I saw the ad somewhere and quickly wrote down the information. Horse Back Riding and a phone number.

It took a month for me to start texting and asking questions about the owner’s format. I wanted to know all about them and how they offered rides to people.

It’s important to ask a lot of questions when you are sick like I am. To further complicate matters, I don’t look sick, it’s all unseen. I started communicating with her about myself and some of my issues. I told her that I was having back surgery in a couple of weeks, and horseback riding was a “before” project. I let her know that I am sick without going into any details.

I told her that I could only ride for an hour. I knew that would be a challenge and I really believed that I could manage the effort and the challenge. When I was a child, we had many horses and ponies and we spent a lot of time with them. We rode everywhere, we swam with our ponies, we rode at night in the summer, and we enjoyed every minute of it. I wanted to smell the horses and feel the life energy of them. I’ve always loved them all so much. I’ve been on a few rides since then but have never owned a horse since I was a child.

I feel responsible for communication both the giving and the receiving of the message. I want to know that I have been heard. That’s why I ask clarifying questions. We came to an agreement that a one-hour ride is what I will have. She agrees that I can control the time of the ride.

The ride was this morning. I loved it! The fields were full of palmetto and pines. The hurricane had blown lots of trees down and there they lay, right where they fell. It is a great forest with beautiful trails. The air was fantastic, it felt cool and was breezy. I couldn’t imagine a more perfect time for riding. I petted and loved the horse to let him know that he was respected. I felt good, sipped water and the guide and I had a positive conversation.

Forty five minutes into the ride, the pain starts up my legs. I asked my guide what the status of the ride is and where we were. He reassured me that we are close to the trail head. I could hold on as long as I know the end is near. The pain is manageable until it isn’t. It takes about twenty minutes for the pain messengers to swamp my brain. The pain then became bigger than the beautiful view.

The conditions that I have love to collide within my body. I have Fibromyalgia, IBS and COPD. It’s a strange combination that basically controls my activities by forcing me to take timely breaks and to stop any activity that is making me uncomfortable. If I refuse to listen to my body’s messages about pain the nausea begins. My body has decided that the way to deal with pain is to either sit still or lie down. Those are the only options. If I don’t I become nauseated and sicker.

I know these things about me which is why I explicitly discussed with my hostess all factors. I’m thinking she did not fully communicate with her associate. He believed he would do me a favor by giving me an hour and a half horseback ride when I was only paying for one hour.

Halfway through the ride (45 minutes) I wasn’t chatting very much, the pain was overwhelming. It was mostly in my thighs. Fibro likes to amplify pain and that is what was happening. My IBS was kicking up with fierce nausea. This is how I experienced the last half hour of the ride.

The first forty five minutes of the horse back ride were magical and everything that I had expected and hoped for. It was a beautiful day, the horses are amazing and we wandered along peacefully.

It was only towards the last half hour that the pain became so punishing. The horses had a struggle with a stable that was on the path. The lead horse (not mine) bucked backwards and shied away from the stables. This caused my horse to jump back violently. Luckily I had just tightened my grip on the stirrups and I had a firm grip on the bridle. Without those safety measures I would have ended up on the ground. As it was, my horse refused to pass the stables. I got down off of the horse and walked him home and I had to stand between the horse and the stables. All around it was a difficult ending to what had been a good day.

I find that I have difficulty with people who stay inside of their own heads and won’t let new information in. Their definition of the world is set and none can interfere. I needed for my host to understand that with my illnesses I would not be able to maintain horseback riding for very long. I was told that I had control. I didn’t. The information that I had given to the business owner was either not passed on or not passed on effectively. Why was my request so complicated? “Mam, can I have an hour-long horseback ride?” “Yes, you can.” Why couldn’t it happen that way? This associate really thought he was doing a good deed by giving me extra time on the horse. What happened was that I was in much more pain than I should have been had he complied with my request.

I don’t want this ending to ruin this beautiful day when I rode through the woods on a lovely horse in a forest that was old and real. The palmetto bushes were close to the ground, the pine trees tall and set against a background of a blue, blue sky. What a perfect morning.

It hate it when people stay in their head and you can’t have an authentic conversation with them. I hate it when I can’t get through. Communication means clarity, both ways. Sometimes that’s slow and clunky and sometimes doesn’t exist at all.