ANNABELLE RYDER

annabelle ryder was born in 2002 to nathaniel and lindsey ryder in seguin, texas. the family lived in a house in town, until annie was 6 years old. they got her on a horse as soon as she was old enough and she took to riding like it was what she was meant to be doing. her grandfather and great uncle cash saw her potential and the small family moved back onto the ryder family ranch with him. growing up, annie was surrounded constantly by people that loved her; her immediate family, her uncles and grandfather. she developed a stutter when she was around four years old and it continued until she got speech therapy starting at age seven. with speech therapy over time, she can generally speak fluidly though her stutter continues to act up when she’s nervous or upset. 

as she got older, she started helping around the ranch and doing more work. she was up at dawn and went to bed bone tired when the chores were done. her mom wasn’t raised on a ranch though and she wanted to make sure that annie had a childhood that wasn’t all work. all annie wanted to do was ride though. so, they started her in rodeos. nothing on horseback is perfectly safe, but lindsey was comforted by her daughter doing cutting and roping events rather than the more dangerous ones. 

in school, annie was getting decent grades and making friends. she played on the soccer team because they were required to do one school sponsored physical activity for a year, but annie kept playing after that because it made her mom happy.

she was the first born grandchild in the family, and because of that she gots spoiled rotten. she made the choice to work on the ranch and spend her free time and weekends, but when it came to birthdays and christmas, annie was getting the best presents a girl her age could ask for.

the only significant riding injury she sustained scared her parents shitless. she was fourteen she was helping her uncle break a new horse when it bucked her. he’d promised her the horse was safe enough to be ridden, but it spooked and annie hit the wooden fence. she broke her arm, but she was extremely lucky. her uncle judd was driving up and saw what happened. he was able to help stabilize the injury and kept the truck running so they could get her to the hospital.

when she graduated high school, she decided to attend ut austin in order to stay close to home and keep competing in rodeos. she decided to major in speech language pathology and minor in psychology. she wants to be a speech therapist after college.