My Journey Back To Riding

It all started May 30th an extremely exciting day due to me getting my driving permit that morning and having my last lesson before I was going to my first show with my new team. I headed in the barn and I heard my best friends scream “Hannah congratulations on getting your permit,” I was so excited to see them and Phippen! I went and put on Phippen’s halter to bring him to the cross ties to get ready for our lesson, he was great and so sweet. Little did I know that when I got on him for lesson that my Summer and goals for riding would be postponed due to a double concussion. The lesson was so great and then as I was cooling him out he spooked and bucked up on all fours. When that happened I wasn’t excepting it so I had no grip on my reins, lets just say I will always have my hands on the reins when I cool out a horse now. Now I”ll get to the serious part, I fell off and tried to roll away from him but he still ended up stepping on my hip and leaving a nice bruise that hurt extremely bad. When all that happened I got really bad whiplash which caused a double concussion, this was way more serious due to me a having a concussion three months before from a serious car wreck. We went to the hospital and everything turned out fine besides my brain, they recommended me to see a concussion specialist so we made an appointment and saw her. I wasn’t too bad off but I also wasn’t good so I’ve started something called Vestibular Therapy to help with balance, eye tracking and memory. It started out hard, frustrating and confusing but in two weeks I’ve excelled a lot which is sooo great, so far I’ve heard I’ll be back riding around the end of July but we’ll see. It has been really hard but I’ve learned so much from it like positivity, patience and perseverance. I know lots of equestrian’s go through  the same thing and some quit over it but it gets better, just stay positive and push through it. ~Hannah Burchfield