Really irritated with this girls mother.

[Balloonhearts]

More of a vent than anything.

I work at a riding school who do weekend pony clubs in the summer, and a longer one over the holidays.

We match the riders to their ponies based on height, weight and experience/temperament.

One of my group is very overweight. Three stone heavier than her mother said she is on her form. She cannot ride the pony assigned to her or any of the ponies. She needs a horse. Which would have been fine if we knew when she booked.

Now I'm desperately trying to find a suitable mount before the 3 o clock hack so I don't have to tell this sweet girl that she is unable to go on the hack due to her weight.

WHY do people do this? Just be honest ffs! If we had the right numbers, she would have been given one of the horses but now there is no one suitable left.

I walked across 4 pastures in 32 degree heat to get a horse who would not have been needed if this woman had told the truth on a very simple form. Yes I fully stand by grumpily calling this mother a bitch.

Agree with all of your points. Nobody has been unkind about/to the child, but 13 stone for a 5 ft child (or woman) is seriously obese, and I don't see what is wrong with people commenting on that in relation to the mother's actions and what the OP had to do to accommodate her.

As someone who runs a business, we hate customers like you. And I think most humans generally hate entitled people like that too. It's not basic customer service you entitled plonker, unless maybe you're at the Corinthia in London.

I don't even think the obesity is that relevant to the thread (except the stigma around obesity being a possible reason as to why the mum was embarrassed to write down the truth).

I'm underweight, but even then if I tried to plonk myself down on a baby animal meant to carry really small little kids that wouldn't be ok. Same for a normal weight tall person on a tiny animal. Not having informed the venue of my actual requirements, unlike @MasterBeth, I would not have the audacity and entitlement to expect them to bend over backwards to magic something up for me.

It says everything about my hormonal state that knowing MT engaged Schoolmaster Mode now has me crying!

You are a miserable being with no sense of humour and poor reading comprehension, and this thread is not for you - move along.

I knoow, he sounds so sweet! 😍 Pls give MT a hug from all of us OP 🥰

Oh he's had loads of those. And treats. And lovely sparkly hooves now too. He lapped it up!

Aww! 😍 Can you share a pic of the sparkly hooves?!

Please could you pm details of you riding school or if you have any recommendations in the Gloucester area I completely trust you recommendation. Not media long time poster sometimes lurker your the perfect teacher.

Sir Major Tom you are a beauty 😍. Op you are fabulous. X

OP, that was really good of you to sort something out for her so she could enjoy her pony time.

My story might make you laugh, in this case, a very entitled adult. We had a couple book for a ride, she told us her height and said she was a complete novice, he told us he was five foot nine and very experienced. When they turned up, he was five foot seven in his platform shoes, still insisting that he was a fantastic rider so needed a very spirited horse, not a pony, (proving there and then he had no experience of equines at all), despite his girl friend admitting on his behalf that he had never sat on a horse before, while he argued with her and us.

Then we told him his platform shoes were not suitable to ride in and he would have to wear a pair of boots from the yard. He was very angry, but we insisted as we didn't want the horse hurt by this good digging heels into him, so he changed this foot wear, glaring at us as he shrank. He wasn't happy about messing his hair up with a hat either, but gave us less shit about that than the boots.

We put him up on a cob that was more whoa than go, which we would have done with any rider we didn't know anyway, but like a lot of cobs, this boy could be a bit cheeky and pull to get to grass, stick his head down to munch and needed a firm 'No!' to get him going again. He pulled this idiot over to grass before they even left the yard and this experienced rider just sat there and screamed at me that we were clearly starving the animals on our yard and he was reporting us to the RSPCA! His girlfriend was mortified, I really hope she dumped him after that. He was the definition of toxic masculinity.

My riding days are long gone (though my younger sister who is 65 still rides).
This thread is just a treat and should go in classics.

My greatest horsey adventure was when we were about 10/ 8 (so late 1960s) and were on holiday. Mum told the riding school nearby that we were experience riders. Experienced in falling off riding school ponies actually.
I was put on a huge horse (Silver) and we set off on a hack down country lanes.
A leaf fell and Silver bolted down the lane. It was thrilling and terrifying as I'd never galloped before. I debated whether it would be safer to leap off in case we hit traffic, or stay onboard. I stayed on for what seemed like miles and hours.
Got severely ticked off by riding school owner for not being able to stop him.

We're nowhere near Gloucester I'm afraid. I don't know anyone in that area. Easiest way is to visit a few places and see the horses. Horses don't lie.

I visited a horse sanctuary once and its one that gets good press but out of 80 or so horses, only 2 approached me. The rest just stood, staring into space, looking depressed. No interest. Felt really quite sad. Not one single pocket sniffer, hood grabber or hand licker among them.

A slightly nervous looking TB who came over but wouldn't let me stroke her and one donkey who came for a fuss before wandering off.

All our horses and ponies will immediately come and investigate a stranger. They might smell interesting or give scratches or better, polos!

I mean, I'm not an expert by a long way but just look for happy, engaged horses who seem used to lots of attention. A lot of ours will present noses for kissing and try to groom your hair. (With varying degrees of success) They're playful and like to interact. That's what I'd look for. Not a place that runs like a conveyor belt of riders on, riders off.

I didn't take one but its just Tyler's hoof oil. This one.

Oh, shiny hooves! 😍

Loved reading your diary Balloonhearts, thank you.

Yeah that's it.

Parents pick up in half hour so will try to listen in. We're just making their dinner and kicking them out for the night.

Haven’t finished the thread, but just had to reply, that as a rider myself I PMSL at this post. I was going to give you a rosette for your efforts but there isn’t an emoji for that, so here’s a 🐴 instead.

I hope the conversation with mum went/goes ok.

I’m a former horse owner and now too heavy with a disability that would be a disaster if I fell off.
I often feel like there’s a gap in the market. I’d love to do some sort of horse/pony exercise class that involved on the ground interaction with the horses.
it always feels like a massive shame that once you pass the weight limit to sit on them, your ability to interact with horses is at an end.

That’s really interesting. I wonder if you can explain this: out on a walk a couple of weeks ago, we passed by a field with 8 horses, all adult wirh one foal and all of them were asleep! It was about 1.00 in the afternoon, not really hot, it was cloudy. One opened its eyes as we made clicking noises at them and just looked doped! Strangest thing I’ve seen.

OP, you sound absolutely lovely. You’ve been extremely kind to the girl in question and to the horses (all of whom sound gorgeous).

They like to nap. If you look on YouTube there s a comedienne called Hayden Krystal (I think)whose horses keep napping and her neighbours think they're dead. She and her horses are really funny. I'll link her when I get a second.

All inexperienced riders wobble on horses, it has nothing to do with weight.
Stop looking for reasons to have a go at OP

You sound absolutely brilliant, I would definitely ride at your stables if you were local to me.