Catherine Dakin Para-equestrian

You're not alone, even on the darkest day - you're still not alone and the world is better because you are here ❤️
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If you have struggled or watched someone struggle it can be hard to see the light, but if one person reading this sees a little bit of light, think how many people we could help if others shared their support.
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Remember. You are the first face your horse sees in the morning, the last they see at night. ❤️ You give them confidence to go places they couldn't go alone. They need you and you matter to them 🫂
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If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health or feeling suicidal, contact your GP, NHS 24 on 111, Samaritans on 116 123, or Breathing Space on 0800 83 58 87.
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For under-35s, contact PAPYRUS Hopeline on 0800 068 4141.
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The most amazing test from my mentor 🩷

Mari Durward-Akhurst Para Dressage Rider and Athene Lindebjerg make their games debut as a combination with a score of 71.792% in the Grade 1 Grand Prix A competition, putting them into bronze position with five riders to go ✨

Check out the full results here: https://bit.ly/BDParis24-results

So excited! All tests are being streamed on YouTube! 🩷

Admiring this photo from yesterday while waiting for my latest round of chemo/immunotherapy 🤍 I’m so lucky, he’s just incredible 😍

It’s GOLD for Great Britain!🥇🇬🇧

A truly unbelievable display of jumping. 3 jumping clears, 2 times faults and the team of Ben Maher & Dallas Vegas Batilly, Harry Charles & Romeo 88 and Scott Brash & Jefferson could not be caught!👏🏻

🐴 🐴 🐴 We urgently need a new horse for Scropton RDA 🐴 🐴 🐴
Following the loss of or lovely horse Hercules last week we've been having to cancel riding sessions 😢🐴 💔

We need to find a replacement horse as soon as possible so that all our partiipants can continue to benefit from the magic of horses. It’s not just about finding a replacement though, we also need to find the money to buy a new horse 😥

You can help by:
🐴 Making a donation to our new horse appeal
🐴 Letting us know if you hear of a suitable horse for sale

Donate now at www.scropton.com/horse-appeal
Every donation helps and with your support we can make more horse magic! 🪄🐴🪄

Please share this with anyone who can help us with funding or finding a horse – thank you!

Absolute class shown by the whole team!! 🤍

It's GOLD for Team GB 🥇🥳

Ros Canter Eventing and Lordships Graffalo, Tom McEwen and JL Dublin, and Laura Collett Eventing and London 52 complete on 91.3 to secure Team GB their first gold medal of Paris 2024 🤩

This also marks a record-breaking fifth eventing team gold for Great Britain and a defence of the title that Laura and Tom helped to secure in Tokyo 💪

Let’s go back to basics:

1. Horses are not machines, tools or performing monkeys. They are living, breathing animals who feel pain, fear and stress just as we do.

2. It is not a right to work with or ride horses, it is a privilege and should always be treated as such.

3. Fear and force based training has no place in our sport, even though many governing bodies turn a blind eye in the name of “performance”, the bottom line is, fear or force may get you there faster, but it won’t get you there to stay.

4. We are not superior to horses. Our aim should always be for our horses to want to work with us, not for us. We may have a degree of control, but that is not a free pass to exploit it for our own gain.

5. Politics, world rankings, titles and experience are completely obsolete when it comes to calling out behaviour that does not align with horse welfare being a priority.

6. Horses are forgiving, more forgiving than we often deserve. We should be aware of this and always seek to reciprocate that forgiveness when they don’t understand what we have asked of them and respond in an unfavourable way.

Arguing amongst each other simply furthers the negative perception of our sport for those on the outside looking in. The internet doesn’t actually need your opinion.

Let’s all agree that changes are needed, but that change starts at home. Stop wasting energy shouting from either side of the fence. Redirect that energy into being the change you want to see, let’s return our sport to the basics and remember what it always has been, and always should be about:
THE HORSE.

Words can’t describe how proud I am of Charles today, looking after me no matter what 🩷 Quick reminder to pass horses at 10mph and if we tell you to slow down, please don’t scream at us 😅

Trip in the trailer to Jackson’s Bank 🌻💕 thanks for coming with us Theresa 💕

Congrats to all nominees, but especially my mentor Mari Durward-Akhurst Para Dressage Rider!!! You’ve worked so hard, you deserve this!!! ❤️

“We are raising money for a 18 year old young lady very close to our hearts from hartshorne, who on the 26th January 2024 was involved in a devastating riding accident. This has caused extreme damage including brain damage , broken ribs , bruised lungs and other minor injury’s.

She was put into an induced coma at the time of the accident and taken to Nottingham Intensive Care Unit , where she spent 6 weeks on life support. She has now been transferred to Leicester General Brain Injury Unit. She has recently regained consciousness and is being assessed to allow the family to understand the extent of her brain damage and how much she will recover. At present , the family have been told that she won’t be able to walk again and are unsure is she will be able to communicate in the future. Family and friends are trying to save money to purchase a specialist wheel chair for her , which I’m sure you can appreciate it is difficult especially with them travelling twice a day minimum , every day , too and from Leicester. Having a specialist wheelchair will get her one step closer to one day being able to have home visits.

This is an 18 year old young lady who had recently passed her driving test and was just starting out on her journey in life to compete in many horse shows and competitions with a dream of ending up competing at Badminton, which has been her only dream in life since the age of 4.”

Donate to 18 year old girl suffers brain damage, organized by Courtney Bolton • THE BACK STORY • We are raising money for a 18 year old young lady very c… Courtney Bolton needs your support for 18 year old girl suffers brain damage

The love I have for this boy is unreal 🩷