Kitten, the gray mare in my profile pic, is an odd horse. I picked her out of a field based on her gorgeous floating movement, despite the fact that she had not been handled for the entire 7 years of her life and desperately needed a lot of remedial hoof work.
Fast forward...what? Three years?
Kitten is very easy for me to handle. I can do anything I would like to with her. However...she doesn't necessarily like other people handling her. It is not a fear thing, but rather a mood issue...as if she wakes up on the wrong side of the bed and has 0 tolerance for other people.
Let me give you an example.
Thursday, my mother came over to drive me to a specialist appointment on Friday. I wanted to ride. I convinced her to go riding, as she rode a lot in her youth, but is troubled by stiffness and fear of injury. She wanted to ride Kit. I wanted her to ride the Old Man, my obnoxious PSG schoolmaster, who was actually in a good, sleepy mood. Kit had the 0 tolerance look to her: the hard, proud, alpha look (of course, she is the top mare right now with my big Holst still in VA).
Mom insisted. I finally gave in, with pissy facial expressions and muttered swearing.
Kit was willing to stand to be mounted, but did a small dophin impression when Mom swung on. I growled at her, and she cocked her head and looked at me, then did it again. I swore, and told Mom to get off right now. Mom stayed on for another moment, enough so that Kit did another dolphin impression, and then got off.
I was highly peeved at this point, as the situation I had seen brewing had just come to life. I stuck my arm through Kit's reins, and swung the Old Man over to the 3 step mounting block. After telling us all to bury her facing Texas, she got on. And they were fine.
Kit, on the other hand, was aggravated and borderline aggressive. In moods like this, she wants to do something, and do it now. I waved to my fiance M, his friend M, and the sister C (with her two little girls). Kit and I marched off down the driveway together, knowing that Mom would catch up.
After we walked the 300 yards to the end of the driveway, I positioned Mom facing us (up the driveway), and ran Kit through all the pre-mounting preparations that we do. She demands a routine, and gets annoyed if something deviates, but doesn't care where we are just as long as she has her routine. So I showed her what I was going to use to get up (two cement blocks), tugged softly on the saddle, checked the girth, pressed hard on the saddle for a few moments, and then swung up.
Of course, she was perfect. She cheerfully wandered along our trail ride with her eyes out sideways like an old plow horse. She didn't bat an eye over running cows, and coolly volunteered a lead past them when the Old Man was disturbed by their bucking and cavorting. She didn't raise a hair at the field of galloping and snorting horses, and (rather snidely, I thought) showed Old Man how perfectly she could walk in the very center of the road.
We walked to a relative's house and chit chatted for a while with the elderly gentleman while the horses ate clover.
The way back was uneventful, with the exception of Kit giving a small ego fit after I got off and stood for a moment talking to M. I pinched the edge of her nostril with my fingernails as she was rather obnoxious, jumping straight up into the air and then waving around a front foot. She grumpily snorted at me, and waited until I was finished talking.
The point of the post?
1. Know your damn horse. I can look at Kitty and tell what kind of day she is having at 200 feet away.
2. Know what you can expect of your horse. Kitty loves her routines, and if she is having a good day, she is willing to put up with more mistakes than usual. If she is having a bossy girl day (like above), then the only person that needs to be up on her is "her" person. I'd chuckled in the past over the idea of a one person horse, and still do, but there is something to be said about the level of competence required to ride a certain kind of horse. A tempermental hot mare may tolerate being handled by a beginner on a day when she is feeling relaxed, and is willing to trade pampering for some small offenses due to inexperience.
3. All my horse knowledge hasn't totally gone to shit despite being sick. I feel like I ride like a tapeworm, as I can feel every obnoxious crookedness in my body influencing my horse. Even though I am not very strong, I can still rely on my ability to observe my horse's moods and make appropriate decisions based on their personality and experience.
