Hello Honeychoppers – how are you all doing?

I hope you haven’t been suffering in the rainy weather we have had recently – it’s been pretty grim where I live. Last week pretty much rained ALL week but the ground is now much better as a result so we can’t complain too much!

So what have we been up to since my last blog? Well, it’s very much a case of slowly but surely on the recovery front for Mikey and his proximal suspensory injury. We are now 10 months in, and had a vet visit just last week, the vet has agreed that we can just ‘keep on keeping on’ and see if we can keep Mikey happy, and sound. Whether we will ever get back to the levels we were working before I am not sure, but for now we will just keep trying to build on the work we have been doing and see where we end up the other side of the summer. That’s all we can do right?

You might remember in my last blog me saying that my confidence had taken a bit of a bashing, well I am pleased to say that I am starting to feel a bit more like the ‘old Laura’. The nerves still rear their head here and there, but thankfully nothing like what I was experiencing a couple of months ago. Last week we headed to a local venue and hired an arena there, Mikey did some really nice work and I came away smiling, which is always a good sign. We have also had our first canter under saddle, the first since last September! I have to say it did feel pretty good to be cantering again! Let’s hope we can build on the amount of canter we are doing over the coming weeks.

Amy has taken Mikey to a couple of shows, mostly in hand classes as he isn’t 100% back to full work, but she also managed a ridden class with him, we spoke to the judge before hand and got special permission to do just walk and trot, they both did so well and came away with big smiles and a couple of rosettes! Clever Amy and Clever Mikey!

Amy and Mikey take part in their first ever ridden show together!

What else have we been up to?

I have also started to get my hacking mojo back – nerves are a funny thing when they just take over, as over the years I have hacked Mikey everywhere! But over the last few weeks I have been feeling more confident and alongside hacking I have been doing lots of long lining round the fields which has helped Mikey get out and about a bit more and used to ‘normal life’ again.

Out hacking again!

The next few weeks?

Are very much a case of continuing to build on our work, getting the fitness levels improved, increasing the canter, and also in the process hopefully dropping some weight as Mikey has definitely increased in the waistline department since his injury! We will keep you posted on our progress and be back in a month with our latest news!

That’s all for now, until next time

Laura and Mikey x