Unraveling: Part 1 - Wyoming
A long time ago, I was a writer. I told stories of underdogs whose stories I thought deserved to be shared. There was something sacred about bringing to life a story that would otherwise remain untold. But I’ve always shied away from telling my own. I’ve told bits and pieces, but never enough to be fully seen or heard.
Somewhere along my journey, I lost that passion for telling stories. It was hard to see in the moment, but I think it was because I was in the process of rewriting my own.
For so long, I proudly wore the mask of being a hyper-independent, eldest daughter, entrepreneur who could do anything herself. She could hold her own in a bar full of cowboys. She could drop everything to make a client happy. She would let her boundaries slide for a good “opportunity”.
And then, slowly, piece by piece, that version of me started to unravel.
It’s hard to say exactly where it started, but I think the strings started coming loose after I took a horse riding job in Wyoming. I was away from home: me, my two horses, and my dog, and I was living in a 32 ft camper trailer that didn’t have running water or a working bathroom. My job for the summer and into the fall was to ride sale horses. Something that eight-year-old me would have absolutely squealed and had an excited fit over. And I would have let her be excited for me, but I would leave out the details of this job that would squash that dream for her.
The hard knot that I was so accustomed to being was almost immediately knocked loose when, upon arrival at my job, between myself and my male counterpart, I was the only one given the barn chores. Cleaning stalls. Feeding. Doctoring. Turning horses out, bringing them in. But guess who wasn’t given barn chores? Now, before you jump to any conclusions, this may have been normal if he was given some chores that I didn’t have, but that wasn’t the case. We were both hired to do the exact same job. Ride sale horses.
Again, this wouldn’t be a sticking point in my story if there weren’t other things at this job that slowly made me see the gender gap in this industry.
But I stuck it out. I thought that maybe this was “just how it was”. In hindsight, I don’t think I saw these things for what they were until I started talking to others who pointed out that my living conditions were grossly unacceptable.
Although, the views were unbeatable.
I was working six days a week, ten hours a day, with a half day off per week to do laundry in town. I wore this job like a badge of honor. My dad always taught me to stick it out and never give up. So I didn’t. I got on every horse I was assigned (even the ones I hated and hated me back). I loped so many circles that I never loped another circle again in my life. I’m painting this picture not to make this job look bad or make the industry look bad, but to highlight that I was so in the weeds of my own mind that I didn’t have the awareness to know what was acceptable and what wasn’t acceptable. Because here’s the truth. This job? Was probably considered tame compared to the horror stories that I’ve heard of working in the horse industry as a female. It doesn’t excuse it, but at the end of the day, I was living in what I allowed. Only I could have changed the outcome of that job, but I let my ego call the shots because I didn’t think there was any other option.
When I tell my story, this chapter of my life always comes up. It is something that truly shaped who I am. It was a defining moment in my life because it was the edge of pushing myself before breaking. In the short few months I worked there, I was taught not to be seen, not to ask questions, and that the only person I could actually rely on was myself. Sounds healthy, huh?
Sometimes we think that trauma is only the bad things that happen to us. But trauma is also the patterns that we use for survival.
Needless to say, that was the last traveling job that I ever took. I came home to lick my wounds. I was exhausted and burned out. And so, the first thread started to unravel.
Stay tuned for Part 2!
