Why I am Gross! Or: Disgusting habits part two

Thanks for joining in the fun, lurkers of the past and followers of the NOW!
So, 51 followers FORTY NINE TO GO until the big one hundred. Perhaps that will happen in my lifetime?

Thanks to Aging Novice Runner you may all sit back and enjoy one of my infamous gory over sharing epics.


Todays tale is a non running one... But gory enough, I believe.

One of the biggest things that plagues we equestrians (other than the fact that owning a horse costs more than having a gaggle of small, private school attending children) is the constant battle against the saddle sore. Yes my friends, saddle sores. Perhaps they sound innocent enough, like you get a widdie bittie pinch from your saddle that you ignore and barely even notice? That kind of saddle sore is amateurish stuff and simply not in the realm of the horror that I know all too well.

You know it's coming. You made a bad choice and wore your too warm breeches on a 90 degree day, or made the heinous decision to throw on a pair of seamey cotton knickers to ride 4 horses in. In the rain. In a too-big saddle, or in a pair of overly large riding pants. Regardless of your original thought process by the time you dismount from your noble steed your butt cheek feels rubbed raw and blisterlike. Upon further investigation you discover that is exactly what happened and, as luck would have it, you still have 4 horses to ride.

We're not too shy, as equestrians, about talking about, showing off and taking photos of our worst war wounds. When I reminisce about some of my more sorry times one story comes to mind.

I was smack in the middle of day one of a 5 day show and was having one of those moments. I was in the saddle for much longer than I had planned much to my rear ends dismay, and since I was expecting to ride multiple times a day for the duration of the show I had saved up all of my finest non-chafing knickers for the occasion. But was one pair short... (so clearly the "occasion was NOT day one) It was 85 humid degrees of pouring rain to add insult to injury and no lie- the vast majority of my butt skin was peeled right off. Imagine.... A snake loosing its skin? But weeping. Bleeding. Thinking about pustulating.

This was bad news.

I was far past the point of being able to "prevent" this madness with a touch of powder or anti-monkey-butt paste. Oh, no- there was no turning back from the brink of horror.

I stayed awake most of that night desperately uncomfortable as I could not lie on my back and every time I rolled over my butt skin screamed "NOOOO, lie still you IDIOT!" It was not the greatest of times.

The next day I went into "save the breeches" mode. I'm not lying when I tell you that a saddle sore is a weepy mess. The damn thing will weep its way thru your undergarments, thru your (white, $200) riding pants, and right onto your saddle causing onlookers to back away as though you have a flesh eating disease. I put on my sturdiest and most non chafing set of drawers and went about the business of trying to sit on a few horses. Ohhhh, they were good times let ME TELL YOU.

Sure enough, at the end of the day there was.... weep?.... everywhere. I had a good look at the stash of knickers that I had brought and discovered that the ones I had already worn were the ONLY ones that would cover the offending area. Offffff course...

Have I mentioned before that underwear is exempt from my "get 3-4 uses out of before washing" rule? Yes I have, as recycling the undies is the ultimate nastiness due to the fact that butt sweat is dirty sweat. But what choice did I have? I had a whole bum full of half dollar sized bleeding, pussing, weeping in fricking AGONY sores and there was nothing else to do.

So. For 4 days I rocked the same pair of white underarmour compression shorts. In my defense , at the end of the day I would try to wash the worst of it out in the hotel sink with a little bar of soap. I'm quite sure that did a tremendous amount of good.... (and this is why.... the Huz is unlikely to ever tag along to a horse show.)

The whole fiasco really rubbed me the wrong way (SNAP I am funny, you laughed, admit it!) It was weeks- no lie- before my skin grew back and even more weeks before I wanted to see a pair of underarmour compression shorts.