Barely Back in the Saddle

 After nearly two months of no riding, my physical therapist (for my knee) cleared me to get back in the saddle, albeit on a very limited basis.  Like "only do 25% of what you would normally do while riding" kind of limited.

After much thought, I decided that was rather a tall order, to keep things at 25% or less, especially as just the motion of mounting was rather a stressor on my knee.  The way I saw it, mounting was about 50% of the workout, but I was determined to try to obey.  So, my current plan is mount, do elementary walk work, get off after 15-20 minutes and build slowly from there.

Which is what I finally got to do this week.  I found that a) mounting does still create a brief twinge in my knee during the moment of springing up and swinging my right leg over the saddle, and b) 15 minutes of walking my horse on the very minimum of contact (ie not allowing his head to be in the air or at his knees) tired my knee/leg out very quickly.  After 15 minutes I was more than ready to get down for fear of reinjuring my knee.

Honestly, I was rather paranoid about maybe all ready having pushed too much--with my idea of mounting being a huge percentage of the work-- and after also having to clean stalls that morning, my knee was more sore than it's been in weeks.  Not nearly as sore, and not swollen, as it had been most of the summer, but there was definitely discomfort there that I hadn't felt in a while.

Still, the physical therapist, upon me reporting on my experience of riding again, encouraged me to get on again, but wait 3-4 days between rides.  So that is the plan for now--riding only a quarter of an hour, at walk (definitely no posting trot for a while) every 3-4 days and increase only as my knee dictates (like, no more pain on mounting, and not tiring so quickly).

Meanwhile, Camaro still gets longed a couple of times a week.  And the weather has turned cold (and wet) enough that he now sports his waterproof turnout sheet.

I also, in a super dressage diva kind of way of worrying about rebuilding muscles unevenly, sprang for a brand new pair of stirrup leathers.  My old ones were OLD (2+ decades old!), and uneven.  So I decided that in the interest of starting riding again with proper balance as much as possible, new leathers were a must.  

Ironically, my totally identical to each other brand new leathers, while looking like the right iron hung a titch longer, feel like my right leg is shorter than my left.  After consulting others for their eyeballing of my irons both with my feet in and out of them, we decided to trust the holes on the new irons.  It's very likely I'd been riding uneven most of this year and now having my legs identical feels weird.