05/24/2026
I didn’t do it.
I didn’t go to the show. My fees were paid, my horse was clean and clipped, and my tack was packed. I was ‘ready’, but I actually was not. It was a hard decision to make but I truly believe it was the right one and I do not see it as failure (but possibly as growth), for a couple reasons:
1. My body is still not the same body I last showed competitively with in 2019. I carried and delivered two babies in two years since then and that’s a big change that takes a while to sort out. It’s only been 4 months since Erin was born. I am feeling stronger and more balanced in the saddle every day, and my confidence is improving too.
2. Marcy has come soooo far, but still has a long way to go. I’m so grateful to have her, and so happy she is sound enough to ride and even to consider showing! She has some behavioural quirks that we are still working on, and cause me to not feel like I can fully trust her yet. Having April off due to the horrible weather did not help our progress. She is super talented so I am confident that when we sort that out, she is going to be very fun to win on.
3. My “competitive brain” is stuck in 2007-2019, where I always had a wicked broke, competitive horse I could trust to do his/her job no matter what. I doubt I can control that part of my mind in the midst of the show atmosphere, and I do not want to put that kind of pressure or expectation on myself or Marcy just now. That is unfair and unrealistic given the above two points.
4. I count this as growth because there was a time I would have gone anyway, even though it might not be the right call for myself or my horse mentally. Sometimes it worked out, but sometimes it didn’t and left me feeling pretty miserable and probably didn’t do my horse any favors. When you know better, you do better. 🩶
My plan for this weekend’s show was to ‘ride the horse I have today’. And that’s exactly what I did - at home, where we needed to be.
