The last couple days have been pretty overwhelming both in horsey land and outside of it. First things, if you don’t know me in person or you don’t REALLY know what I do, I am a business office manager for a senior living community. This means I take care of all resident billing as well as other financial duties for the entire community ie accouts payable, account reconciliation etc. I also oversee and, when necessary, cover the front desk. This means I am very hands on with my resident in a lot of facets. They meet with me in my office, I speak with them on the phone and I am someone they trust when it comes to financial conversations. I definitely have my “favorite” residents and those that I get close to.
So where this is going is that obviously we are still in a massive world wide pandemic where the demographic in my community is pretty much the largest at risk demographic for the virus. The last three-ish weeks we have had a pretty sizable outbreak in our comunity. We have had residents go out to the hospital. And unfortunately, I lost one of my residents this week and its been heartbreaking. Additionally, being part of the executive team, helping manage all the ins and outs of testing and retesting and managing PPE etc with our outbreak has been incredibly draining and stressful.
So while I have been dealing with work stress I have found myself a little bit of pony stress. The other night I was simply swinging by the barn to drop food for my oversized money pits and a friend of mine was there having her gelding’s feet done. Unfortunately, due to injury, her gelding is not currently rideable and she herself has gone through some emotional trauma recently. It occured to me that maybe she and I could help one another. I asked if she would be willing to put miles on Ruffi so that 1) I could focus more on Bacardi and 2) she could have a horse to ride and start to heal a little from her stress. She willingly agreed and I was eccstatic!
So Tuesday night comes around (incidentally the same day I found out about my resident at work) and she is happily texting me letting me know every step of the way that she was there, tacking up etc. So I am on my way out when I get a text that the mare seems to be in pain and maybe my new saddle doesn’t fit. I am am CRUSHED and of course start to get anxious and stress about how I just dropped money on this saddle and I like it a lot and and and and.
So Preston and I get to the barn, another border shows me some video and at this point I am just being inundated with all sorts of suggestions as to what might be the problem; saddle fit, hormone issue, attitude, some other kind of pain and I just become so overwhelmed I am practially silent. I didn’t have a lot to say or a lot of feedback on the matter. Simply that I would have my body worker out on Saturday for massages and would have her advise on the saddle fit for the mare.
Last night (Wednesday) I went out again, this time to actually RIDE Bacardi, since I didn’t get to it the night before and take a little time with the mare myself to evaluate her. My friend had gone out again and tried to ride her, this time in our western saddle and she was still very much reactive and indicated she was in pain. So after I have a fairly successful ride on B, Preston and I go down to the lower barn where Ruffles is stabled and check in on her. I tried to put some sports gel linament on her back to help with any muscle soreness and she is VERY reactive. Similar to the first time we met her and she presented with back pain and bucked me off. I am glad the same fate did not befall my friend. She’s a tall pony and its a LONG way down.
I was able to massage Ruffi’s neck and her hamstring/hindquarter area but not much luck getting anyplace near her back/spine. So Preston and I start brainstorming. Maybe upping her massage schedule, maybe chiro, maybe accupuncture. So we tuck our baby girl in goodnight and go home.
Today I was consumed with all the thoughts of our girl. I messaged our body worker, told her what I observed last night, and also sent her a compliation of videos of the mare under saddle from when we first tried her out til Tuesday night, maybe she can see something I don’t. I also start just rolling ideas around in my mind.
Maybe she is sore because she has no back muscling, maybe kissing spine – but I don’t think it likely because she hasn’t been in a lot of work or being made to go around inverted. Still maybe a potential of hormone imbalance/ovary issue, but I am not as likely to think that is the case. So right now, I am settled on pursuing back pain, after an eval from the body worker who is not only a part of our care team, but a trusted and knowledgable friend.
Preston and I decided that it would not hurt either to put the mare on the same muscle building supplement Bacardi is on to help her start building that back muscle. We also talked more about accupuncture, potentially PEMF and my least favorite idea, using a pain reliever to help mitigate the pain and continue to try and ride until she builds up her own back muscle. I am also going to be looking into ceramic therapy blankets and similar ideas. I also haven’t really touched or thought about the idea of injections (nor do I want to).
Eitherway at the very moment of writing this blog post, we don’t know anything and won’t have any better ideas until Saturday. So here is hoping! Keep good vibes coming for us.
Happy riding + diagnosing!
A+R