I am not having good luck with my horses these past few weeks.🤦‍♀️

My FEI dressage horse injured his jaw and can't wear a bit for at least a month. Possibly 3-6 months. Possibly has to be bitless forever. Somebody kill me. I'm working closely with a vet, and she said he's fine to ride right now as long as he doesn't have anything in his mouth. Anyway, I have no problem riding bitless, but he sure does. He is a chronic, awful puller. Worst puller I've ever come across in my entire life hands down no competition. I think it's probably the result of being ridden with harsh hands in his early riding career, but I can't say for sure.

I've spent nearly four years trying to correct this issue, and I finally got him light in a bridle 90-95% of the time. We really only have problems with individual movements most of the time. I'm saying this because I want all of you to know that he is indeed capable of the FEI work and all that, and it's not really as big of a problem under normal circumstances now. Unfortunately, he's not so respectful of my hands bitless. So far I've tried riding him in a halter (1/10, do not recommend that), a halter mechanical hackamore combo (solid 5/10, still manages to pull on the hackamore), a western rolled leather sidepull (6/10, but unfortunately he gets rubs from the noseband so it's a no-go), and a halter with draw reins (6/10, not awful but still seriously not great). I tried him in a Dr. Cook's bridle years ago and he became a giraffe. I can ride him around in a neckrope, but we can't school the movements we need to work on that way for obvious reasons. He's normally ridden in a double bridle and goes well even with a fairly loose curb rein. I think it's partially a psychological thing with him and the pulling at this point in his career. He definitely needs to be in work because he gets depressed, jealous, and mopey when he's not ridden.

Does anyone have good bitless dressage bridle suggestions for me? I think something with some leverage would be ideal, but I also have to be able to keep light contact. Sidepulls are not my favorite with this horse. I am open to rigging some kind of double bridle mimic (that's what I was trying with the halter-hackamore and halter-draw reins combos). It doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to keep my horse rideable. Bonus points if it backs him off the hand a little.

Dr Cooks are garbage.

I would look into a flower hackamore. Put it on the biggest leverage setting, and then as he becomes lighter on it you have the room to choose lighter leverage actions.

So sorry your horse got injured. It's so frustrating :(

Thank you. I agree on the Dr. Cooks... I literally cannot imagine a situation where you would want all the pressure to be coming from a cross under the jaw. I think a flower hackamore sounds like a good idea for him. Thank you for that suggestion. Could probably stick two reins on it too and have one on the highest leverage and one on a lighter one. That might just be enough.. and if it's not, I could probably rig something ridiculous with a martingale or draw reins. I don't like using gadgets with dressage horses, but at this point I may have to throw traditional training to the wind a little. Probably better to keep my horse happy and working even if the tack is questionable than to have him depressed and sitting around. 🤦‍♀️

Thank you. It really is. Both of my horses are currently having issues. My three year old now also has something going on with him and needs to have something done because the tendons in both hind legs are swollen and look bad. I noticed some weirdness with his hind legs a while back, but I was waiting to see what it would do with letting him grow and keeping him in light, age-appropriate work (think light lunging under tack on a big circle a couple of times a week), and I was planning to do x-rays before doing any serious work with him. I originally thought he was in a weird growth stage, or maybe it was something he did outside, etc. He's always been sound, and it didn't look that interesting before, so I didn't panic and get the vet right away. Lucky us, things got worse. I might have to sell my soul to the vet at this rate. This has been a very, very bad couple of weeks.

Personally, I quite joy the Micklem Combo bridle which can convert to bitless or be used with a bit. My horses do great in it when bitless, even the strong ones.

I used a really good hackamore once-I think my trainer called it a five-point hackamore. It doesn't put too much pressure on the horse's nose, either.

As Holly Hill Farm said above, the Micklem Combo Bridle is really nice quality too.

I have heard and experienced good things with the Micklem bridle from people who train their horses bitless. I also backed my mare initially with a Micklem bridle copy (someone made me a bitless bridle). I still use this bridle for inhand and groundwork as I prefer to do inhand work in a bitless bridle.

Here is another bitless bridle which is recommended by a trainer

This is also quite a nice informative article that actually also explains how to correctly fit a cavesson correctly for training

I've tried a Micklem on him in the past. Better bitted than conventional bridles, not a chance in hell bitless unless I want my arms and/or face removed. Definitely a first instinct for me to try as well because, well, they're nice bridles. My horse is just rather interesting.

Haven't tried a cavesson yet. That might be next on the list of possibilities.

I seem to have stumbled upon something that almost works. He's fairly rideable in a mechanical hackamore with a running martingale. Is it overkill? Yes, absolutely. It's quite silly. Are my arms thanking me? Also yes. Is he still difficult to ride in this? Somehow also yes. It's not a perfect solution because the mechanical hackamore lacks some of the required finesse for keeping him schooling the upper level movements, but I'm starting to think a running martingale might help a lot of our problems here because it's harder for him to get the right angle to pull on. He likes to pull up and out like a llama, not down and out like a lot of horses do. Might have to do some experimenting with new bitless options and the martingale to see if something in there works better than this and allows for finer communication.