Early Morning
Coming to a Halt
It was a Monday afternoon, five days before I was supposed to leave for the Alltech National Horse Show. Like every afternoon I headed out to the farm to do the PM chores; feed, clean stalls, watering etc. There were six horses I was taking care of. As I was coming to the fifth horse, I placed my very full wheelbarrow outside his stall. When began to open the stall door the horse freaked out. The horse charged the front of his stall and jumped out over my extremely full wheel borrow knocking it completely over. I chased this horse all over the property trying to catch him. I figured at some point someone is going to see me chasing this almost eighteen hand animal and would come help me. Turns out, I was completely alone. I finally herded him back into the barn, he cantered down the aisle and came to a halt at Early’s stall. I panicked, I didn’t want this horse trying to jump into her stall or worse her hurting herself by lunging at him. The only thing I had in my hand was my phone. I didn’t want to walk up behind him as he was fighting with Early. I tossed my phone at his butt hoping it would get enough of his attention. My little plan worked, the horse jumped back over the knocked over wheelbarrow and into his stall. As I approached his stall, I noticed the horse was covered in mud from his chest to his hooves. I grabbed his halter and proceeded to enter the stall. He definitely knew he was naughty and was standing in the back of his stall quivering. As I went to move the pitch fork to outside of the stall he squatted down, my first thought was “that’s weird, he looks like he is trying to kick me.” BOOM! The next thing I knew I was on the ground on my side under the water buckets, screaming so loud I didn’t even know I was screaming. The pain was indescribable, it was almost so much pain at once I felt nothing. As I came to regain some kind of normal thought process, that is when I remembered I was completely alone on the property. I figured that it was roughly around 4:30 PM, sooner or later someone was going to show up to feed the other horses. My first rational thought was “If the man could stand in the Grand Canyon with his arm caught in a rock for over 24 hours, I can lay here waiting for someone to help me.” As I laid there, I was too scared to look down to see what damage had been done. I knew my hands were wrapped around both sides of my knee. I also noticed my quad blowing up like a balloon. As minutes turned into many, I started to get very dizzy. I knew I had to stay awake and wait for someone to find me. Eventually the horse came over to me, he put his head down on the ground near where I laid, as if he was saying “I’m Sorry.” As he raised his head, his nose was covered in blood and it was my blood. That’s when I realized I was in trouble. I gathered all the strength I could and screamed out the first thing that came to mind, “MOM!” Finally, I heard the voice I was waiting for irritably reply, “WHAT SAMANTHA!” Instantly I felt a sigh of relief knowing someone was here and that someone was my mom.
After getting to Wellington Regional Hospital and LOTS of morphine later, I was told I had a compound fractured femur which was going to result in surgery. I went into surgery at 1:30 AM under the care of Dr. Sama. When you are in that much pain and on that much morphine, you don't know what is going on around you. I had no idea how severe my injury was until the next day. I spent six agonizing days in the hospital, every hour slowly figuring out something I couldn’t do. I couldn’t move, couldn’t walk, couldn’t get up to go to the bathroom, could barely eat due to the pain and the list went on. The one thing on that list that caused me to break was not going with Early to the Alltech National Horse Show. As the week in the hospital went on, I found out I was looking at intense physical therapy for the next four to five months and a minimum of three before I could sit on Early again. Just hearing those words, crippled me more than my injury.
The Comeback is Greater than the Setback
Every day I struggled, the pain I don’t have words for it. I went to physical therapy twice a week and had a doctor’s appointments every three weeks to check the healing of my injury. There were so many days I wanted to give up, so many days I woke up and just cried. The only thing that physically kept me going was getting back to Early. After my week in the hospital I had to wait another week and a half before I could even think about going to the barn. The first day I was allowed to go see Early, I was grinning from ear to ear. I had very little mobility, for the first month and a half I was riding a walker. My parents were very nervous about me going to see Early. One, they were worried she was going to spook at my walker and two, if she did what would that do to my mental state. That day, I slowly hobbled into the barn. When Early and I made eye contact she lit up with joy, as did I. That visit was the first of many over the next 2 months. One day, after I graduated from walker to crutches, I went to go see my girl. Early’s mane was all messy, which annoyed my very OCD mind. I grabbed the nearest comb to brush her mane out. Placing my crutches at the stall door, I used the stall guard and wall to position me up right. After roughly five minutes of not being supervised by my dad, I found myself with Early in the back of her stall. There was no way without physical help was I going to make it back to where my crutches were. I grabbed hold of Early's mane and asked, “Hey big mama, can you help me get to my crutches.” Early then began taking the smallest steps towards the front of her stall. At one point I lost my footing and she completely froze. When she felt me stable enough, she began her baby steps again. As I thanked her with a big kiss I turned around to grab my crutches, to my surprise my dad was at the door. My dad stood there holding my crutches with a smirk on his face as he witnessed the entire moment that Early and I had. As I looked him in the face like a deer in the head lights he said “If I wasn’t here to witness that, no one would have believed you. That was a moment straight out of a Disney movie.” My response was “Please don’t Tell Mom!”
