beejy; my heart hurts
so after spending most of the summer treating my horse for what i thought was a back injury & giving him heaps of time off as he just wasn't getting right, i've finally got a diagnosis.
please don't snark me for not getting a vet out the minute he was 'unsound' as i have only just finished paying off the LAST vet bill for his bung eye and it's all well and good saying that all horse owners should have a billion dollars in the bank for 'emergencies' but it's just not feasible all the time. plus, his veins weren't gashed open & he wasn't dripping pus, he wasn't lying on the ground crying (like taz does when he colics!) and he hasn't lost an ounce of condition.
obviously i already feel like a bad mother because he was telling me he was in pain since october/november and i wasn't listening enough & completely mis-interpreting him and thinking it was a sore back OR that he was revisiting crazy town (which he has done quite often and as we spent many a year in residence there, i don't think it is entirely unreasonable to presume that he wanted to return to see friends).
anyway.
it's unconfirmed as we have to xray, but i'd say he's pretty fucking arthritic.
in all four legs. he's only 11 years old!
near knee the WORST. he was crippled after a flexion test. i did NOT see the soreness in his knees? all i saw was the unevenness when trotting in his HIND end. argh!
offside knee slightly better, and "spavin" is present in both hinds.
i have no idea how to use that word in context! i've never heard of it before. my vet said to mention it to my farrier so he can start corrective shoeing with "rollbacks" or something.
anyway. i'm pretty devastated because 5 years ago i retired blitzen due to ongoing arthritis issues. beejay was sound as a bell when i bought him & he was meant to last forever & he's only 11 fucking years old & it has taken me four years of fucking HARD WORK getting him nice enough in the head for ME to ride pleasantly and take out and about and COPE. (and seriously, i don't give a fuck if someone else more talented and wizzbang could get him doing official hacking in 1 week or whatever, *I* am his owner so it's *ME* who matters here, and it's not like i haven't fucking TRIED to be better for him - i dont' know anybody else who would put so much effort into a horse who offered so few rewards for such a long time)
egh, who let all the anger out?
anyway.
he's started a course of arthropen aka Pentosan (pentosan polysulfate sodium) - 1 vial a week for 4 weeks. you don't even wanna know how much a vial costs. gotta also start adding shit to his feed, like glucosamine & devil's claw.
might just work on one thing at a time & see how it goes. do some quality control.
other things i've heard of for arthritis:
-rosehips
-celery seed (which i am already feeding)
-msm + Chondroitin (maybe i can get this in a mix with glucosamine? idk)
-Cosequin
advice/help would be most appreciated. sorry for the whine.
when blitz became increasingly unsound i retired him as he was already getting joint injections (i did xray him cos we knew precisely where his soreness was), and was heading into his twilight years anyway. i would like to at least get another 4 years of soundness or productivity out of beej if i can so i guess i'm going to go down the route of supplements & pentosan injections. if funds are available i'd like to xray, but as he's showing changes in all 4 legs, at $400 a joint i am really not in a position to xray everything right now. could just xray his WORST leg to see if there's a floating bone chip or whatever, but if there IS, surgery is not an option anyway.
i know arthritis is workable & not the end of the world. things have come a long way since i had blitzen in work. but i am very angry & upset about it and i just wanna ride my horse.
i'm not even allowed to do any groundwork or anything with him for a month whilst the pentosan kicks in. he's gonna be crazy!
i am jealous and sad because everyone else around me is competing and going to pony club and getting lessons and i have to scab rides off whoever's available. there's no reward in riding Mouse cos she's just for sale so really i'm just tuning her up to sell, which doesn't interest me. plus she is a cow!
got pony club next week & dunno who to ride. taking taz to a show on sunday, which should be good fun tho. thank god for taz, he makes me feel like a little girl with her pony.
anyway. Emily is riding taz in the hunter trials so she needs to get some training up. she's gotta practice bush jumping, opening gates etc. going out in the bush with her today hopefully for some fun.
out of interest, Emily's mother has the most intriguing job. she cleans up after 'deaths'.
