Feeling thankful 23/1/17

It's all to easy to focus on the negatives isn't it?  To think about all the bad luck you have had and feel very sorry for yourself.  With social media you see all your friends and people you follow having success with their horses and doing things you want to do, it's easy to feel jealous or that life just isn't fair!  I'm as guilty as anyone of feeling sorry for myself when things have not been going well with Jack but you know what it's time to stop because I am blessed.  I have a lovely little horse who might come with a bit of baggage and have his issues but he is a lovely character,  he isn't the most talented but he tries his hardest for me, we have reached an understanding, I know how to get the best out of him and while he isn't going to win any gold medals he's mine and I love him!  People have told me I should get rid of Jack before he has any more health issues, that they wouldn't bother with him anymore and cut their losses before anything else goes wrong, but the thought has never crossed my mind.  For several reasons I don't think it would be the right thing to do for him or me.  I actually think his health issues are a reason to keep him, I understand what is needed to keep him happy and am prepared to manage these conditions.  I know what is normal for him and know when something is wrong.  I would never be able to trust that someone else would do the best by him no matter what and can't bare the though of him being passed from home to home as a problem horse.  He is mine, he is my responsibility and I will do right by him because he deserves it, he didn't ask to have kissing spines, arthritis, ulcers or strain his ligament.  Yes it's bad luck but that's all it is.  I have stopped beating myself up about him having all these issues, they are not my fault, there is nothing I could have done differently to prevent them but I have done my very best to treat them and manage them to make him as happy and comfortable as possible.
It's taken a little while but he is looking better and better as his work increases and his weight drops!
Although obviously I would rather my horse had not had all these problems is has meant I have learnt so much about the process of rehabilitation, injury management, different types of therapy, nutrition, diet, supplements and more.  I have also made lots of friends through support groups and blogging about our experiences so there are always positives to be found in any situation!

On to this week and we are progressing well, we have been able to have our first canter after 2 weeks of building up the amount of trot work.  I took him out for a nice hack last the weekend and at the end of the bridle path is an open bit of grassed land which you can have a canter on so I picked up trot and as he felt keen allowed him to pop up into canter.  It felt fantastic, a real step forward!  He was a little too keen and I had to keep him from going too fast too soon but it was great to have him feeling so well and wanting to take me.  We also got a lovely hack in with a friend with lost of lovely forward trot work and a play up and down some slopes to get him moving and using his back end!
It's always hard to hack out Monday to Thursday in Winter as I don't get finished at work in time to get out in the day light but this week I was able to get round the block for 20mins which is real progress and wont be long till the light is good enough to hack after work, while I still went in the school after our little hack as well to make sure he got enough exercise it was nice as a change.  I had a fab schooling session this week and a lunge over poles too, I even got to pop a little jump this week! Exciting!  More hacking was done this weekend with some really pleasing trot work especially.  We are building up with a few little canters thrown in where we can and I'm particularly pleased with Jack's attitude which is keen and enthusiastic in his work, something that has been lacking a bit in the past but had improved considerably before his ligament injury.  It's pleasing that this has not been affected by the injury and time off and that he has not reverted to being lazy!
I've given in and clipped him again too, while we were doing walk and trot work it wasn't needed but now we are increasing the work load and cantering Jack is sweating up a bit and it will only get worse so it had to be done.  I did think I might get away with not clipping as I really don't like it but I either needed to hold off on increasing his workload or clip!
I've gone for a version of combination of a trace and blanket clip, it keeps his back and quarters warm but all the main sweaty areas are now nicely clipped and non sweaty.  I don't like taking the hair off his back and quarters as I don't want them to get cold and stiff and him not work so well.

 

I also managed to get this lovely snap of the horses just after I had turned out yesterday morning, it was a beautiful crisp, frosty morning with the sun just coming up, something caught the horses eye and they were all stood fixated on something in the distance!

 

A positive start to the New year 1/1/17

Happy New Year!!

It's been a while since my last blog, I got rather bogged down with Christmas preparations, computer issues and work!
I also didn't have a whole lot to write about as Jack continued to be intermittently lame from mid
Oct.  We had a frustrating few weeks and 2 vet visits had failed to identify the problem therefore it was impossible to formulate an effective plan to get him better.  After rest and pain relief failed to have any effect I eventually managed to get the senior vet out to him on 7th December.  I have not seen Matthew in a few years so I filled him in on what we have been doing, Jack's kissing spine surgery, rehab and recovery etc and went over the latest issues we have been having.  He was so down to earth and easy to deal with and having looked at Jack trotting up and inspecting the lame leg he quickly identified a swelling just above the fetlock.  When he clipped the leg I was horrified at the size of the swelling at the back of his tendons and felt awful, worried and extremely silly to have missed it although he assured me it probably had not been that bad before as one of his vets had also missed it twice! 
I didn't feel so bad after that, we also think that as Jack had been messing about in the field the day before and galloping around he probably made it much worse so it was easy for Matthew to find. 

Next Matthew performed a scan on the Palmer Annular ligament which runs down the back of the leg and found damage. It was a huge relief to finally have a diagnosis and be able to effectively treat him rather than guessing and hoping!  Matthew assured me that of all the things he could have done this was the least serious, easiest to treat and highest chance of a full recovery.  He gave Jack a sedative then a steroid injection into the damaged area of ligament and was hopeful this would provide the pain relief and anti inflammatory response needed to start healing.  Jack was to have a couple of weeks off and then Matthew would return to assess how well he was doing and if work could begin.  Ideally we would have box rested him for at least the first week but knowing how badly Jack copes with it we agreed that he could have some turn out each day to keep him from going nuts when he went out and doing himself any more damage!  We had to be careful as Jack is carrying a few extra pounds due to not being in work for so long and the steroids could cause a laminitis risk so turn out was kept to a minimum, enough to keep him sane but not enough to cause any additional problems!  The 2 weeks passed and Jack seemed sound and the swelling reduced so Matthew returned to reassess the injury and I was confident of good news.  After seeing him trotted up and performing flexion tests Matthew was happy with his response to the injection and agreed the best thing now was for Jack to get back into work. 

Since this all began he has become quite stiff behind and is not using his back end as well as we would like but we are hoping this is just because of the lack of work recently and that getting him back to fill fitness will see this ease off without needing further intervention.  For now Jack is having a bute a day in the mornings to make him comfortable and able to work properly and is then being worked in the afternoon.  We started with 10 days of walking beginning at just 15mins and building up by 5 mins a day to an hour then introducing a small amount of trot.  We had our first trot on New Years day and he felt brilliant, what a great start to the new year :)
We will continue to build him up slowly and carefully over the coming weeks and hopefully have him back to full fitness and normal work in another 8-10 weeks.  Just doing walk work has been pretty tedious and cold so I'm glad we can now start to introduce some trot too to break up the monotony and get some blood moving to warm me up a bit.  I also find it quite hard work to get Jack working well in just walk, especially in the ménage.  When he is in full work I usually give him a good walk, trot and canter on a long rein to get him moving before asking him to pick up the bridle and work into the contact so not being able to do this has meant having to use a lot of leg!  I'm starting to introduce ground poles too now which does help get his back end moving a bit.  I cant wait to have the lighter evenings so I can get out the ménage more as he works much better out in the open.