade, she would be holding the banner. I felt that I was running out of options with her. She
had muscle soreness all the time, even if not worked, she is very barn
sour, and she never really seemed to relax or enjoy any interaction. Along with not having a highly rideable horse, what was making me even sadder is the fact that I was not feeling that I had a meaningful connection to her. It was like she was in her own world, and could barely acknowledge the fact that I was here. I
was starting to resign, and accept the fact that she would never be
sane again, and that maybe, if she was never going to be physically or
mentally happy, I should have her put to sleep. Then, as I was looking around on the Bay Area Equestrian Network website, I saw the advertisement for the Focus Equine. I thought I would give it a try. I
ordered the one week trial sample, and see what would happen. For one
thing, I wanted to see if she would actually eat it, as I spent a lot
of money on products that she would not touch, no matter how much
molasses and carrots I would put it in. My first great
surprise is that she eats it really well, and my second great surprise
is that I actually see improvement in her behavior. I even started riding her again, and she is a different horse. She is still forward and energetic, but the nervous edge is no longer there. She does not fight the bit, or rear up anymore if I ask her to stay at a halt for more than five seconds. She used to be impossible to keep at a halt. She
would get so impatient and angry with it that she would, as I mentioned
before rear up, or get into flipping her tongue in her mouth. She also used to put her tongue over the bit all the time, and then get very upset about it. I believe that if the product is able to help my horse, there is hope for a lot of horses and people out there. As
I mentioned before, this mare was tagged as dangerous on the track, and
a lot of people trainers, vets, chiropractors, always gave me a pretty
poor prognosis on the chances this mare would ever come back to some
“normal” physical fitness, starting by a normal muscle tone, and
nervous system, without even talking about mental soundness. It
feels like I spent over five years with a stranger, and there are no
words to describe the joy to see her looking around, with peace in her
eyes and starting to remember who she truly is. Welcome back Fleche
Bleue, I truly missed you.
Love, mom.
Martine Bouvard
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