4. I do a good job training. Kitten hasn't been in consistent work since I got really sick. Despite that, she is always (for me) very purposeful in completing the tasks I give her. I almost used the word "quiet", but that is a misnomer...she is very determinedly doing what I asked her to do so she can get a reward. That is very different from a horse that is rather dull and ignoring what you want (often a definition of quiet). She is dead set on her task, and she wants her cookie afterwards (even if the cookie comes as a grazing reward during the ride, or even two handfulls of grain after she is in her stall).
5. I like my horses hot and temperamental. :)
Monday, September 26, 2011
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Ah, fudge. And #$#@$@*&.
I sent my big Holsteiner mare out about a month ago to get a full reproductive exam. I have a contract on Colorado, the Elite Knab stallion with Avalon Equine, and I admit to having dreams of a little spotty baby.
But it seems that nature has other plans.
My big mare is a solid 4th level schoolmaster when she feels like it. At times, she does a great interpretation of pluggy greenbroke packmule. I was of the opinion that perhaps she just needed some time...I knew I needed some time to work on my overall physical strength, so what harm in her being a royal hay eating pest of mammoth proportions? I was considering possibly doing hock injections for her comfort when I built up enough strength to ride, as I feel like a wobbly neurologically impaired limp noodle / hot flaming mess*, but the main thing in my mind was to keep her comfy.
*for reference, my dear Lyme friend A tried to convince me to get on the whopping 13 hands of her Icey, and I wouldn't, as I was afraid of admitting to her and myself that I thought I would ooze up one side and down the other!*
Well...she has some whack issues. Psycho. Like holyshitdamn I am so freaking glad I sent her to get worked up, as she has a monstrous anaerobic and aerobic uterine infection that lit the culture on fire in 24 hours (instead of the normal 48). My exaggeration of course.
Add to that..
A slack R broad ligament that creates a lovely continual pool of fluid.
A slight pelvic tilt that allows for the possibility of fecal bacteria to enter the uterine environment.
A weird injury to her cervix, obviously sustained with her previous one and only foal.
And you get a perfect storm.
I feel slightly overwhelmed that I did not give my old she bear credit for hurting. I honestly thought it was something in her legs or back, and that taking a few months off to just loaf would be the best thing for her.
But I am looking at hitting her with 2 cc of oxytocin at the end of every heat cycle to encourage her body to shed that extra fluid...for the rest of her life. Of course she already has been sewn up back there to keep out the possibly re entry of fecal bacteria.
It gets better. The cervix has a blind outpouching in its very center--where it had to be poked by a torsional little hoof. And there was no freaking way to have found that out without all of this. There is some thought about taking her to VA Tech to literally nick the outside of the cervix...the opinion is that her cervix would be able to function perfectly well (and my thought...perhaps better without the blind pouch to harbor creepy stuff).
I am so glad I saved for this. Despite the reality that there will be no bouncing spotty baby next summer, my old queen will not be dealing with the pain of untreated raging infections! The vet and breeding manager both agree with me that a situation of this magnitude has to be 1) painful and 2) chronic.
I think this is a humongous breakthrough in understanding this mare, as she has been labeled a butthead (on good days) by many people. It is also a very sharp wake up call to me as well...given the fact I know pain so well, how was I so blind to what she was feeling? How could I simply have attributed her occasional erratic behavior to something other than pain? Why did I settle for the trite behavioral explanation? Honestly...this is why I love people medicine. Being able to ask how long has your back hurt?--since your last baby, perhaps? --is priceless. And so is being able to communicate that we are going to fix this, and you are going to finally feel better.
An illness is like a journey into a far country; it sifts all one's experience and removes it to a point so remote that is appears like a vision.
~Sholem Asch
But it seems that nature has other plans.
