What is Riding Through?

Life can take you in so many different directions. Some good and some bad, but everything puts you to where you need to be. The questions is how do you handle each situation. I can honestly say I did not handle them all with grace but Horse Back Miracles has helped put me back on track.

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Let me start by introducing myself. My name is Jerry and grew up as what most know as a military brat. My family moved from location to location every couple of years. This made growing up difficult as you don’t make long lasting meaningful relationships. You don’t have friends and family to confide in. It also took its tole on my family which often times left me in situations where I did not feel loved, I did not feel understood and sometimes simply felt forgotten. These emotions followed me into my teens where I did not make the best decisions for myself or my future. I knew joining the military was going to be the best option for me.

 

I joined the military in 1998 where I was a combat controller and after 9/11 I cross trained to be JTACH. I was deployed numerous times to the middle east to undisclosed locations. Going in I was well aware that there were going to be some incredibly difficult times, but I was not prepared just how difficult it would be. The saying “Better them than me” became a quick reality. Every day we had to make choices and decisions to ensure that we and those around us made it home alive. Daily we were aware that a uniformed officer may make it to the doors of our loved ones. We wanted to go home, but not in a flag draped pine box.  The decisions I had to make haunt me daily and nightly.

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There are many nights that I have woken up in a sweat, screaming with fear or rage, sometimes both. So many memories haunted me to the point of not wanting to sleep. The lack of sleep put me in a perpetual state of anger and frustration. What are my options or coping mechanisms? Alcohol, drugs, fighting, meaningless companionship, suicide? All of them had gone through my mind and I had danced with all options.

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I was going down a very dark road until I found a partner that was able to communicate with me the way I needed to be communicated with. Even that wasn’t enough some days. As we both struggled with our demons we made it through each day, sometimes with laughter, sometimes with fear but we had each other. There was something else missing though. Then I met Bill who introduced me to Horseback Miracles.

 

At first I was a skeptic; how on earth would riding a horse backwards help me? Don’t get me wrong, I grew up around horses and knew the dopamine affect they can have on you. The joy of bliss you get just being around them, but that feeling goes away as soon as you separate yourself from them. So how can riding a horse be a lasting option? Bill and his wife Tammy really put things into perspective for me when they placed me on one of their two horses backwards. They had me close my eyes and we walked in a circle. They asked, did it feel like you were going in a circle? “Of course!” was my response because how else should it feel. They had me do an exercise that forced my left and right brain to communicate with each other and we moved on with the ride. Suddenly the world around me stood still, everything sounded and felt differently. I could feel the horse breathing beneath me, I could hear his hoofs hitting the ground and kicking the rocks, the wind on my face felt different, and I swear we were out of the round pen walking down the road in a straight line, but most of all…… I was present. That may not mean much to most, but I was no where else but there. I wasn’t in the middle east, I wasn’t in fight or flight mode, I wasn’t thinking about anything except about how I felt in that moment. Then there it was, the emotional release. Suddenly, out of no where I began to well up with tears. This emotion was extremely foreign to me, not because I was afraid of crying but because the tears weren’t anger, they weren’t fear and they weren’t happiness, they were just there. The drive home that night my eyes were heavy but my heart and head have never felt lighter. That night was the best night sleep I have had in as long as I can remember.

 

It didn’t end there, every ride I became more aware of my surroundings. I was able to logically think through things and even noticed the things I had put my loving wife through all these years. I did not have rage out moments when someone in front of me drove slower than I would have liked them to, when the person in front of me at Walmart was standing in the middle of the isle just visiting with someone. Things did not affect me the way they did before. This process has been absolutely mind blowing and has allowed me to be happy in my everyday life vs struggling with the demons. Don’t get me wrong, they are still ever present but they seem much more distant and I am able to cope with them much better.