Falls That You Didn't Bounce After

Only a few days ago my step mother was riding her haflinger when she fell and pretty much landed on her head, and now she is wondering if she should wear a helmet. But it got me thinking about the falls I've been in, not the ones where you brush the dirt off and hop back on but the kind you come off but don't bounce.

Two years ago my saddle apart and I fell off and knocked myself out, and lost a lot of skin off my back. Lucky for me I wasn't alone so Mooney was caught, but I had to walk almost 5 km back to the road thinking how everything hurt while trying to explain to my baby sister that I really was okay. I now have a lump on my hip where I landed on it the doctor said it was something from the impact.

So what is your story, even have a fall that you won't forget, got a few scars or makes your scratch head on how the heck did that happen?

Just one... Landed standing on my leg but my foot planted and body twisted. The tibia (big bone beneath the knee) had a spiral break, the fibula (the little bone) split in half length wise, three breaks in the ankle and tore the Achilles tendon off. Had three surgeries, the last one being a bone graft, and spent 23 months in a cast of which 20 of those were a full length cast!

I bought a really nice, though hard to catch, mare to ride during that time as I didn't want to spend any time out of the saddle :)

One time, I was jumping a holy terror of a lesson horse. I went over a jump and she cantered away, bat out of hell like. I turned 90 degrees to the next jump, putting a good deal of weight in my outside stirrup. My stirrup leather snapped and I came off the side and landed hard on my hip. I couldn't stand up, so my friend thought I had broken it. She laid me across her horse and walked me back to the barn.

I didn't break it, but I couldn't walk correctly for several days. I pinched a nerve and still have pain and weakness from that in left thigh.

Well, this time I wasn't riding, but a week ago this last Sat. I was trying to clean up around my pen. Leaned over trying to pull a piece of baling twine up out of the ice and snap! I sprained the ligaments and mussels in my lower back and they think I may have a small tear. On pain meds and mussel relaxers and have at least 2 more weeks before I can go back to work. Baling twine - 1, me - 0

WickedNag that sounds painful... never mind I am betting it was. I always watch the other riding students slid right off and hop back on, of course my first fall I didn't bounce just splat all over CNR, helmet plastic, saddle pieces and my beloved back. Still can't find the dumb stirrup that start that whole thing, some where in the ditch probably sitting there for the past two years.

Oh god i'm afraid to answer this one...

I always said til y our mid 20s you bounce.. after that it's more like splat.

I've splatted a lot.
Though ironically worst injuries were not falls - shattered leg (kicked by another horse while riding), spine/road rash, trampled, back and neck injuries among others... (ran over by horse), broken pinkie/hand requiring surgery and pins (horse bucked on longe in place as I was backing away total freak accident)

Left knee reinjured in a fall when I just landed wrong but initial injury was playing soccer in HS and never had it fully fixed (had 2 surg, need a third but shattered leg instead and had to cancel lol) and right knee back in 1998 when my horse tripped and went to his knees and when I went to tuck and roll I was already so close to the ground I fell over my knee...sideways (had the surg for that one and it's been rebuilt nicely lol).

So yeah, hm, no major fall injuries other than knees. Oh once I got a concussion. But get this - I fell off and landed square on my butt! Apparently I jarred my skull and tore the lining of my brain that attaches it to the skull and they had me on meds for swelling and anti-seizure meds. Only I could get the worst concussion ever w/o ever hitting my head lol! That was also ages ago.

I rode a LOT as a kid. Well hell still do. And have a lot of horses so i'm just used to it being an "occupational hazard" ;)

Sadly I was 16 and I didn't bounce. Got a minor concussion even with a helmet which turned to a million pieces. I haven't fallen alot but been in a few accidents like breaking all the fingers on my right hand (which I write with), carefully removing the skin off my neck with a tree branch, braking a few toes and so on.

