Broken

Those of you who follow me on Instagram probably saw the picture I posted yesterday of Tim at Rood and Riddle. I was luckily able to get a last minute appointment with my favorite vet and hauled Timmers to Lexington yesterday afternoon, and thank goodness I did!

The news was not good. He flexed well and was actually fairly sound on concrete, but the vet got a strong positive reaction when he hoof-tested his left heel. Apparently the various angles of his left leg are wonky, leading to much less heel on that foot and most likely causing the ligament issue. Then we went inside to really find out what was going on with the ligament. Dr. N stuck the ultrasound probe on his leg, pointed out all of the structures to me, and then casually stated that Tim has torn all the way through his left check ligament. He was able to do a side-by-side comparison of the left and right legs, which revealed that the LF check is at least twice the size of the right and that roughly 60% of the ligament is damaged. Not only does he have this going on, but I also learned that he has seedy toe and white line disease. YAY ME.

Picture on right: normal check ligament, outlined in yellow

Picture on left: Green outline- Tim's left check. At least twice the size of the normal one. Yellow outline- the torn area

So, what does all of this mean..? Well, for starters, he has to be on stall rest for three weeks. In three weeks, if all goes well, he has a checkup with Dr. N and will have another ultrasound. If he seems to be healing nicely, I will then be allowed to get on him and walk for three weeks. At the 6-8 week mark, we'll have another checkup and ultrasound. Provided that he has healed by then, I'll be cleared to WTC and eventually go back to our normal routine.

During the three weeks of stall rest, he has to be iced twice a day, once in the morning and once in the afternoon, with the hope of minimizing the development of scar tissue. The injured leg also needs to be wrapped after each icing session; dry wrap in the morning and butecort sweat overnight. To add to that, he also needs to have three sessions of Clean Trax, which is a lengthy process that I have personally never gone through before. We pulled his shoes while at R&R yesterday in the hopes that going barefoot, combined with the Clean Trax, will really speed up the hoof healing process and get rid of the white line/seedy toe issue. He also needs to get out of his stall and hand-graze as often as possible... there really aren't enough hours in the day.

In the meantime, I'll be begging my friends to let me ride their ponies and I probably won't update my blog much (not like I have a stellar track record to begin with). I'll post as often as I have something interesting to say, but Tim and I are mostly likely going to go a little (or a lot) stir crazy in the next couple of weeks, so I'll try to spare you all from the whining and the pity party!

Everything Was Good...

Until it wasn't. Basically, I went out to CVF with my school friends today to have a nice, relaxing ride after a long week of classes. I planned to work on our dressage test for the upcoming show and hack around in the gorgeous fields. Got Tim all saddled up and was going to wrap his legs, when I noticed that his LF was puffier than normal. I called everyone into his stall and discovered that not only was his tendon area swollen, but it was also hot and squishy. My BO came back out and we got the vet out there within 15 minutes.

Thank goodness we did... the area was too swollen to ultrasound, but the vet believes he strained his check ligament :( He wrapped it immediately and I'm going to be using a lot of ice and poultice for the next TWO weeks while he is on stall rest. This means no show, no lesson with Dorothy Crowell (former olympian, people), no riding. Two weeks is also an absolute minimum... I won't be cleared to ride unless the ultrasound comes back 100% clean. Considering we don't even know what it looks like yet, I'm not optimistic. Fingers crossed, please!

Our first ever attempt at a triple! It does not seem like this was just two days ago 

Never Forget

M.I.A.

Yes, I'm alive. So is Tim, in case you were concerned for his safety after my last post. Things have been cray at school with move-in and new classes (mostly gauging my profs to figure out what I can/cannot get away with), as well as the unfortunate situation that I had to come back to school without my laptop while Apple replaced the track pad. That was the primary reason for my absence from my blog - and all of your blogs - because I really can't deal with the shittiness of the iPad Blogger app and would rather be absent for a week than throw my iPad out the window in a fit of frustration.

Since then, I managed to find my Mean Girl Pants and kick Timberly's cranky old man butt (yes, that is one of his nicknames, originated by Kimmie). Let's just say that my last day at the home barn, we made some huge progress on the spinning front. Tim threw in some mean spins and even a tiny little rear, but I finally found/used my voice. Imagine me screaming "GEEEEETTTTTTTT" about 5 octaves lower than my normal voice... Yep. It worked! Since that day, no spinning, even when I have deliberately put him in situations where I thought he might at least try. 

I might actually have this embroidered on the butt of my XC breeches. 

We have had some really great rides this past week since moving back to CVF :) Lots of hacks, fun times, and some more progress towards hacking out alone. In other news, we also have a cute freshman guy who joined the barn crew... riding with a guy is super weird, but he's very nice and fits right in. I'll update with more details later, but here are some pictures from the last week! 

We're like some sort of gang. The CVF crew. 

So incredibly fortunate to ride in such a beautiful area 

SHINYYYY

So freaking cute

We even conquered the front field all by ourselves :)! #proudmama  

The CVF girls go for a hack :) 

Around and Around We Go

As much as I'd like to pretend that everything is peachy keen and perfect, it has become glaringly obvious to me that new horses do not come without struggles. My struggle with Tim comes in the form of a rather pony like behavior - drop head, spin in circles repeatedly until allowed to return to the herd. SO MUCH FUN. Except when he tries to run us into a trailer. Or a fence. Or a truck. Or another horse. See where I'm going with this? The fact of the matter is that the spinning becomes more and more dangerous every time it happens, yet I have absolutely no effing clue what to do about it. I can sit back and pony club kick him, crack him with the whip, try to turn him around, etc. but we just end up spinning continuously until I get freaked out enough to dismount or someone leads us from the ground. I also don't know him well enough yet to know when it's coming, nor am I brave enough to beat the shit out of him and show him who's boss. This leads me to my questions... have any of you ever dealt with a spinner? How did you handle it when it happened? More importantly, how did you prevent the behavior from recurring? 

The spinning started the first time we hacked out alone at home. He was great, perfect really, until we got to the scary section of the farm near a house that is under construction. Scary noises, spooky corn, new farm - okay, I convinced myself that he was just getting settled and that it wouldn't be a problem again. Then, a few days later as we walked away from the barn towards the jump field, same deal. This time, my trainer saw it and had to lead us to the field because he refused to walk forward. That leads us to yesterday, when we schooled XC for the first time. He was a saint until my trainer told us to warm up and we split off from "the herd." We were calmly trotting around when he suddenly grabbed the bit and dive-bombed for the nearest trailer with a horse tied up. In one of the more embarrassing and scary moments of my life,  we almost spun into the horse and trailer and once again had to be led away by the poor owner of said horse/trailer.

Now, I am fairly certain that all of this originated in insecurity in me as a leader, barn sourness, and herd boundedness (?). Limerick had his barn sour/herd bound moments, but nothing at all resembling Tim's go-to maneuver. I'm sure that he is just testing me, and right now he is definitely winning the battle. Luckily, the rest of our XC schooling adventure was mostly uneventful, though we're hopefully going again this week to work out some kinks. Have bunches of pictures from yesterday, HUGE shout out to the bestie for documenting the whole experience :)

GAHHH SO CUTE 

Heel wayyyy down. YAY!

WEEE! Proof to me that I can actually jam my heels down.. there's still hope! 

Up the hill. Work those butt muscles

Need to fix that pesky jumping ahead issue, be he's adorbs 

Trying to remember to keep a soft/loopy rein 

I 

LOVE

THESE 

First Field Trip