Leslie grew up with parents in the State Department Diplomatic Corps. They took assignments in many places around the country and the world. During one part of her life, they lived in Wrightwood, CA, which is only a few miles from my ranch. She told me about purchasing an Off-the-track Thoroughbred mare while she was living in Wrightwood. Her mother let her ride the horse home from Victorville, CA. At eleven years old, that was some feat at the time. That ride would have been close to 25 miles through desert brush.
Leslie was always interested in horses and loved Arabians in particular. During her time in Wrightwood, CA, she also skied every winter season. In her travels with her parents, Leslie rode horses and skied around the world. From eight to eleven, the State Department sent the family to Tunesia. While there, she bought an Arabian stallion. She loved riding him through the desert of his homeland until the family moved, reassigned to another post.
Fast forwarding a lot of years, Leslie married, went to school and got her degree in Studio Art, raised two sons, began a photojournalism career, and covered Desert Storm with her husband, divorced, and returned to her photojournalism profession in New York City. But she always had a horse in her life, an Arabian if she could find one. While Leslie attended college, she rode three times each week. She went back to school and got her nursing degree before marrying a second time and adopting another son.
Three years ago, Leslie and her second husband of six months took a two week trip to Switzerland to ski. While she was skiing down a fall line, she heard a loud pop. Leslie put her right leg in the exact wrong position and shattered her femur in seven places. She knew she was in trouble and did a pirouette and glided to the edge of the slope. Ski Patrol evacuated her to a hospital in a helicopter for treatment. Surgery was a grueling experience. Her right leg was pinned and plated together but her femoral artery was damaged. The doctors transferred her via ambulance to another hospital nearly two hours away for further treatment. They tried to prepare Leslie for the amputation of her right leg. When her new husband heard she might never walk again, he walked out. She began the fight for her life alone in a foreign country. That was the point in her life she felt strongly she needed an Arabian horse to get her through it all.
In another complicated surgery, the doctors repaired her femoral artery, although some of the damage caused was permanent. Their treatment plan for her was to remain in Switzerland in the hospital for rehabilitation. The doctors told her it could take up to two years before she could return to the US. She fought. She won. Leslie was life-flighted back to the US, with a cardiologist and surgeon on board the plane with her. Her oldest son left school in the middle of his final semester at Rutgers University to help her and was on that flight back to the US.
Leslie went straight to a hospital for three weeks as they tried to get her agreement to move into a nursing home in Pennsylvania permanently. She and her family fought the establishment to bring her home. Once in New Jersey, all three of her sons moved in with her to help care for her. She was in a hospital bed for a while but gained strength enough to get herself into a wheelchair and a rehab program.
Leslie began her rehabilitation. She was bound to a wheel-chair and hated it. She talked to her family and several friends about getting an Arabian horse to help her. Leslie knew, in her heart, a horse would be her best therapy.
She found a beautiful bay Arabian stallion in Texas that was hurt and needed surgery to recover. She raised the money but lost the horse on the table in surgery when the Veterinarians couldn’t save him. Several people in the Arabian community heard about her case and spread the word across the country. A caring couple in the Pacific Northwest heard about Leslie and her situation. They volunteered a young stallion they owned to her, provided someone could pay for the transportation to get the horse to New Jersey. Leslie scraped up the funds and waited four days for the horse.
When MarKo, a handsome, chestnut, 14.1HH Spanish-bred stallion arrived in New Jersey, Leslie was waiting for him in her wheel-chair. The transporter walked him off the trailer. MarKo walked directly to her, dropped his nose, and licked her right knee. Leslie was immediately surprised but realized all the pain in her leg disappeared in that instant. She knew MarKo was her horse. He was exactly what she needed to heal.
At first, someone had to drive her to the boarding facility to see her horse. Now, she can occasionally drive herself there. When MarKo first arrived, Leslie got around in a wheel-chair. Marko gave her the incentive to work harder in therapy. She went from the wheel-chair to a leg-brace and walker, now to just the brace. She learned how to balance and walk on one foot she can’t feel at all and learned how to take MarKo on short trail walks. Today, Leslie can use a mounting block to get on his back and take short walks riding him. She is looking forward to the day they can begin to trot around his pasture.
“Marko saved my life in so many ways,” Leslie told me. “They wanted to put me in a nursing home for the rest of my life. I couldn’t do that. It would have killed me. MarKo is my best friend and my savior. I wouldn’t be where I am today without him. He is a gift from God. He is my hero who held me up and showed me the light to fight even harder to balance and strengthen my heart and soul to walk. MarKo has made it all possible to no longer be a prisoner to my wheelchair and alleviates my PTSD, depression and anxiety. We haven’t been on a trail ride yet, but that is in our future. One step at a time with my red hero, MarKo.”