My big mare is a solid 4th level schoolmaster when she feels like it. At times, she does a great interpretation of pluggy greenbroke packmule. I was of the opinion that perhaps she just needed some time...I knew I needed some time to work on my overall physical strength, so what harm in her being a royal hay eating pest of mammoth proportions? I was considering possibly doing hock injections for her comfort when I built up enough strength to ride, as I feel like a wobbly neurologically impaired limp noodle / hot flaming mess*, but the main thing in my mind was to keep her comfy.
*for reference, my dear Lyme friend A tried to convince me to get on the whopping 13 hands of her Icey, and I wouldn't, as I was afraid of admitting to her and myself that I thought I would ooze up one side and down the other!*
Well...she has some whack issues. Psycho. Like holyshitdamn I am so freaking glad I sent her to get worked up, as she has a monstrous anaerobic and aerobic uterine infection that lit the culture on fire in 24 hours (instead of the normal 48). My exaggeration of course.
Add to that..
A slack R broad ligament that creates a lovely continual pool of fluid.
A slight pelvic tilt that allows for the possibility of fecal bacteria to enter the uterine environment.
A weird injury to her cervix, obviously sustained with her previous one and only foal.
And you get a perfect storm.
I feel slightly overwhelmed that I did not give my old she bear credit for hurting. I honestly thought it was something in her legs or back, and that taking a few months off to just loaf would be the best thing for her.
But I am looking at hitting her with 2 cc of oxytocin at the end of every heat cycle to encourage her body to shed that extra fluid...for the rest of her life. Of course she already has been sewn up back there to keep out the possibly re entry of fecal bacteria.
It gets better. The cervix has a blind outpouching in its very center--where it had to be poked by a torsional little hoof. And there was no freaking way to have found that out without all of this. There is some thought about taking her to VA Tech to literally nick the outside of the cervix...the opinion is that her cervix would be able to function perfectly well (and my thought...perhaps better without the blind pouch to harbor creepy stuff).
I am so glad I saved for this. Despite the reality that there will be no bouncing spotty baby next summer, my old queen will not be dealing with the pain of untreated raging infections! The vet and breeding manager both agree with me that a situation of this magnitude has to be 1) painful and 2) chronic.
I think this is a humongous breakthrough in understanding this mare, as she has been labeled a butthead (on good days) by many people. It is also a very sharp wake up call to me as well...given the fact I know pain so well, how was I so blind to what she was feeling? How could I simply have attributed her occasional erratic behavior to something other than pain? Why did I settle for the trite behavioral explanation? Honestly...this is why I love people medicine. Being able to ask how long has your back hurt?--since your last baby, perhaps? --is priceless. And so is being able to communicate that we are going to fix this, and you are going to finally feel better.
An illness is like a journey into a far country; it sifts all one's experience and removes it to a point so remote that is appears like a vision.
~Sholem Asch
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Softly, Softly
The defining way I think of animals, period...
but also...
an excellent description of today. Now we are 41 minutes past the midnight hour, so it is technically no longer Sept 11. That, for me, is a good thing.
This morning, the television showed endless portraits of Americans remembering 9/11 of 2001. I had been up for about 6 hours with relentless stomach cramps and sharp nausea, and being sleep deprived due to pain makes me extremely grumpy. As the M-Man (the fiance) used to be a volunteer firefighter for years (and was a firefighter before and after 9/11) he was very into watching the coverage. I couldn't. Despite being curled into him on the couch, I began to cry and couldn't stop. I demanded that we watch the segments of talking heads instead of the unending litany of names read by surviving family members, and kept my eyes closed and my head against his chest.
Eventually, he untangled himself and made us breakfast. I hid in the bathroom, yelled at the barking mini dogs, wrapped my chilled and sniffly self in layers of fleece clothes, and cocooned myself under the ugly couch comforter so that the words became a soft drone.
