A Lifestyle Approach

We are celebrating the fact that dressage is for every body on YourDressage! With that celebration, we have partnered with SmartPak to offer three awesome prizes for the readers and writers of our #DressageForEveryBody campaign. Learn how to enter here!

Here, a rider from Region 1 tells us about the hills and valleys of her weight loss journey, and how horses motivated her to maintain a weight management program.

By Samantha Silver

Watching my mom battle with weight struggles and food addiction had a huge impact on me growing up, and I’ve been facing a similar battle myself for the past twenty years. 

I remember my mom trying all the diets and programs available at the time. Eventually, she underwent a gastric bypass and lost a significant amount of weight. Years later, she still doesn’t have an easy time maintaining her weight, but she consistently makes better, healthier choices, and that is the most important thing. She has also gained way more mobility and can keep up with her granddaughter thanks to that surgery.

Luckily for me, I have managed to keep up with my weight and make drastic changes to get back to a healthy weight after each time I have “ballooned” up. I have a lot of the characteristics of a person with an eating disorder: I have a big appetite, a bad sweet tooth, and I obsess terribly about food.

The first time I got heavy, I was taken on as a working student for an eventing trainer during a hot Virginia summer. I literally sweated the pounds off in the four months I was there. I managed to keep the weight off for a few years, but slowly, bad eating habits took their toll, and I gained it back. 

I consulted with an endocrinologist specializing in weight management, and we tried a few different medications. However, I struggled with medication tolerance issues stemming from also having bipolar disorder with insomnia, as a lot of weight loss drugs are stimulants. At this point, Ozempic had just come out, and my insurance covered it. I became thin again with the help of that medication curbing my appetite. 

I find that with a smaller appetite, I not only eat smaller portions, but also make better choices in what I eat. When I have a larger appetite, I can fill part of my stomach with junk and still have room for the important bits (which I recognize is a very unhealthy attitude). 

Since then, my weight has been a rollercoaster and fluctuates anywhere between 30 and 70 pounds. In 2023, I gained a lot of weight when I had to retire my heart horse, and I ended up back on Ozempic. This time it was out of pocket (ouch). 

Unfortunately, being overweight is not enough for me to stay on top of my food intake and workout program. In 2023, when I reached my heaviest weight, it really began to impact my riding. I started (and am still) riding a friend’s draft cross, who is not the most motivated individual. 

I could not even trot a full lap around the arena when I started riding him. It felt shameful to me, as someone who earned their USDF Bronze Medal on a self-trained off-the-track Thoroughbred (OTTB) in 2018. How could I not even do a posting trot once around the arena? That was really the kick in the pants I needed to jump-start my weight management program again. I went back to the doctor, almost fell off the scale when I saw the number, and immediately began the hard work of shedding pounds.

Not only am I eating fewer calories and better quality foods, but I am also very physically active, which is something I think most horse people can appreciate. Four to five days per week, I ride two horses and clean stalls at two different barns for extra income. I also go for long walks through the woods with my friend and our dogs several days out of the week. When the weather isn’t so atrociously hot, my boyfriend and I do a lot of extra dog walks through local parks, too. 

I have lost weight by taking a slow and careful approach, and I am currently down 30 pounds, with only 35 more to go. I’m almost halfway there! Luckily, my friends and family are very supportive of my weight journey and never shame me for putting on weight. Plus, they actively make sure to comment if they notice I have been trying – and succeeding – at losing weight. 

To motivate myself, I have made myself a promise: if I get down to my goal weight, I will buy another pair of custom riding boots to celebrate!