Nearly three years ago, Storm and I relocated from Canberra, Australia all the way to the other side of the country and we are now about an hour south of Perth, Western Australia. We have been agisting at an eventing stable and taking lessons from the owners which has been a really great sea change for us - I've been wanting to get more into jumping for ages and for whatever reason Storm was getting more and more stressed out about dressage, to the point where it was really pointless trying to compete her - as soon as she came up the centre line she'd start to melt and promptly attempt to canter the entire test
So we've been having fun playing around with jumps, coming along quite slowly to build both of our confidence. One of the trainers here holds regular clinics, so I clinic with him every few months and train every week with his partner.Unfortunately, my health has taken a nose dive since we moved here - after being continually fatigued, in pain, having vision problems and cognitive dysfunction and a whole bunch of other things, I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome last September. I started seeing a GP who has a special interest in fibro and came highly recommended, but he and I were both dissatisfied with the original testing I had (fibro obviously doesn't have a specific test, but all I got was a blood panel and then the diagnosis was symptomatic - not even a pain point test) so we're going through all the testing all over again. Fibro does, by and large, perfectly explain my symptoms but the complete lack of upper back/neck/shoulder pain has made everyone (doc, physio, acupunture doc) kind of step back and go "let's just double check this". Obviously this has an effect on my riding - while I'm not in too much pain while I actually ride, the fatigue is a killer and it's hard to even get out to the stable most days.
But despite all that, we're doing well and I'm lucky I have one of these horses that doesn't mind only being worked once or twice a week - she truly is an amazing horse and I couldn't have asked for one better suited to me. Just love her guts <3
In other news, the move interstate forced my departure from my much beloved job at the shelter - I ended up taking a vet nursing job while studying for the VN qualification, due to the fibro/mystery illness I've had to cut back hours pretty dramatically but I make up for it by running a stray cat rehoming program (essentially a rescue but it is, thankfully, funded by the clinic owner). I started doing it about two years ago and have rehomed about 120 cats, plus a few rabbits and a ferret
Absolutely love it even though my house has become a revolving door of foster kittens and my personal menagerie now consists of four cats, a dog, a ferret and of course, the horse.Pics!
One of the VERY rare good moments in dressage
October 2015 - our very first XC clinic - thankfully I can see the improvements!! (the pics up top are the most recent)
And just for cuteness - my ferret, Zelda:
And one of the more recent kitten crops:
I suppose I'd also better do a bit of a shoutout to this wonderful man - we got engaged last August and we're getting married this December ^_^ I am so excited!!!
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