mostly car accidents, but anything really. i think it's fascinating. it would be very hard tho.
please don't snark me for not getting a vet out the minute he was 'unsound' as i have only just finished paying off the LAST vet bill for his bung eye and it's all well and good saying that all horse owners should have a billion dollars in the bank for 'emergencies' but it's just not feasible all the time. plus, his veins weren't gashed open & he wasn't dripping pus, he wasn't lying on the ground crying (like taz does when he colics!) and he hasn't lost an ounce of condition.
obviously i already feel like a bad mother because he was telling me he was in pain since october/november and i wasn't listening enough & completely mis-interpreting him and thinking it was a sore back OR that he was revisiting crazy town (which he has done quite often and as we spent many a year in residence there, i don't think it is entirely unreasonable to presume that he wanted to return to see friends).
anyway.
it's unconfirmed as we have to xray, but i'd say he's pretty fucking arthritic.
in all four legs. he's only 11 years old!
near knee the WORST. he was crippled after a flexion test. i did NOT see the soreness in his knees? all i saw was the unevenness when trotting in his HIND end. argh!
offside knee slightly better, and "spavin" is present in both hinds.
i have no idea how to use that word in context! i've never heard of it before. my vet said to mention it to my farrier so he can start corrective shoeing with "rollbacks" or something.
anyway. i'm pretty devastated because 5 years ago i retired blitzen due to ongoing arthritis issues. beejay was sound as a bell when i bought him & he was meant to last forever & he's only 11 fucking years old & it has taken me four years of fucking HARD WORK getting him nice enough in the head for ME to ride pleasantly and take out and about and COPE. (and seriously, i don't give a fuck if someone else more talented and wizzbang could get him doing official hacking in 1 week or whatever, *I* am his owner so it's *ME* who matters here, and it's not like i haven't fucking TRIED to be better for him - i dont' know anybody else who would put so much effort into a horse who offered so few rewards for such a long time)
egh, who let all the anger out?
anyway.
he's started a course of arthropen aka Pentosan (pentosan polysulfate sodium) - 1 vial a week for 4 weeks. you don't even wanna know how much a vial costs. gotta also start adding shit to his feed, like glucosamine & devil's claw.
might just work on one thing at a time & see how it goes. do some quality control.
other things i've heard of for arthritis:
-rosehips
-celery seed (which i am already feeding)
-msm + Chondroitin (maybe i can get this in a mix with glucosamine? idk)
-Cosequin
advice/help would be most appreciated. sorry for the whine.
when blitz became increasingly unsound i retired him as he was already getting joint injections (i did xray him cos we knew precisely where his soreness was), and was heading into his twilight years anyway. i would like to at least get another 4 years of soundness or productivity out of beej if i can so i guess i'm going to go down the route of supplements & pentosan injections. if funds are available i'd like to xray, but as he's showing changes in all 4 legs, at $400 a joint i am really not in a position to xray everything right now. could just xray his WORST leg to see if there's a floating bone chip or whatever, but if there IS, surgery is not an option anyway.
i know arthritis is workable & not the end of the world. things have come a long way since i had blitzen in work. but i am very angry & upset about it and i just wanna ride my horse.
i'm not even allowed to do any groundwork or anything with him for a month whilst the pentosan kicks in. he's gonna be crazy!
i am jealous and sad because everyone else around me is competing and going to pony club and getting lessons and i have to scab rides off whoever's available. there's no reward in riding Mouse cos she's just for sale so really i'm just tuning her up to sell, which doesn't interest me. plus she is a cow!
got pony club next week & dunno who to ride. taking taz to a show on sunday, which should be good fun tho. thank god for taz, he makes me feel like a little girl with her pony.
anyway. Emily is riding taz in the hunter trials so she needs to get some training up. she's gotta practice bush jumping, opening gates etc. going out in the bush with her today hopefully for some fun.
out of interest, Emily's mother has the most intriguing job. she cleans up after 'deaths'.
mostly car accidents, but anything really. i think it's fascinating. it would be very hard tho.