The Juxtaposition of Rider Joy & Horse Distress...

All over equestrian media you can find photos showing the faces of elated riders, joyous from their competition wins or the sheer joy of riding their horses. Their faces are alight with big authentic smiles, their joy is palpable.

But, then you look at the horse.

The horse’s mouth is tensed into a grimace. Their lips may even be parted, teeth visible, or perhaps their jaw is open and their mouth is gaping. Their eyes are tense and wide, sometimes showing the whites of the eye in a look of sheer distress, their eyelid pulled into a triangulated peak. Perhaps their tail is also ringing in the photo, the moment captured as they fly their tail around like a windmill, willing it to propel them out of the situation they’ve found themselves in.

The contrast between the face of the rider and the face of the horse is stark and deeply saddening as it is clear just how happy the human is, their horse bringing them so much obvious joy and the love they feel for the horse and the time they spend with the horse palpable even in a still shot of a photo.

And yet, they don’t see it. They select these photos for their highlight reels, for their profile pictures, for the imagery to go along with lengthy write ups about how fantastic their horse is and how incredible their partnership is. They paint a picture of the deepest love, admiration and respect for their horse while using photos that show their horse in a state of paramount stress.

I didn’t used to notice this eclipse of rider-elation and horse discomfort. I used to be the very type of person I describe, selecting photos of my horses where were stressed, unhappy and possibly also in pain. I thought the photos were beautiful, some of the photos that I now am the most appalled by used to be in the hall of fame for my favourite pictures ever taken.

Learning about horse behaviour and the amount of information we can get simply from their facial expressions has been a blessing and a curse. A blessing because now I can better understand my horses and thereby do better by them. But, a curse, because now I see just how rampant the equine stress epidemic actually is and just how out of touch so many horse-loving humans are with how their horse is actually feeling.

It is heartbreaking, to have a community of people so full of love for the horse but so unable to see when horses are not happy. It’s gone on for so long that when they are eventually exposed to information suggesting their horses may be stressed or in pain, they double down in the denial and insist that couldn’t be possible.

That they love their horse.

That their horse loves them.

That their horse loves the job the human has selected for them.

They may even lash out at those who dare suggest many horses are in high levels of stress. They may call those who say these hurtful things names. They may suggest that these humans are less skillful riders, that they don’t know anything about horses or that they’re overreacting. Or, perhaps, they will say that those who express concern about horse stress are bullies.

There may be any number of deflective accusations or excuses to try to derail the conversation of horse stress and quell the growing discomfort inside of them.

A quiet but persistent internal voice that tells them if these words about horse stress are true, then they have hurt their horse.

And, the idea of hurting their horses is in direct conflict with their love of the animal.

So, rather than pausing and considering that even amongst human relationships, love doesn’t cancel out the ability to hurt those we care about, they insist that the information suggesting they may be causing harm mustn’t be true.

It’s easier, more comfortable.

Push away that internal discomfort and go into denial so you don’t have to deal with a storm of conflicting emotions.

But, even as you push it away, it still stays there, deeply rooted within you, whether you realize it or not.

And it festers.

If you don’t address it, it’ll eventually consume you. You’ll become angrier and angrier with anyone who aggravates that discomfort you’ve buried deep within. You may become more and more rooted in your beliefs as time goes on, for the more time you persist in this denial, the more time was spent hurting your horse if you ever do alter that perspective.

I know this because beast that is rage, shame and insecurity consumed me for many years before I finally had the epiphany that allowed me to realize just how misled many horse people are, how many of us have full blinders on when it comes to horse stress.

Admitting that to myself was hard. I had to completely reevaluate my place in the horse world and reinvent myself as a horse person. My entire trajectory shifted. All of my past goals disintegrated into dust.

There was a period of bone deep grief and sadness. A veil had been pulled and my entire reality had shifted, my identity had been lost and I had to rebuild myself from the ground up.

It is a scary place to be and I totally understand why so many would rather run from the discomfort that it promises, but despite how difficult it was, I don’t regret it.

In reinventing myself and learning how to understand my horses better, I deepened my bonds with them. I learned how to love being around horses again in a way not dissimilar to how I could as a child. I no longer needed the gratification of riding and showing to sincerely enjoy my horses and find value in them.

I was no longer deeply impacted by riding and showing plans being derailed by lamenesses or behavioural problems, because my priorities had shifted. The axis of my horsey universe no longer revolved around being able to ride.

My own mental health improved enormously. I had not realized how impacted I was by my horses’ discomfort, even when I wasn’t consciously aware of how stressed they were. My body could feel it in the air and it hurt my soul, but I could never connect why I was feeling anxious, sad or angry. Or, I didn’t realize I was even feeling any of those things at all.

I caused my horses distress for many years of my riding career. Despite the changes I’ve made over the last few years, the time spent contributing directly to my horses’ chronic stress still comprises the majority of my years spent riding.

But, the whole way along I loved those horses. I never acted deliberately out of malice. I acted in ways I’d been taught to act, in ways I’d had modelled to me by my peers, instructors and upper level idols. I reacted from my poor emotional regulation capacity, often taking out that frustration on my horses. Not to intentionally hurt them, but because I was hurting.

What I did was still wrong, but it wasn’t done with malice.

I wasn’t a bad and evil person even though I hurt my horses.

I was just a human.

Humans make mistakes. Humans become misled by belief systems that they are indoctrinated into. Humans are heavily influenced by the environment around them.

Even outside of horses, humans aren’t really taught to prioritize emotional regulation and learn how to feel emotions in a healthy way. We’re often encouraged to suppress emotions like sadness, because they’re uncomfortable and may make others feel uncomfortable. I’m sure we’ve all been told “don’t cry.”

But, you should cry. Let it out. Emotions serve a purpose. Feel sad. Lay into that uncomfortable feeling and see it through, you’ll feel better after.

You aren’t an evil irredeemable person just because you’ve done things you’re ashamed of.

We all have. Societally, we often just hide it and pretend we’re more perfect than we really are, creating pressure to fill a narrative that doesn’t actually exist in practice.

Every person, no matter how unequivocally good they seem, has done something to cause harm, somewhere.

Every single person.

So, don’t let the internal guilt stop you from growing.

It is far better to accept where you’ve gone wrong and the hurt you’ve caused than it is to deny it and perpetually continue down a road of causing further harm whilst denying it.

It’s also never too late to change the trajectory of your life. To create a new outlook. To reinvent yourself.

The juxtaposition of rider joy and horse distress is an epidemic in the horse world. Still, far too often, photos of highly stressed horses are used to advertise products or to applaud upper level riders for their competition prowess.

Naturally, it desensitizes us to what we’re seeing. Especially when many of us are never actually taught how to properly read horse behaviour and are often actually taught to misread it.

In the horse world that we’ve created, it’s actually harder to learn to walk the path of lowering horse stress because it’s not the most rewarding or encouraged one. You’re more likely to be taught to ignore horse stress signals than you are to be taught how to accurately read them because of the current state of the industry. So, if you slip up and make mistakes, be gentle with yourself.

Unlearning misinformation is a natural part of bettering your horsemanship.

You don’t need to be doomed to continue repeating the same mistakes.

I firmly believe that in the right environment and with the right help, any person can learn to become a better human, regardless of their history and the wrongs they’ve committed.

Life is a perpetual journey of growth and self discovery.

With that, change comes naturally.

To love isn’t to be immune to ever causing harm.

But, to love is to recognize where harm has been done and make changes accordingly.

I see the amount of love in the horse world growing, changing and adapting.

So, hopefully one day, the photos of rider joy will be more consistently aligned with equine contentment.

The path to achieving that starts with you.