Once, I was riding with my mom up at my former trainer's barn. His indoor looks out at the hayfields. Dallas was still being retrained from the time he spent with an abusive trainer. Anway, there was a wolf in the hayfield. It started chasing some turkeys right as I rode by the door that looks out to the field. I was not expecting to see a wolf, or get taken off with. Dallas's butt dropped and he flat out sprinted. I got taken by surprise and fell off his side. My foot got caught in the stirrup and twisted almost all the way around. I got dragged for three steps before my foot was freed.

The wolf disappeared into the woods, and my mom jumped off our pony and caught Dallas. I just laid there in the dirt for a minute trying to figure out what happened. My mom called to me, and I went to get up. The second I put weight on my left foot I crumbled to the ground. My mom puts me up on the pony and leads Dallas while we go home. She puts the horses away, then comes inside our house to check on me. My foot was so swollen it was near impossible to get out of my boot. And once we did, my foot was black and purple with a huge lump on it.

I spent hours waiting in the hospital. They thought I fractured my growth plate, but that turned out not to be it. Basically I tore all my ligaments and muscles open. I had massive soft tissue damage. The huge lump was from internal bleeding in the foot. The recovery was long and painful. But luckily I'm young and my body did a great job healing. I have no pain in it now. It was definitely my scariest and most painful fall.

GAA! Some of these are really bad! I didn't 'bounce' from this one fall but instead rolled and rolled and rolled. Was cantering with a pack of horses at summer camp and the horse behind mine got too close. Mine bucked out and I lost reigns and stirrups and was balancing on her neck. She bucked out again and over her shoulder I went. I rolled and rolled forever it seemed like. When I finally stopped I jumped up like 'I'm OK' but nearly fell over because I was so dizzy from rolling. Not sure how everyone got to me as quickly as they did but one woman asked if anything hurt and I held my hand up because my pinky was a little sore, but she grabbed my shirt and dabbed my face and all I saw was blood all over my shirt. Turns out I split my lower lip wide open. Had to go to the hospital and get 3 stitches in it. What with being traumatized at having to go to the hospital for the first time and without my mom or dad anywhere nearby...I forgot about my pinky. Years later I came to find out I fractured my pinky finger but it healed over the fracture. I wont forget that one because it was my first most serious one. In any case, I'm currently going to a chiropractor because of my LAST one where the horse I was leasing decided to take off with me across the riding field, stop abruptly and changed directions and down I went. Seriously CRUNCHED my neck, although I waited a while to go to the chiropractor because I have had similar 'accidents' and my neck is usually better shortly there-after with no medical treatment. The chiropractor says you should have a slight inward curve of your neck/spine and I no longer have that. He thinks it will come back with time though, and adjustments. And, yes, I was wearing a helmet...that the head harness part that holds the helmet in place broke on from this fall and the helmet came down on the bridge of my nose and probably fractured it since it was red and swollen a couple days after the fall

So weird, for me, that this thread popped up when it did. Just last Friday, I had sort of a freak accident. I was riding my gelding, who is a little green, and he tripped and went down on both front knees while trotting. I ended up being thrown forward and as he struggled back on his feet, I was hanging off the right side of my western saddle. I was too far forward to right myself, so I was just going to slide off. I then realized that I could not move. I finally figured out that my left foot was caught on the saddle. It was wedged in the stirrup and caught under the skirt of my saddle. (Imagine if you were dismounting and as you went to bring your leg over the back of your horse, your foot stayed in the stirrup and got caught on the saddle.) I don't have any idea how exactly I got into that position, but by this time, my horse started crow hopping and I really thought that I was going to be in a lot of trouble. Luckily, the hopping was enough to loosen my foot in the stirrup and I plopped to the ground flat on my butt, no bounce :(

I believe that my biggest mistake was not riding in boots that my foot could have slide out of. If my boot had not come out of the stirrup on its own, I hate to think what could have happened. This scared me enough that I will never ride in lace up boots again.

I have had my share of falls and injuries, but even though I was not hurt in this one, it was by far the scariest. I have never been just plain stuck and totally helpless before.