Stacey's Therapeutic Horseback Riding Journal

September 11, 2003

September 11th will always be an unusual day for us. We will always remember the tragedy of 9/11/2001. However, September 11th is also a wonderful, happy day for our family-- it is our wedding anniversary!!

This September 11th was very busy day for Isaiah. Today was horseback riding day. Ready, Set, Ride has been building a new, covered stable for the past few weeks. So, today is the first time in a while that we attended a horseback riding session. In addition today was Isaiah's first basketball class and the first time he attended horseback riding following a full day of school. The day was quite busy!

We arrived at Ready, Set, Ride about an hour after basketball class. Isaiah had fallen asleep in the car; he was mad when I woke him up. He told me that he did not want to get out the car and he cried when I tried to put his riding helmet on him. Harold and I reminded him of how much he enjoyed horseback riding-- especially the games. I did feel a little bad for Isaiah. I know he was tired. Today he go up at 7:00AM; was in school from 8:30AM-2:45PM-- without a nap. Then, basketball was from 3:15PM-4:00PM. So, it is reasonable that by 5:00 he would be exhausted.

We decided to try to get through today's session and then decide if we needed to change Isaiah's Thursday schedule. We finally got him on the horse. At first he looked tired and did not want to play. But after about 3 minutes I heard him laughing as Schnapps pranced around the new stable. When the session ended, he did not want to get off the horse.

We are still not sure if we are going to continue with this rigorous Thursday schedule. Basketball is important because it will help Isaiah develop social skills. Thursday is the only basketball class that meets after Isaiah's school hours. We'll see.

Stacey 9/11/03
editor@celebratingchildren.com