Precious

My horse Precious is doing good. Getting fat as a bear! Her neck has healed up good and so has her ribs. They still have some knots on them but not as bad.

You can still see the knot on her back. It has gone down but I still cannot put a saddle on her. It will possibly be the end of summer before I can ride her again, if at all. I may have to get a special saddle made that will not cover that place on her back.

I do not know if I ever told the tale of me and Precious.

In May of 2001 Pat and I went to see someone about a horse. That horse was Precious. Pat rode her and thought that she did pretty well. She had just came back from the trainer and from getting her first shoes. I did not ride her at that time. Well we decided they were asking to much for a greenbroke horse that had no papers. A month later we saw that they had an ad in the paper and they had cut the price in half! We went back and I rode her this time. No one else had rode her since the last time we were there. We decided to buy her. It was June 10th.

LOL. Bringing her home was a good one. She kicked the trailer the whole time and kept hollaring. We would stop and I would go back there and talk to her and calm her down and then back on the road. Normally a 30 minute drive took a little over an hour. She was in a panic, all sweaty and shaky. I felt so sorry for her. After we got her home and unloaded her, I brushed her down and fed her. She was thin as there was no grass in the field where we got her from. She kept rubbing her head on me. Made me feel good. I was growing to love her then.

We turned her out in the pasture with Crystal. That was an adventure! Precious and Crystal got into a fight right away. Crystal backed down and Precious became herd mare.

We enjoyed riding together. On June17th, we saddled up to ride. Pat had to go into the house for something and I decided to ride around the field while waiting on him. I was in the back corner and stopped to look around. Precious stuck her nose to the ground and all of a sudden started jumping sideways and twisting in the air. I was unseated and she took off. Upon landing I felt a sharp pain in my hip and knew I was in trouble. I felt stiging all along my back and thought that I had landed on a fireant hill. I pushed myself up but I was unable to move anymore. The pain in my hip was terrible and almost unbearable. I cried out to Godto please don't let my hip be broken. In a matter of seconds the pain diminished in my hip but I was still unable to get up. I heard hoofbeats coming at me and all at once Precious is running around me in a circle. She circled me a couple of times and then ran off. Pat had seen her standing at the porch and tried to get her. She took off and came to me. Pat followed her out in the field and saw where she went. He said that he could not see me because of the high grass. Precious then ran to him and he put her in pasture. Did not even take off the saddle. He came to me and called 911. Thanks to Precious getting Pat's attention and then showing him where I was, I did not have to lay out in the field for very long.

My back was broken in 4 places and my hip showed a healed fracture in the xrays.

Precious had found a yellowjacket nest in the field and had been stung several times.

2 months later I rode Precious again. Actually I was led around on her back. I had gotten rid of the wheelchair that day and was using a walker. I was determined to ride my Precious again.