Weeks passed and I was itching to get back on Early. I fought hard in physical therapy every session. Eventually my sessions moved from two days a week to three. Every time I saw Dr. Sama he would ask “Your depression is stunting your healing. What can we do to make you feel better emotionally?” My response “Sitting on Early’s Back.” Finally, the day before Christmas Eve I had an appointment with Dr. Sama. As I waited for him to appear in my operatory room, I looked over at my mom making the comment, “All I want for Christmas is to sit on Early.” When Dr. Sama came into the operatory room he looked at me with a smirk on his face. At that moment I knew I was getting the news I had been waiting two months for. Dr. Sama asked if he could give me my first Christmas present. He told me I was FINALLY able to ride. HOWEVER, I had to promise to ride a horse I trusted and it had to be drugged! I of coursed agreed to everything, not really hearing anything he said after the words “You can ride!” I got in the car, looked over at my mom and said, “TAKE ME TO THE BARN!” When I arrived at the barn, there were power sprayers on the roof with workman everywhere. My mom asked if we could come back later when everyone was gone. I scolded her “I have waited two full months to sit on this horse, I AM NOT WAITING ANOTHER MINUTE!” What I have yet to mention is, Early couldn’t be ridden by anyone but me. Early’s workout schedule was going on the treadmill twice a day for two full months. I walked (as well as I could) into the barn tacked her up as fast as I could and walked her out to the mounting block. Early never stood still at the mounting block. Still being weak on my right side, getting on was definitely going to be an issue. As I got everything situated, I leaned over and said, “Hi mama, I need you to stand still for me, I am not as quick as I once was.” That mare froze at the mounting block, she didn't dare move a muscle until she felt me secured on her back. Gives me chills to this day. As predicted, Early was absolutely PERFECT our first ride. I only walked and in the ring like my mom requested. I cried the whole time, just thinking how hard I had worked the last two months to get to this moment. The next day, I was out in the field trotting around as if I never missed a day.
Back In the Saddle
After a month of just trotting and trail riding, I finally got the “Okay” to jump. Which was a grey area to begin with. I remember telling Alan to enter me in the point nine-five jumpers and his response was, “Early is going to jump the point nine-fives the same way she is going to jump a meter twenty-five. Get her in shape and we’ll enter you when you’re ready.” Two weeks later I was in the meter thirty jumpers, Early and I placed tenth out of a hundred and thirty horses. The following day we won the meter thirty-five speed week seven of WEF. I had goal for myself with the support from Alan to end WEF in the meter forties, thankfully Early agreed. We finished out WEF in the meter forty speed challenges and were working our way up for the spring meter forty open stakes and maybe the Grand Prix’s.
Not Out of the Clear Just Yet
Little did anyone know, I was suffering in silence. I had expressed the amount of discomfort I had in my leg to my physical therapist, my parents, and to Dr. Sama. But I was truly never honest with any of them. My fear of riding Early being taken away kept me from telling anyone how much pain I was truly in. So many days, I would either get in my car, shower, or anywhere that no one could hear me. I would just cry from the amount of pain I was in. Just to paint a picture of my pain tolerance, when I shattered my collarbone, I was laughing. I remember so many days trying to get up my stairs to get to my room. I always looked around the house to make sure no one saw me wince as the tears streamed down my face. As you are reading this, I bet some of you are thinking “wow, she is dumb. If she was that amount of pain, she should have told someone.” But what you don’t understand is, having Early taken away from me for the second time would have been more painful then rebreaking my leg all over again.
