Fighting Words

Based on my realizations I had with Dancer which I mentioned last post, I tried playing with her today. I have to say that I did do better than previous times playing with her, but she still doesn't like being around me.

But yeah, the positive part of our playtime yesterday was  that I had more awareness of what I was doing than before. This time, if I fought with her, it was because I chose to, not because I thought that was the only option. But her behavior still has me confused! Whenever I put her online, she goes into this mode which could best be described as Nervous Dominance. That's the best way I can put it, because I'm not exactly sure. It's like she's half RB and half LB. She gets nervous, so she doesn't think. For instance, I'll ask her to put her nose on a cone and she will, but she then proceeds to paw the cone apart, and then tries to step on it and walk over it (it's a big cone, by the way). But she's not thinking: the whole time she doesn't think about it, she just does it. But after she destroys the cone, let's say I let her come in. She always pokes her nose at me 2+ times coming in, and then comes in VERY close with ears back a little. (I've tried having her stay away from me a little bit, but it just ends up in another fight, so I decided no to go there today.)

But another thing that is bad is leading. I would say that I hardly feel safe leading her at anything more than a slow walk. Reason being that she leads very close to me. Maybe she was taught this way, I'm not sure, but it makes me feel pretty unsafe. Say Dancer is on my right and I'm leading her. Well, her head would be by my right shoulder, but her body is behind me. Basically, she's in the position where if anything happens, I'm going to get ran over by her shoulder. Make sense? I remember Pat talking about it at the Madison Tour Stop last year with the demo horse.

Honestly, I feel more like a lion-tamer or snake handler than a Parelli student when I'm with her. Plus, she hates me and I don't feel safe around her. Not a good match.

Oh, and I noticed something about her attitude yesterday, too. She says "NO!" to everything! But at least this one doesn't apply for only me. She does this with the other horses, too. For example, Moose will pin his ears at her to move out of the way, and she swishes her tail and kind of saunters away. Then, he'll charge at her, and she moves out at a trot with an angry "Fine" attitude. She reminds me of a crabby old lady. :)

Lastly, I tried giving her treats when she got aggressive. Don't think I did it right. She stopped being aggressive, but then crowded me. So, I asked her to get out of my space, and she got mad again. Am I supposed to give her treats every time she gets mad? Because if so, I don't think I'm going to have enough treats. She gets mad at everything, like I said in last paragraph.

P.S. I'm not trying to criticize Dancer here. That is not my intention. I just want to document my issues with/feelings about her, because then I can see how things have changed when I gain more savvy and she likes me. Which is definitely something to look forward to!