I didn't want to understand this. It plays a part in my family--my brother is at Westpoint (I suspect a no small part of this event in his decision)and my uncle was SF. On my mother's side of the family, military service is an expectation of the men. Women usually act as support. My mother was the first woman in her family to go to college, breaking the staff mold. From the age of eight/nine to thirteen/fourteen, all I dreamed of was being SF like my uncle. Bad events happened to me once in that time frame, and happened again at the 14 range, and my focus changed from dreaming of the future to surviving the present. I hid from the silent girl who ran the ridegelines in ratty sneakers, who drove herself to clock mileage barefoot in the snow to develop endurance. That innocent self, who dreamed of hunting, of serving, of dark miles with a gun and pack--that girl was not someone who could deal silently with the events that happened to me. That girl dreamed of blood and vengeance in a million scenarios. To keep sane, she had to be hidden.
Today I grieved, like that morning my senior year, for having to hide that girl. I longed for her single minded purpose, for the years of whipcord endurance I could have created in myself, and for the possibility of absolute sacrifice I could have made.
I know now that survival is sometimes the sole purpose--and name--of the game. That the choices I made then were the only choices that I could have made.
These memories lean out and capture me with their long, pointed fingers. I see flashbacks of that time and resist the need to run and hide. They wait for me in the long shadowed corners of the house, booby trapping the dark spaces of my mind. I walk softly around the edges of rooms, wary of becoming trapped in the old/new pain leering out from bookshelves, clothes, patterns of light on the floor.
This does not make today any easier.
All sorrows can be borne if you put them into a story or tell a story about them.
~Isak Dineson
but also...
an excellent description of today. Now we are 41 minutes past the midnight hour, so it is technically no longer Sept 11. That, for me, is a good thing.
This morning, the television showed endless portraits of Americans remembering 9/11 of 2001. I had been up for about 6 hours with relentless stomach cramps and sharp nausea, and being sleep deprived due to pain makes me extremely grumpy. As the M-Man (the fiance) used to be a volunteer firefighter for years (and was a firefighter before and after 9/11) he was very into watching the coverage. I couldn't. Despite being curled into him on the couch, I began to cry and couldn't stop. I demanded that we watch the segments of talking heads instead of the unending litany of names read by surviving family members, and kept my eyes closed and my head against his chest.
Eventually, he untangled himself and made us breakfast. I hid in the bathroom, yelled at the barking mini dogs, wrapped my chilled and sniffly self in layers of fleece clothes, and cocooned myself under the ugly couch comforter so that the words became a soft drone.
I didn't want to understand this. It plays a part in my family--my brother is at Westpoint (I suspect a no small part of this event in his decision)and my uncle was SF. On my mother's side of the family, military service is an expectation of the men. Women usually act as support. My mother was the first woman in her family to go to college, breaking the staff mold. From the age of eight/nine to thirteen/fourteen, all I dreamed of was being SF like my uncle. Bad events happened to me once in that time frame, and happened again at the 14 range, and my focus changed from dreaming of the future to surviving the present. I hid from the silent girl who ran the ridegelines in ratty sneakers, who drove herself to clock mileage barefoot in the snow to develop endurance. That innocent self, who dreamed of hunting, of serving, of dark miles with a gun and pack--that girl was not someone who could deal silently with the events that happened to me. That girl dreamed of blood and vengeance in a million scenarios. To keep sane, she had to be hidden.
Today I grieved, like that morning my senior year, for having to hide that girl. I longed for her single minded purpose, for the years of whipcord endurance I could have created in myself, and for the possibility of absolute sacrifice I could have made.
I know now that survival is sometimes the sole purpose--and name--of the game. That the choices I made then were the only choices that I could have made.
These memories lean out and capture me with their long, pointed fingers. I see flashbacks of that time and resist the need to run and hide. They wait for me in the long shadowed corners of the house, booby trapping the dark spaces of my mind. I walk softly around the edges of rooms, wary of becoming trapped in the old/new pain leering out from bookshelves, clothes, patterns of light on the floor.
This does not make today any easier.
All sorrows can be borne if you put them into a story or tell a story about them.
~Isak Dineson
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