But that recovery was short-lived.
The next morning Daumeyer walked into her stable and discovered the horse had died sometime overnight.
“I saw her laying down and I realized she wasn’t breathing,” Daumeyer said, tears streaming down her face. “Her legs were stiff and it was too late to do anything for her.”
For two weeks, Daumeyer tried to decide what to do after losing the fast, high-spirited horse.
“I didn’t know if I wanted to come here and show at all because I didn’t have my horse with me, the one I’d worked on for four years,” she said. “I was looking forward to showing everybody what I had done with her. Then I realized this is what I like to do ... so I decided I should come.”
Daumeyer ended up shifted her training efforts to backup horse, Maverick, a 9-year-old quarter and paint horse mix.
“We don’t click very well, we don’t have a lot in common but now we have one thing: He was there when Trinity died and that was his best friend, too,” Daumeyer said.
Daumeyer got some good news earlier this week in the form of a new horse, Caz, a 6-year-old Kiger mustang gelding neighbor Bill Smith found for her.
4-H adviser Debbie Heck said she was afraid Daumeyer might back out of the competition but is very glad she didn’t.
“It’s really tough for her to try to come in and show this other horse but she gets to be at the fair, she gets to follow through and complete her project, but this new horse ... you should see her eyes light up, she gets so excited.
“It’s hard to rebound and when you fall in love with one and then you find another one, it’s amazing.”
Still, nothing will replace Trinity, a horse that Daumeyer said she knew like the back of her hand.
“She was my first horse ever,” Daumeyer said. “There’s not a horse in the world that could replace that.”
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