Photo courtesy of Kate Freeght.

I own a pony named Angel, AKA “Tinkerbell.” She’s the best pony ever. She does everything from eventing to pony jumpers and has even gone to the Royal Horse show.

My mom and I bought her as a six-month broke 5-year-old not knowing anything about green ponies. She was quite the handful at the beginning but grew and began to show she had quite a bit of talent in her and could be an upper level pony. We had a truly stellar season.

Placing in almost every class we went in and qualified for the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair, which had been a dream of mine since I was 11 years old. In August of 2016, she was diagnosed with skin cancer on her eye. Because she was having such an amazing season, we decided to deal with it once the season had finished.

Anyways the season finished, we went to the Royal and the the battle with cancer began.

Photo courtesy of Kate Freeght.

It was a very emotionally tough two months but Angel handled it so well and woke up every day with the “I got this” look. After beating the cancer, we went down south for two weeks and trained in prep for the season. It was truly a trip of a lifetime and I even got to compete at Pine Top farm.

Once we got back, I noticed her eye looking a little funny so we called the vet. Turned out the cancer was back and she required more chemo and another very invasive surgery and skin graph. Once she got through the three rounds of chemo, she had her surgery and skin graph. After having two weeks to recover, she had to get four more rounds of chemo to get all the cancer once and for all. Angel is going to be eventing this summer and hopefully go Pre-Training.

Although she had fought cancer twice already, she is one of the toughest ponies I will ever meet. No matter what she has gone through or what she will go through, she is proof that even if things seem to be getting bad, they can and will get better.