When riding Early, her trot was so springy it perfectly popped me out of the tack for a posting. When I cantered she was so strong all I had to use was all my upper body strength to keep myself in the saddle. Jumping, she made sure I was perfectly in the center of her back and not once did she ever through her body to my weak side. There are a few pictures after my accident where I am sitting in the saddle awkwardly to avoid pain in my leg. When someone would mention how funny or awkward I looked, I would just laugh it off. I didn’t dare say “Well my leg is positioned like that because if I move it, the pain is so high I wouldn’t be able to keep my composure.” For five months, Early was the only horse I would ride. Then eventually when I started being asked to ride other horses, I couldn’t say no. The fear of being questioned ‘why not,’ made me say yes. I faked it until I could no longer fake it.
Middle of May, my parents and I took a trip to Israel for me to make Aliyah, which means becoming a citizen of Israel. I was planning on joining Dani Goldstein on the Israeli equestrian team. While we were in Israel, my parents insisted on taking a three-hour walking of Jerusalem. As much as I wanted to say no, I couldn’t. My parents were both so excited. In my head I was just praying my leg just kept it together. Half way through the tour, I suddenly felt a deep pain in my hip. I practically collapsed. When I stood up, the pain was gone. When I went to take another step, the pain reappeared. It was a deep crippling pain right outside my groin. I was actually terrified to tell my parents. One, I knew they would be on the phone with Dr. Sama before I could finish my sentence. Two, I didn’t want to ruin their trip. My only saving grace was we were leaving the next day. I kept my composure for the remainder of our trip. As we were making the trip home, we were walking through Newark trying to make our connector to Florida. I took a funny step and completely fell to the floor. Before I knew it, my dad was at my side asking what happened. I couldn’t even form word’s, I had tears streaming down my face. Every time I took a step it was this horrific deep pain in my hip. As I went to describe what I was feeling, my dad was already on the phone with my PT. The next morning, I had an eight AM appointment with Dr. Sama, then my PT immediately after. The results from both appointments were signs of trauma in my deep hip flexor tendon. It was either the tip of the screw that was in my femur holding the rod in place or by trauma from the original accident. I had exactly four days before I left for Country Heir Horse Show, in Lexington Kentucky and I wasn’t going to miss it. We ended compromising on a type of treatment that would keep me in the saddle, at least for my Kentucky horse show. What we hoped was that this new course of treatment would solve the problem. It didn’t.
The Ultimate Comeback
I finally was on the road to Kentucky and I couldn’t contain my excitement to be going back to one of my favorite horse shows with my favorite girl. (Side note, I also was going to meet six-week old Lillo for the first time, but I’ll save that story for another time.) My game plan with Early for the first week was meter forties. If that went well, enter in the Grand Prix on Saturday. This would be my first Grand Prix since my accident, I was asked if I was nervous. My response was every time, “Early will take care of me.” I had so much confidence in that mare. Some of our best rounds were in the Rolex Stadium. The only thing that made this time different was the internal bling I had in my leg and the unknown cause for the pain in my hip.
That Week Early jumped into fourth out of fifty-three horses in the meter forty jump off class and jumped super in the meter forty Welcome Stake with one down. Given our two super rounds. Alan and I felt pretty confident entering in the Grand Prix. I remember that day as if it was yesterday. Due to my new hip issue, walking the course was not in the cards for me. I had my friend Carson walk all the lines in the Grand Prix course while I monitored from a distance. It was actually quite comical. Carson would walk a line and then scream across the ring the number she walked. You could only imagine the stares we were receiving from the course officials and everyone else walking the course.
Finally, it was time to get on and get warmed up. Early was pleasantly easy to warm-up that day, no major issues. We walked down the ramp to the ingate, Alan looked over at me and said, “Start singing, Good Luck.” My song of choice that day was Justin Bieber and Chris Browns ‘Next To You.’ As I we walked into ring I started singing “You are my dream, there’s not a thing I won’t do, I’ll give my life up for you, ‘cause you are my dream.” Early sorrowed around the course that night, probably jumping the best she has ever jumped for me. I remember coming up to the last oxer, grinning from ear to ear knowing that my girl was about to jump a clean round for me. I landed from the oxer and the crowd roared. You would have thought I won the Olympics. I walked out of the ring hysterically crying, Alan smacked my leg (the good one) and told me Good Job then instantly ran the other direction to avoid the emotional cry fest. I hopped off Early, remember I gave her a big hug and whispered how much I loved her. I knew after that round there was one person I had to see, my mom. I limped around the corner to make my way up to the stands to find her. As I made the turn, she was on her way down to come find me. The minute we locked eyes we both burst into tears. My mom just held me while I sobbed into her chest. I just kept thinking how hard the last six months were and how I felt like I was never going to be the same. Here I was six months back in the saddle jumping clean in the Grand Prix on a horse people doubted. When I came up to breath, I realized we weren’t alone. There stood the girls from Castlewood also in tears. Before I knew it, their arms were wrapped around me and my mom. It was a moment in my career I will never forget.
