The Message is Clear

"I’ve never actually told anyone this.  No one in the equestrian community knows.  It’s just something you don’t bring up in conversation.  It’s such a long conversation.  To me it’s normal.  And that’s the hardest thing for me to try to explain.  People don’t understand this.  So I don’t talk about it” (Jake Barham, 2016).

My life will not be quite the same after hearing Jake’s story, a story that other than his family and closest friends knew of until now.   This extraordinary young man exudes positivity and a refreshing earthy back to basics style that tells of a lifetime of hard grafting and horses, everything pulled together and done on a shoestring. In fact, I would say Jake’s and his family’s lives have been enriched beyond what most strive to achieve and fail at.  Money cannot buy what Jake and his family have.  Jake’s parents, good old fashioned Kiwi battlers, clearly live true to their values and standards, and they have raised in Jake, and I’m certain his three siblings too, an honest, hardworking young man who believes in working for what you want and never giving up.  He has succeeded against all odds and his journey competing at a high level is on the rise. 

Jake has overcome a physical defect that would have most of us choosing chess as a pastime.  I find him and his story not only admirable and unbelievable, but inspirational too.  Jake opted for the most physically demanding of sports- Eventing.  After a lifetime of riding, he is competing in fine style, on Atlan, purchased as an off the track thoroughbred in typical light-weight racehorse condition and  paid for with a dozen beer.  Atlan has been produced solely by Jake, who was 15 when his dad brought the horse home after a day at the races.

There had been lively discussion in the family between Jake’s parents, Kambel and Vivienne Barham, as to exactly what horse Jake should move onto given that he had completed the Pony Club Championships at A1 Level on a special little horse that was simply too small and limited for what Jake now required.  Kambel was adamant that good money could not and would not be paid for any horse.  But Viv argued that Jake was ready to move on, and to do so he needed the right horse. Something tried and tested, and readymade. 

Jake fully agreed that consideration must be given to his three siblings.  If he had a lot of money spent on him, the others must also receive the same benefit to use in whatever way they chose, but this was simply not affordable.  While Jake completely understood this, the situation of not having the right horse had him questioning whether or not to continue riding. 

Jake’s dad reassured him, telling him, “I’ll pick you one up from the races.  You’ll see.”

But Jake was not holding his breath.  Kambel is not a rider.  Although, he has been a farrier for all of his life and he shoes most of the racehorses in Masterton and surrounding areas, Kambel would be solely looking for a good temperament and good feet.

However, the day did arrive as promised, when Kambel came home with Atlan in tow.  Jake and the horse eyed each other up, suspiciously at first.  Then almost immediately Jake was riding his new horse along the road and down to the river.  It didn’t occur to Jake to not just jump on and trust a four year thoroughbred straight off the track, that had literally been racing that day, albeit slowly, and was filled to the eyeballs with heating feed.  Atlan, paddock named George, did not let Jake down and the pair, to this day, have not looked back.   

Jake’s mum had grown up in Masterton and she rode track work as a teenager.  Jake followed her lead and he also as a school boy, rode young race horses.  It wasn’t to make money he told me but he lived five minutes along the road from Tauherenikau Racecourse.  His neighbour trained racehorses, and Jake was purely interested in them.   All he wanted to do was ride.

The money he did make went back into his horses, petrol and entry fees.  His day started at 6am at the track and then his school bus left at 7am.  When he arrived home from school at the end of a long day, he rode his own horses.  Even now after a long day working as a farrier alongside his dad, Jake will ride until well after dark, sometimes not finishing up until after 11pm.  And he does not have an indoor school, arena floodlights or even an outdoor arena.  Jake rides outside in a dark paddock.  

While most of us are horrified at the idea of owning a horse with a club foot, do any of us ever give a thought to having a club foot ourselves and then overcoming this problematic disability and riding with it?  Jake was born with a club foot.  A club foot so severe that his big toe touched his shin and was permanently locked there.  He was in a cast from the day he was born that was changed once a week until he was six months old.  Then he had his first operation and at night both feet were fixed to the end of the cot and locked in place while he was sleeping, to straighten and correct the foot.   He was unable to move his legs at all.  At one year old, he underwent another operation to lengthen his Achilles’ tendon.  He wore a fiberglass shoe with a Velcro strap and could not walk at all until he was four years old.  At five years old, Jake had his third major surgery.  He wore special shoes.  His mum called the shoes special in order for Jake to feel lucky to wear them.  These shoes were moulded orthotics and fastened with a Velcro strap.  As Jake grew, more and more of these shoes were made for him. 

