The Slowwww Restart of a Middle-Aged Broodmare

This seemed like a good way to document our progress. This is probably going to be a bit boring though. I am taking it super slow and evaluating and re-evaluating. I'm not a trainer, so I am not the most efficient at getting results. I am also not really in a hurry to get in the saddle, I want to be super confident in ALL of the groundwork.

Backstory:
I bought "Cider" at New Holland Auction in September of 22. She was advertised as a 12-13 year old grade mare that rides (no other history on her at that point). She was ridden bareback through the auction ring. She actually was a bit of an impulse buy on my part. I was there to buy a horse, she just wasn't on my list- I had somehow missed her at the tie racks. So I did not inspect her prior to her getting in the sale ring; this is a HUGE risk at an auction like New Holland. So why in the world did I bid on her?
1. I have a thing for palominos (nostalgia, my first horse was a pally quarter horse mare); i know, i know- not recommended.
2. her conformation looked decent
3. one of the sale ring riders was siting on her bareback in a huge pack of horses/riders waiting to get into the sale ring-she was standing so quietly.

I had bid on a few other horses prior to this, but they all went way higher than I was willing to pay for an auction horse without a vet check. Magically, I won the bid on the horse that i didn't even lay my eyes on before the auction. My first thought was "What have I just done?" My husband went to go pay the bill (he's a good man) and I went to look closer at my purchase. Her udder looked like she had weaned a baby not long ago. Her feet were a little long and she had a goopy eye. Other than that she looked ok. The eye turned out to be just a long hair causing irritation.

She was not impressed with me. She would not even look at me. "That's ok, we will work on that later". I untied her and walked her through the bowels of the sale barn to the check out/ loading door where my husband was going to bring the trailer around. She walked calmly next to me through the chaos of horses, people, and cattle. I was definitely MORE nervous than she was. We finally made it over to the check out and my husband gave the man our receipt. He checked her hip tags and told us we were good to go.

My hubby opened up the trailer door. Moment of truth here... I took a deep breath and we walked forward, as I stepped in, she stepped in. "Whew, ok, maybe I didn't make that big of a mistake?" She rode in the trailer calmly home the entire time. Unloading and turning out was uneventful as well.

Because she came from auction, I wanted to give any drugs that she may have had on board to wear off before I could really assess her personality. I was not planning to ride her for a while.

Over the next few days, I realized that she would not come near me. This gave me my first clue that we were probably going to start from square one. I don't think she was drugged at all. She was still just as quiet, just didn't want to be near me.

To Be continued...