I have blogged before about owning my first mare, and how Khaleesi has been trial by fire as she is the most marish of any mare in the program. For the past year and a half, we have managed her hormones very well, and she has only had one heat cycle that snuck through. While hormones have not taken away the reasons she is nicknamed “The Black Dragon,” and I still tack her up with a helmet on, they have managed the physical issues associated with cycling that left her unwilling to work for days at a time.

After a great show at Morven, her one-star qualifications were complete. I had entered Maryland Horse Trials the following weekend as a backup, but realizing I did not need to run the event, I elected to just go and perform a combined test.

The weather was gorgeous, my husband and good friend were joining me for the day, and I was excited to really go for it in dressage. She is consistently in the top after dressage, but I got a good lecture from Kim Severson in my lesson last week on pushing outside my comfort zone and changing all my 7s to 8s.

I was a woman on a mission at Maryland. Like many doomed missions, the ways in which it would unravel were not fathomable to me at the onset. I would lose my innocence in the dressage ring that day, one murderous mark at a time.

I cheerily mounted up for my warm-up, and gave myself 40 minutes instead of my usual 25, because she is extremely fit and takes a bit longer to settle. I knew within about 30 steps that it was not going to be a good day, and Lizzie was NOT in the mood for a morning of dressage. I thus began my first trip through what I will call the five stages of negotiation with a mare.

Stage One: Rational Compromise

We began the way we always do, some walk leg yields and then big figure eights at the trot in a low frame to warm up her back.

But today, she didn’t want to leg yield left.

“OK,” I thought, “then let’s leg yield right.”

Nope.

“OK, maybe she is a bit sore, how about we just walk forward and stretch?”

Lizzie made it clear she thought, “How about you get off me and walk wherever and however you so choose yourself?!”

“But Lizzie,” I reminded her, “this is the thing we do, you know, where we come out and we do the stretchy thing and then we do the power thing and then we go in the box and you wink at the judge and flick your feet?”

Lizzie: “No idea what you are talking about. And also, I hate you.”

Stage Two: Challenge over Control

Trying not to panic, I enter the mindset that, “Hey, I feed you every day of the year, and you get to do whatever you want for 23 hours a day. But for this hour, on this day, I am in the one in charge!”

Instead of asking her to leg yield left, I tell her to. She stomps her hooves firmly as she walks, and throws her snout in the air for good measure. I give her a swift kick to the right side.

“I am serious! I am the human!” I say with my aids.

She gnashes her teeth against the bit to make sure I know that she, also, is very serious. She then humps her back and lurches forward, and then leans aggressively into the leg I am asking her to yield from.

“No,” she is insisting, “I am 1,200 pounds, and most days I humor you, but today is not one of those days, and you are most certainly NOT the one in charge.”

I am beginning to agree with her.

Stage Three: Shameless Begging

After stage two took up most of our warm-up, at most gaits, I realized I was in a real pickle. I was sent up to the final warm-up and was only two riders out. I had never been in this position with her, and just couldn’t make sense of it. She LOVES flatwork, it is easy for her, we have a great partnership….what is the deal!?

I then took on the new tactic of shameless begging. After any tiny little softening she offered, I would pat her and effusively say, “Good girl Lizzie, that’s it!”

I think she found me condescending.

The more I tried to encourage any type of yielding, or forward motion, or heck, generic movement in the direction I was praying for, the more she seemed to try the opposite. As I realized we were in some crooked state of reverse psychology, my number was called.

“Oh God, Lizzie,” I begged as we trotted/piaffed around the ring, “please, please, I will keep my hands extra still and my legs extra steady and let’s just do what we do really well, please, please!”

I entered at A, headed to X, thought perhaps the gods were smiling on me, and then as I tried to halt I saw her snout fly into the air and I got hit in the face with a flying hunk of foam from her mouth. Literally.

Shamed, proceeding in crooked forward motion against my will towards the judge, Lizzie’s snout still in the air while her jaws chomped, I threw a salute. I realized this would be the longest six and a half minutes of my life.

Stage Four: Stupefied Horror.

I can’t tell you much about the test. I think, in order to survive with dignity in this life, that my mind was deleting it as quickly as it occurred. Or perhaps I was in genuine shock over the events unfolding inside my white rectangle of happiness.

I know that I saw her snout more in those six minutes than I have all year, and I know that anything I suggested was OFFENSIVE. It didn’t matter if it was going forward (OFFENSIVE IDEA) or half halting (ALSO OFFENSIVE) or perhaps doing nothing (STILL OFFENDED), every tactic I tried was met with utter disgust by Lizzie. Or delight, I am still not sure.

I finished the test the same way I started it: screeching to a crooked and unstill halt somewhere near the centerline, throwing a salute in motion. I looked at the judge with eyes that said, “I am sorry. I am sorry that six minutes of your life was wasted on judging this.” She clearly took pity on me, and offered the words, “Well, today was really not your day!”

Shamed and saddened I left the ring, my head low and Lizzie’s finally allowed the freedom to be in the stratosphere without harassment. The first face I saw was my husband, who comes to one or two events a year, is allergic to horses, and knows nothing about dressage.

“That was the worst test of my life,” I said to him slowly, letting the shock subside.

“Yes,” he said, “the transitions were especially bad…she looked really angry.”

I wanted to yell at him that he was supposed to be supportive, but then I realized that there was nothing to support. He was right, damnit.

Stage Five: Revelation

I scratched from the jumping, because let’s be honest, the only thing worse than that dressage test would be to involve jumps in our display of disobedience. I picked up my test, and saw a slew of 4s, including one for submission. To be honest, a 4 was generous. We had a record high score of 47 (I haven’t been over a 40 in over two years!), and I was not enjoying the taste of the humble pie that riding all so often shoves down my unwilling throat.

I got home, unloaded her and took care of her, then turned her out. She trotted over to some geldings, spread her legs, squirted, and began squealing.

She had overridden her hormones for the first time in a year and a half, and boy did I have hell to pay for it.

I learned one undeniable truth that day. When it comes to negotiating with Lizzie in heat, there is no negotiating. 

One of the Chronicle’s bloggers, Kristin Carpenter juggles the management of her own company, Linder Educational Coaching, organizing the Area II Young Rider Advancement Program out of Morningside Training Farm in The Plains, Va., and eventing at the FEI levels. She grew up in Louisiana and bought “Trance,” a green off-the-track Thoroughbred, as a teenager. Together, they ended up competing at the North American Young Riders Championships and the Bromont CCI**. She’s now bringing another OTTB, Lizzie, up through the ranks. 

Read all of Kristin’s blogs…