Early and I went back in for the jump off and put in a solid clean round putting us in sixth place out of a super competitive field of horses. Honestly, the ribbon didn’t matter to me. I had just endured one of the most horrific injuries, I was eight months out of surgery jumping clean on one of the most difficult horses in the buisness. I won that night, Early and I won that night.
Early and I traveled to Fox Lea Farm’s summer circuit after our Kentucky vacation. We won a Welcome Stakes and had top placings in the Grand Prix’s. It was the best summer I could have asked for. Little did I know, it was going to be my last.
Better to have Loved and Loss, then to Never Love at All
After coming home from my summer with Early, we had a lot of life changing events coming up. My parents found a property in Wellington where I could finally live out my dream of having Early in my backyard. I was also looking at going back in for another surgery. Turns out, the tip of my screw at the top femur was sticking out just enough that every time I walked, it was cutting my deep hip flexor tendon. I agreed to have my screws removed in August. One, being it was the month I could afford some down time. Two, I would be recovering with Early in my back yard. I figured if I was going to go through recovery again, I was going to do it with Early by my side, literally.
A day after surgery, I was back on crutches, I promised I would stay out of the barn. I made sure someone brought Early to my door multiple times that day. I just wanted to see her face. While I sat on my couch, I could see look out my window and see Early in her paddock. I remember looking over at her thinking something was off. I just felt it in my soul. Early just didn’t look right to me. She was eating and enjoying the summer morning. But I just knew something was just off. My next drive by the window she was laying down. She never lays down in the paddock. I called my mom in a panic. My mom brought Early in put her in her stall, reassured me she was okay. “She ate a mint and apple from me, she’s is fine.” As I was laying on my couch, I felt the ground viberate (Disclosure I live in the barn apartment and can hear/feel all the horses from my living room.) I broke my promise, I hobbled out to the barn on my crutches. Early was laying down. The way she looked at me, I knew she was collicing. I screamed for my mom to call our vet. Within the hour our vet was out at the barn, giving Early IV fluids and treating her for colic. The way Early responded, we thought it was just a simple gas colic. You know, no big deal. My vet told me if by nine pm, she hasn’t poop, peed, or won’t take a mint from you, to call him. I checked her every thirty minutes. Every time I walked out, Early looked at me like she was ready for dinner. At nine I walked out, there was no poop in her stall, but she had peed, and drank some water. I gave Early four mints and she was looking for more. I went back into my apartment, finally able to lay down without anxiety. I remember looking at the clock, it was 10:17 PM, as my eyes went to close I heard a bang in the barn. I instantly jumped up, ran out of the door forgetting my crutches. Early was back down, this time her face was different. Something wasn’t right.
At two-thirty in the morning, I had to make the hardest decision I ever made. I had to let Early go. Early had suffered from a ruptured colon, there was nothing we could do to save her.
I asked if I could go into the surgical room to say goodbye. I remember walking in, she looked to peaceful. I placed my head on her neck, sobing. I thanked her for everything she had ever done for me. For loving me more then she loved herself. For being the horse of my dreams. For believing in my as much I believed in her. As I left the clinic, I knew my world was never going to be the same.
After the news spread, I recieved an overwhelming amount of calls, texts, Facebook messages of out pouring love. I honestly could not believe how many people admired Early. The one messaged that stuck out the absolute most was the text I got from my coach, Alan. Alan expressed how sorry he was about the loss of my Early, how Early and I defined all odds. But the one thing he said that touched my heart was “Riders dream of having the bond you and Early shared. Carry that with you, that is what truly made you guys special.”
There is not a day that goes by that I don’t think about Early. There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do to have her back for just one more minute. Early saved me. She gave me a purpose. She gave me a reason. She gave me dreams that turned into reality. She made me a better rider and an even better person. Early gave me wings and showed me what it was like to fly.
“You Are my Dream, There’s Not a thing I won’t do, I’ll Give my Life Up for You, ‘Cause you are my dream.”
Forever and Always Big Mama, Forever and Always
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