Annie....11/4/10

11/4/10
Annie has a lot of issues with claustraphobia.  You would never know it to be around her, she likes people.  She will leave her feed to come and see what you are doing.  So, I tend to want to move to fast...after all, nothing really bothers her...until the pressure comes.  Then it can get a little western.  She can sometimes be tied and all of the sudden start yanking back.  She feels trapped and I wasn't attentive enough to notice the signs.  Blocker rings are a good thing here, but just remember...if your lead rope is to stiff, you can break a blocker ring!

Since I am fairly freshly back from a Brent Grarf clinic, I thought it would be a good idea to put into practice some of the things I learned there.  We spent the afternoon doing some ground work.  She took to this pretty well but we did have a little trouble with some of the retraining I had to do on myself.  The more I pay attention, the better she seems to do.  I look forward to some riding this weekend, but I always need to remind myself to pay attention to her claustraphobia.  She will get better with this in time.