There’s no easy way to say this: rescue work is hard. There’s an endless supply of horses to help, work to do, and people to talk to. It can be easy to get burnt out.
So I was really happy to be asked why I rescue horses the other day. It took me back to the beginning, to the reason I started helping horses, to my “why”.
For me, it is because of a horse named Flight. When I graduated college, I moved to Texas and couldn’t afford horses. I met a woman who needed help with her Arabs, and she agreed to have me help her in exchange for a horse.
There was a 3 year old grey gelding at her place named Flight, and I have always, always loved grey Arabians. So I began grooming horses, turning them out, bringing them in, etc., all with the goal of ending up with Flight.
Well, it turns out she was what we now call an animal hoarder. She had 40-60 dogs, 10-15 cats, and about 30 horses. While she talked about selling them, or letting me have Flight, she always found an excuse to NOT actually finish the deal. I found buyers for several of her horses, but she always changed the terms or the deal at the last minute and destroyed the sale. Some of these horses never got out of their stalls and their stalls never got cleaned. I was the only person doing anything, and there was only so much I could do by myself.
After a few months of trying to help these animals, I found out she was being kicked off the land because she was squatting. She had stopped paying her mortgage long ago and been ordered off the property, but she just never left. So we parted ways. And, of course, she wouldn’t let me take Flight – once again, she changed the terms of the deal.
I was heartbroken. And a year later, I learned that all of her animals had been seized and then returned. She moved and another county almost seized them, but she moved again.
Finally a third county did seize them. Because of Flight.
He had gotten sick with a respiratory, and instead of treating him or giving him to someone who could, she chose to euthanize him herself. And then left his body to rot in front of the horse trailer she was living in.
In the end, her son got the horses from the county (after a lawsuit) and the dogs went to a rescue. I don’t know what happened to the cats.
I couldn’t help Flight, even though I wanted to and I tried. So I learned how I could help other horses in his memory, and I’ve been doing that for 22 years.
But, I still miss Flight and feel a enourmous regret that I didn’t know what to do to help him (or the dogs or cats) at the time.
If you rescue horses, have you stopped recently to think about your why? If not, maybe it is time to.