How a horse changed my life

My beautiful Bay mare, ‘Baby’ has cushings syndrome.  Which means that the end is in sight.  And so the process of my grieving has begun.  Trying to imagine a life without her in it.  Trying to decide where to bury her.  Grieving all the dreams I had for us which will probably never now come true.

On one of my weeps with Baby over the last few weeks I realised that for all our life together I have been lamenting how our relationship ‘should’ have been.  How we should have been able to ride off into the distance together every day, fearless, bonded, as one, just revelling in nature and each other and the pure bliss of riding safely, harmoniously, peacefully.

My heart had been breaking over the fact that the vision I had always held of our relationship was unlikely to come true.  After weeks of weeping I realised what she has given me, what she has brought me, and how she changed my life and its course completely.

Without her, I never would have bought Tinkerbell who is so completely Ben’s pony. I never would have stumbled across Parelli , I never would have started to heal the relationship with my own Mother (because I finally understood how frustration easily leads to temper loss and violence), I would never have met Peter and Judy, I would never have met my wonderful english farrier friend who gave me back so much self esteem, I never would have met the gorgeous Shane vet, I never would have learned to ride again properly, I never would have gone to Tamworth and met Kim, I never would have gone to Kangaroo valley and met the Grippers, I never would have come to Avalon and met Ged and got married and had a son etc.,

I thought I was saving her but it turns out she was saving me.  Setting my life on a completely different trajectory.  She changed the course of my life.  Everything was different after Baby.  No longer was I a beach girl, but a paddock and bush girl.  My dream of owning land in Australia had to come true, she made it so.  She has taught me so much about horses and she has been a serene, nurturing, beautiful background to my life.  And with her illness has come a return to the pure love we have for each other and the daily communication which had been abandoned in the busyness of Ben.

I know what it is for horse and human to be bonded heart to heart.  We may never have that easy riding relationship I long for.  It would be lovely to think that it was still possible and I guess if I had the time and didn’t have a 3 year old I could work to make it so.  But now I know that doesn’t matter because owning and loving a horse is not necessarily about riding.  I always felt guilty that it was ‘a waste’.  But Baby and Tinkerbell have brought me love, they have been patient with me while I learned, they are still patient with me when I am wrong, they have been my companions and friends when I had no others, they have been my children when I was sure they were the only children I would ever have, they have amused and amazed and frustrated and educated me.

Baby is one of the great loves of my life and I can’t begin to imagine life without her. For over 12 years she has been my friend and comforter.  I can only hope and pray that I have brought something beautiful to her life too and that she can forgive me for the wrongs I have done her and that she is as grateful for me as I am for her.  I wish I had been a better owner, Mother and custodian than I have been.  I wish I had more courage and persistence and patience.  I love her so much and I do know she loves me.

She changed everything.  She is a bright shining angel who healed so many parts of my life, and all the time I was looking at where she failed me and what I had missed.  No one has ever had a better friend than Baby has been to me and to all of us who have ever bathed in her beauty and radiant beingness . . . I guess this is a lesson to look not for what we have lost, or wasted or missed out on but to flip the coin and see what we have gained.

Menopause or I don’t want to die

Just as I had really started enjoying the summer of my life, with my little boy, my farm, my lovely husband, I turned into a raging Monster with a heart and soul black and dark and thick with anger and frustration.  Then the hot flushes started.  And still I didn’t have the sense to marry the two together.  I blamed toddlerdom (even though I have an angel child), Ged and the world at large.  My marriage almost didn’t survive the onslaught.  I couldn’t believe that Menopause could happen to me aged only 45.  We wanted another child . . . every time last year my period came later and later I was convinced I was pregnant.  I didn’t see the writing on the wall … didn’t even know there WAS writing on the wall.

I thought menopause happened in your fifties, not your forties.  I thought I was in my prime, not starting the steady decline to death.  I thought anything was possible and the world was my oyster.  Instead my ovaries were shutting down, changing me forever from woman to wasteland of broken dreams, lost opportunities and babies terminated before they ever had a chance to become.

Menopause is a bitch.  The mood swings, the violent rages welling up from nowhere, no reason and no way to control them.  The hot flushes which take over and rule my life.  The feeling of being ill and at the mercy of something so far beyond my control as to make me look like King Canute trying to stop the waves . . . The constant pain in my uterus, the grief – the endless waves of grief as I farewell my child bearing years, the little girl I didn’t get to have and hold, the sense of myself as young, that glorious feeling of ripe fertility only possible in late pregnancy, the sense of limitless possibilities . . .

All of a sudden I, who have duelled and diced and danced with death so many times in my lifetime and have longed to fall into his peaceful embrace am screaming and sobbing ‘I don’t want to die’.  Clearly one has to see one’s one ultimate destiny and the steady decline towards it unblinkered in order to appreciate just how precious this life, and every moment in it, is.

After all, we don’t know what is going to happen next.  I was flirting with the idea of getting pregnant again, not taking it that seriously, thinking I had plenty of time . . .

Baby is dying too.  She has Cushings and she is going downhill fast.  So I am also screaming and sobbing ‘I don’t know how or who to be without Baby’ and ‘please don’t go’ and ‘just one last summer together please’.  I’m letting go of babies real and ethereal – those who are and those who were never meant to be . . .

You see, I was so busy being busy, so determinedly procrastinating, saving the fun and enjoyment and play til some  ‘later’ in the ever diminishing future when all the work is done that I didn’t realise that we have to have fun NOW because we just don’t know what tomorrow may bring and the greatest gift we can give anyone, can share with anyone, can spend is TIME.  Sweet, precious, limited, ever ticking time.

Like Peter Pan before me, I never wanted to grow up.  I succeeded pretty well.  I only ever thought of myself as grown up last year and now it appears I am old, dried up, used up, washed up.  Old before my time with creaking joints and sore, tired muscles and wrinkles like clothes left too long in the dryer.

I didn’t know this was around the corner.  I never imagined how debilitating, depressing and daunting this particular female rite of passage could be.  It feels like transition in labour – totally out of control, completely uncomfortable, sick making, overwhelming and I’m trying to stand on the merry go round, yelling ‘I didn’t sign up for this, let me off!’

Why the code of silence Women?  Why don’t we talk about this, map the stages and ages of our ovaries and life’s passages so we know what to expect, when and how to wear and bear it.

The addict in me is appalled at how many pills I am taking at the moment.  And how many I seem to need.  My naturopath says ‘why not?’ and ‘stop fighting it, this is beyond your control.’  But really I would rather just ride it out and get it over with.  But I can’t.  I have a little boy to look after.  A little boy of three who knows what a hot flush is, where the fan is, and hates having to have all the car windows open while I ride one out.

I have to try and manage and mitigate and massage some of my moods into something resembling normality.  For my own sanity.  For my child’s future psychological health.  For Ged’s peace of mind.  If only I could sleep how much better would all our lives be . . .

I completely understand why my Mother’s generation took HRT.  Instead I am on red clover, licorice, zizyphus, vitamin E, iron, B6, zinc, st john’s wort, the occasional kava, some sort of anti stress pill and who knows what from my acupuncturist.  The grief I can handle, the physical symptoms are driving me mad . . .

No man could handle menopause.  No woman ought to have to.  It’s too much, too soon, I’m not ready, can’t cope and don’t want to die . . . .