“They broke my foot, on purpose, and they aligned it and shoved it all in and stuck it all together with pins.  So they completely mangled the bones up and whacked pins in to get it straight.  And so from then on once that healed, I was ordered to swim.  That’s the one sport where the foot has to stay straight while it’s in the water.  And from there on because I was going to the pools, mum was taking my three siblings to swim, and we all went competitive. This is on top of riding.  In primary school I used to go from school, to the swimming pool for a few hours then home to ride the ponies after school, and so forth.  Swimming was a huge thing to strengthen the leg. When I got to college I couldn’t swim competitively and ride competitively.  I had to choose.”

Jake’s affected leg is much thinner than the other and it is considerably shorter.  He has no arch in his foot, not much movement in the ankle and periodically this locks itself while he’s riding.  It has taken a while for Jake to be on top of this.  Often he would hit a corner in the show jumping or on the cross country course, his ankle would lock and he could not get his balance right so he’s had a few falls.

During lessons, he would be told constantly that he was crooked and to sit up straight.  If both stirrups were even they didn’t feel right so he had to ride with different length stirrups.  One leg understandably is much weaker than the other.  George and Jake have made a great team because they have learned together and George doesn’t know anything other than to have an unbalanced rider.  When Jake’s trainer corrected his position it was obvious George would react negatively.   “George would be hard for others to ride,” Jake said, “because he’s used to me riding out of whack.”

Jake has never let his situation interfere with him living his life to the full or stop him from doing anything at all.  “I do understand it’s not how it should be,” Jake added, “so I take this into consideration when I’m under too much pressure and I do rest in between riding other horses.”

As one can imagine, finding chaps and boots because one leg was bigger than the other has been a constant battle.  Often Jake has used a thick bandage around his leg to fill out his chaps so they looked like they fitted better.  His mum found an old pair of leg warmers to wear under his chaps, and these did the trick but of course, Jake’s leg roasted from the warmth.

The family owned three or four ponies and the situation was literally, first up best dressed and best pony for the day.   They chose which one they wanted to ride.  Nobody owned any pony in particular.  Viv, having ridden as she grew up, was interested in show jumping at a low level.  On a sports day that the entire family would go to, the children had to sort themselves out as Viv would be off riding and they wouldn’t see her until lunch time. After which they’d all be off again, each going in their own direction.  

“We never had flash ponies growing up.  They were young ponies that needed schooling.  We couldn’t afford spectacular ponies.   To us, horses were horses.  We learned to keep riding no matter what went wrong.  My little sister got me to hop on the naughty ones then she’d get back on,” Jake said.

Jake is adamant that this was very good for all of them.  If there were classes they didn’t want to do that was their choice and they simply didn’t do it.  It gave them a true independence and helped them all develop their own problem solving strategies.  “Nowadays parents are more involved and not giving independence to kids like we were used to.”

 Jake likes to take children he teaches at Pony Club away from the parents and he tells the parents not to do anything.  “Kids will tack up and muck out yards and work happily together. Teaching them they can do it themselves.  That’s how we learnt growing up.”

“It really grinds my gears when people talk about disabilities.  Yet no one knows that I could have been disabled if I didn’t have the operation.  When I think of smart remarks it really fires me up.  People talk about things that they don’t experience.  They make a general statement about anything, and so it’s just to say if I hadn’t had the operations I wouldn’t be riding or walking.  I couldn’t be anything.  It’s just lucky that we live in a country where things are available to everyone and you can get the help you need.  But then there’s always ‘a what if’.  It makes you think about it, if you didn’t have it.”

An incredibly huge influencing factor behind Jake's motivation to succeed is the tragic accident of his best friend in 2014.  This young man drowned right before Jake's eyes and in spite of Jake's best efforts to save him.  Some would be affected negatively by this and Jake is of course devastated by the event.  But in his admirable ability to turn negatives into positives, he now fights even harder to make the most of every day.  He tries not to ever complain or be disatisfied about anything.  Consequent to this tragic life altering event, Jake is more motivated than ever to succeed in his chosen sport.    

"My mate got caught and I went in after him trying to get him out. In the back of your mind you think it could’ve sucked me in too.  It sounds cheesy but you genuinely do have to live everyday like it’s you last.  Until something serious like that happens you don’t understand the full meaning of it.  You know, unless it happens to you first hand, you really have no idea." 

This story is not only inspirational, but it also possesses an ironic twist.  Jake’s mum, as nearly all mums would do, insisted her son needed a readymade horse.  However, as it turned out, what Jake needed was Atlan.  A completely blank canvas, Atlan with the prerequisite good temperament and good feet, had no preconceived ideas about a balanced rider.  Jake’s father, a farrier all his life but never a rider, was always interested in only two things, temperament and good feet.  Currently, Jake follows his father’s philosophy by not allowing a horse with good feet and temperament to be discarded.  Jake, having come to know many of the racehorses he regularly shoes, will not allow them to be discarded if they are too slow for the track.  Rather, he takes them home, schools them and rehomes them, taking particular care that the horse and future rider are well suited, as he is with Atlan.

© iSpyHorses 2016