The Fall
It was Wednesday, October 17th and I went out to the barn to do some jumping on a hackney pony I've been riding a lot. As usual, I had been working on jumping with her and this day she was doing wonderfully so I raised the bar to about one and half or two feet, which she had done before. I had previously had a few falls before this accident, which had dinged up my helmet just slightly. For example when I fell and broke my nose but nothing too serious to hurt my helmet. It was about our fourth time jumping this high, so I was going to take it slow. At about the fourth time toward the jump, she began into a full gallop due to me losing my stirrup the last time around, which I know if she went at it too fast we could get seriously injured.
For our safety, I began to steer her away from the jump. I was riding her in a halter on this day, which was sort of my own stupidity. Since it was just a halter, it took a lot of force to steer her suddenly away from the jump yet it didn't work. She had her mind set on going over the jump, at top speed. As she went over it, she tripped over the jump. As she tripped, I could tell in the only photograph I got of the accident, her body began to twist in mid air. Which of course, she went down face first with me going over the top of her. I slid directly in front of her while she fell to the ground on her back, partially landing on me. Because she was in shock, of course, she was kicking and kicked my in the thigh.
As I got up, I realized there was a sharp pain in my back but I didn't pay any mind to it. Of course, I was more worried about the horse than anything. The hackney pony was fine, only just a scraped nose and some hair scraped from above her eye and knees. After exiting the arena, I looked at my back, seeing that I had minor abrasions on my back and elbow.
Once I got home, I took a good look at my helmet. I noticed how the back of it had a great amount of give to it and the back piece, which I call the 'neck brace', bracing the back of my neck so I will not get a concussion was completely broken. It was practically about to fall off. Being at age 13, it's definitely important to keep my head protected! Without my helmet that day, I would probably be in a very bad situation. 