So this is my first post since Baby J (Jynx) was born. It has been a rocky, rocky road to say the least. He was at the vets for almost 7 weeks, although I think we could have pulled him out much sooner had the vet been more proactive. Lesson learned. Long story short, the legs improved dramatically enough that he could have gone home, but vet kept pulling bloodwork and Baby J had a mild infection for quite awhile. We probably did three rounds of antibiotics with limited success. Finally, after that third round vet suggested plasma transfusion. Which, unknown to me, he told my trainer/breeding partner he would do the first week. Well lo and behold, after the transfusion his numbers pretty much came normal. GRRR!!! He still continued to struggle with the knee a bit, as well as the lovely addition of pressure sores from the splint. And towards the end of his stay, he started not wanting to put weight on his leg that had been more seriously contracted (also had the pressure sores on the fetlock). All these things made the vet want to keep him longer, so we did.
However, it did get to a point where we were both like "wow, our bill is going to be really high, let's just pull him out, bring him back to the barn and see how he does". Vet thought he was good enough to do that (and would periodically check on him) so we brought him home.
He made HUGE leaps of improvement once he got home. HUGE. I was able to get his sore healed up in a couple weeks (whereas it was improving super slowly with the vet). He had no issues putting weight on the leg when I started bandaging him, and then wouldn't when the vet came to bandage him. We figured out it was because of the way he was being wrapped and the type of bandage the vet was using. I think it was just so tight, it was irritating that sore and making Baby J not want to put weight on it. Leg started straightening out more as he used it more (since he was on stall rest at the vets). Started putting on some weight, and some muscle.
He also started to get limited turnout. Oh man...I was SO happy the first time I got to turn him out for an hour. HE was so happy! To see him running around like a normal baby was supposed 7 weeks after being born was awesome.
And all through this he kept his curious, and very sweet personality. He is now super duper easy to handle, and loves humans. I guess that's the one perk to being handled every single day for a variety of treatments since birth?
Anyway, we named him Jynx because its meant to be a little tongue in cheek. He has been jinxed! He's had a lot thrown at him at such a young age and so far, has come through the other side relatively unscathed (just has a few scars, which I'm hoping will disappear in a few shedding cycles). I'm just thrilled to have mom and baby back at the barn. Arwen is doing great-I was warned she would drop a ton of weight but so far, she is holding her condition fantastically. I'm planning on getting on her back a little this winter to just do some flat work and get her a little tighter in prep for her next breeding (will talk more about that later...the stallion search continues). I am dying to bring her into the arena with jumps/poles, just to see what the baby will do with it all!
Speaking of riding, I have still been taking lessons consistently on a handful of horses. Its just been kind of a rotation of whats available (and of whats available, what I am able to ride!). I tried leasing one for about a month but that didn't end well. Started out fine, but after about two weeks horse started trying to rear. It was really weird-I attribute it to some kind of pain issue because other than that he is a pretty good guy who does like his job. Lately I've been riding a horse one of the juniors is "leasing" who is super fun and I like a lot, but is tricky. He has a stop in him that he employs when you are not accurate which unfortunately for me, happens a lot. Not the stopping but the lack of accuracy...anyway, I guess you could say he is not super forgiving in that sense. But in others, he's great. He kind of trucks along, especially since we've only been jumping 2'3-2'6" lately. Although last night, with my trainer back from a show, I got to jump him up a lot which was great. Probably around 3'-3'1". This horse has an AMAZING jump, just so smooth, round, slow and lovely so jumping him up was an experience. He took one oxer huge, and I got a little jumped loose and may have shrieked, but hey, I stayed on. Left that lesson with a really big smile on my face.
So that's pretty much what's been going on in my horse world. Lots of happenings coming up, and I do need to update on the CF front, although that isn't super exciting (besides me hitting some PR's, which I guess is exciting in its own way).
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