I Am Not Built To Sell Horses

I am lucky to say I’ve owned many horses in my lifetime. From my first pony as a kid and now into adulthood, the vast majority of my mounts have stayed with me for the entire length of their lives.

That’s because horses are not my business. I am not a professional. And while I love to compete (as an adult amateur), my horses instantly become a member of my family, and are cared for and treated as such.

So when my heart horse suffered a devastating ligament injury more than a year ago, everything in my life felt like it came to a screeching halt. In short, everything was awful. While my horse settled into a new life of rest and recovery, I looked for a distraction that would give me something productive to do while I cared for the horse I knew I’d keep, no matter the soundness outcome at the end of this rehabilitation journey.

I bought another horse.

I’ll be the first to tell you it’s not a wise financial decision. But I bought this second horse with the intention to find him a forever home at the end of our journey together. I bought a retiring racehorse with the goal of training him to compete at the 2023 Retired Racehorse Project’s Thoroughbred Makeover.

Naturally, there are a lot of bumps in the road along the way with horses, especially green ones. But somehow, after 10 months of getting to know each other and some proper training, I made it to the Kentucky Horse Park with this new horse and competed. It felt like a fairytale experience, being the one to introduce this new horse so many “firsts”, and helping him gain confidence, fitness and skill in so many new areas.

Of course I fell in love with him during this time. How could I not?

The closer we got to making it to the Makeover, the clock was ticking – our time together was running out. I had started the year with a strict financial plan of how I could afford to feed and care for two horses, and keep training and competing one of them. It was a complicated and stressful matrix of moving parts, involving a lot of sacrifice to make it work. And the financial runway was only so long. Even though I loved my new horse – I could not afford to keep him forever.

Shortly after the Makeover, an interested buyer turned into a serious one. Suddenly I was looking at a lump sum of money in my bank account, but I felt terrible about it. My horse had a few weeks left with me after the Makeover, and I just couldn’t bring myself to ride him again. I wanted him to spend as much time as possible in the pasture with his buddies. I wanted him to feel relaxed and loved and cherished for everything we’d accomplished together in the last year.

On the day it came time for him to ship off to his next home, I was a mess. I couldn’t hold it together. Walking by his empty stall in the barn made my stomach churn in knots. Packing away his things, his blankets, his halter, brought tears to my eyes.

I wish I could afford to keep them all, forever.

This experience was personally revealing in many ways for me. I was proud of what I had done with this horse. I was grateful for the partnership we’d built. But I was heartbroken to hand him off to someone else, even after going to great lengths to ensure he’d went off to the very best possible home.