Question for trainers on this group (long, sorry!)

I want to pick the brains of anyone out there who has worked with
sensitive OTTB types. I feel like I have gone BACKWARDS with Reason
and I want to see what you all think.

A little background. I got him for free in Feb 2002 at age 9 because
I was told he would not pass a vet check because of his arthritic
hocks (which I would believe, since he raced 29 times as a 3 and 4
year old.) I was looking for a project horse to start doing some low
level jumper and eventing stuff (up to 2'6" since I am a BIG weanie
over fences above that height!) I figured that the hocks wouldn't be
a big deal since I was going to go slowly and not have any kind of
timetable to get him that far.

Well, the timetable got pushed WAY, WAY back when he bucked me off in
August of 2002 and broke my collar bone and shoulder blade. Why, you
ask? His back was incredibly sore and it traced back to a horizontal
fracture of his left hind splint bone that was healing incorrectly.
Options were rest and/or a surgery that only had a 50/50 chance of
healing. Well, since I was laid up myself and I couldn't justify
spending the money with those odds of fixing the problem, rest was the
obvious choice.

I later found out through the grapevine that Reason had a history of
bucking off riders, thus the REAL reason he was free to a good home
(can you say sucker? ;-)) I figure he had been sore for one reason or
another for awhile before I got him.

After about a year (because of various life changes) I started working
him again and he seemed sound. He came to me totally avoiding the bit
and with a totally inverted way of going with his head straight up in
the air and his ewe neck extremely exagerated. He also rushed every
where with no set rhythm to any of his gaits except for whatever
entered his empty, handsome head! My plan was to just get him to slow
down and accept the bit calmly. I figured if we got this far, he
would bring his head down on his own and then we could move on from
there. However, I wasn't able to put as much time into him as I
should because my obligations at the farm (feeding and teaching
lessons to regular and therapeutic riders) put him low on the priority
list. But, over the last 5 years in bits and pieces, he began to
steady his pace and bring his head down, which I think was
accomplished by alternating riding in a rope halter and my french
link egg***.

We had a minor setback last year when his back became sore again, but
that appears to have been solved by using another saddle.

At this point, I considered a successful ride one in which he didn't
buck or act like a lunatic for the entire ride; we even got to the
point that bucks didn't occur at all for weeks on end!!!! I took him
to a couple of gymkhanas last year just to get him out into the public
again, since he hadn't left the farm for 6 years at this point. He
was wonderful at both of them (we even trotted the patterns at the
second one!) and I was very pleased with his progress.

This fall, I decided it was time to get a little bit more serious
about what the two of us were doing. I started taking lessons with
the new instructor at the barn, and the first thing she had us do was
get moving more forward off my leg. Well, since that point, he has
been uneven in his pace and spends all his time tossing his head when
I ride him, both in the rope halter AND the regular bridle. He is not
happy and our rides are a lot of fighting to get even a few good
strides.

So, I am wondering if we are on the right track now? I was frustrated
at the end of my ride today, because I was hoping that he was just
fussing with the bit yesterday when I asked him to go forward off my
leg. But this morning, he was just as fussy in the rope halter.
Granted it was cold and snowy outside and he can be fractious under
those conditions, but this was just not high spirits.

A ride like today's makes me feel like he is back to where I started
with him 7 years ago EXCEPT that he will bring his head down once in a
while and relax for a few strides. PLEASE convince me that I am doing
the right thing, since I miss the horse I could just hop on and hack
for 20 minutes without being exhausted and I am afraid I have lost
that horse for good. BUT, I also recognize that the horse that gives
me that relaxation and balance in those few strides is actually a
pretty impressive horse!
Sandy
(does any of this make sense?)
.