my horse wont take the bit and is scared of the bridle

Question
I have a 4year old arabian mare that we are keeping for a 30 day trial to make sure she is what i want and she is fine except for she won't let me put a bridle on her she seems to be scared of the bit when we did get it on her once and she reared up and fell back can u give me any suggestions because we even went and got a gentler bit and she is still scared. the lady we got her from claims she had the bit in her mouth last summer but i'm wondering if that is a lie. i am 16 years old and a beginning horse rider.

Answer
heya,
 this is quite a difficult problem to solve over an email. I would try bulding the horses trust up from the beginning, it may be the fact that shes in a new environment that shes acting this way. However, it does sound like the woman did lie to you. Have you ridden this horse before? If you are a beginner rider it may be worth trying a different horse out as it sounds liek this horse may be a bit of a handful, through no fault of its own.
 I hope this helped,
emma