Doing Dressage

Don't mind us, just out here clocking along working on our dressage like a normal riding horse pair.

despite someone's best attempts of getting out of
work, he was still sound missing a hind shoe and
my farrier was out the next morning to put it back on.

We've hit some big milestones like doing a whole ride of stretchy work--twice! We've also started incorporating collection work for the sake of working in collection, not just putting him together as snugly as we can because if we don't he will fall apart and go lame. 

We had our lesson this morning, and it was like an actual real lesson. It wasn't a "can you watch my horse go around and help me mask his weirdness?" lesson. It's been AGESSS since we did normal things!

slightly sus about these developments

I really wanted to work on our trot-walk downward transitions because they were never particularly good to start with, and they've returned to being quite braced and above the bit. We started off with a lovely quiet little trit-trot to warm up with. 

The day before had been one of our stretchy days and I put in a lot of work riding from half halt to half halt to contain the zoomies so we weren't just freewheeling around with his head on the ground but his legs going a million miles an hour. It took some time, but eventually the half halts went from every single stride to every other and on out until he finally got the hint and was able to maintain the rhythm himself. 

He was a Smart Boi and remembered that slow is the way to go starting out. He still struggles to the left pushing into the outside rein on a circle. You can tell that's a big weakness for him right now, but at least he isn't lame on the LF (knock on wood lololol). Once we got our nice slowness and bending established both ways, we took a quick walk break and then went to pick up the trot again to start the transition work. Opie said, "nah we're cantering next yeehaw bitches." Which was false. He got to do some turns on the haunches instead to redirect his tiny brain, and then we picked up our trot again.

managed to get our lesson in before it rained
unlike earlier this week when the weather ruined our walkabout

We did the accordion exercise: in and out of bigger and shorter strides on a great big circle. Ugh, he was SO GOOD for this. MB and I were feeling quite giddy because as he went on, his shoulders unlocked and he started offering his old Opie toe flicks while staying super easy and light to ride (although my abs were absolutely screaming, it was a delight to sit). MB was like, "He's doing dressage again! Real dressage!" Yayyy, Opie!

But then we had to also do the downward transitions. Which turns out if you can establish this amazing quality of gait, you stop your hips and the horse just stops trotting. Total snooze fest. To the left he needed the extra support of the outside rein really being held, but also super boring. Basics forever and always amen. 

At that point I did want to canter, but again we had redirect the tiny brain to distract him from that. This time we did renvers to SI, a reinback, more renevers, now we're just trotting so boring, and ope we're cantering. We started off going right--his stronger direction--and MB told me not to stay in the cute canter, ask for the big jump in the stride. We did the 1-3 canter work with the shallow counter canter loop followed by a 15m circle. Crushed that, tried a lengthening which he nailed but then couldn't come back from it without breaking which was fine. That's a weakness thing, easy peasy to work on.

To the left he wanted to get a little squirrely anticipating again, but he settled enough in the trot that I just asked for the transition and it was fine. Again, definitely still much weaker this direction, but he didn't get tense about anything which was a big win. He was fine for the counter canter, but we had to either keep his hind end straight or his head/nose straight. I let his haunches come in a little bit to keep his RH doing its weird too far under the midline thing, and that kept the front end straight so whatever. Compromise is fine for now. We attempted a lengthened canter, and he opened up about one inch, but he came back quietly one inch too so good boy. 

posture work is boring.
would rather be touching things.

His recheck is scheduled for mid-July, and if we need to treat again no bigs. I'm super impressed and relieved we finally found something that seems to be genuinely getting him on the right track. Hopefully it can continue!

The bar is low...

...BUT!

We may have finally.....solved? (heavy emphasis on the question mark lolz) one of the roots of Opie's problems.

just insert (drug laced) candies plz

Today marks one week of treatment, which means we'll be all wrapped up by the end of the week.

So far it's been relatively smooth sailing. Let's break it down day by day.

(last) Tuesday: It was hot AF so we just did a bareback stroll.

Wednesday: I wanted to do our regularly scheduled lesson with MB the next day to get her eyes on him, so I figured I better put a saddle on him for the first time in about three weeks to see what we were working with. It was a mess. The footing was a little sloppy from rain, and he just could not settle. He couldn't soften, he couldn't focus, he still felt lame LF starting out on top of feeling tight and whacky behind. I was not feeling particularly optimistic.

Thursday: I went forth with the lesson anyway because MB isn't going to judge if he came out still looking Not Good. Plus she's very good at methodically talking me through unlocking Opie's crazy and coming out the other side with whether or not he can't or he just won't. 

had to do sitting trot to the left to control the zoomies

He did blessedly feel better right off the bat. We did a ton of stretchy walk where he felt a bit trippy up front, but he hasn't been able to stretch down without being dead fucking lame in ages so that was a massive win. Into the trot where we focused on keeping the rhythm slow. He still felt a little weird behind, but nothing notable with the LF which was another huge win. 

He had one big trip up front in the trot where we went sprawling for about three strides before he managed to right himself, but he went back to work for a few more minutes to wrap things up without issue.

right before he ate shit

Friday: Day off.

Saturday: We did our first canter! He couldn't turn right. At all. In any gait. But overall felt sound and relatively normal.

Sunday: I longed him in just his halter. He looked....herky jerky is the best way to describe it. Like his legs just weren't bending like normal horse legs? Question mark? I don't know, it was weird. He also looked like he had no control over his lower lip the whole time. It was swinging in the breeze like there was no connection between it and the rest of his face. Was he sleepy or relaxed? Those aren't really Opie things.

Monday: I finally succeeded in slowing down the trot. He's been zooming around probably looking good from the ground, but it's been half a centimeter from tipping to the point of no control. I'd rather have him slower and feeling more relaxed than blasting around looking powerful and about to fall down. Again. 

(this) Tuesday: We warmed up by running through the trot work from 1-3, but in the walk. The trot was in control from the start! We had a couple discussions about picking up the canter without being feral. The right lead canter was good--we could turn today! The left was a lot of being very angry that I wouldn't get off his right side (where I'm allowed to sit, so sorry), but once he snorted out all his rage over that injustice, it felt fine too. And then we finished with stretchy trot! Which has been sooooooo long in coming!

I'm hoping that we can go about our lives and rebuild strength yet again. And then maybe we can plan things? Knowing this horse probably not lol.

An Answer

Alrighty, we have a lot of catching up to do!

finally wore him down on the cuddle front, AND
managed to sneakily get it on camera

The new vet (Dr H) came out to take his turn at Opie. I messaged Hubby's cousin (Dr H's assistant) the day before to confirm they'd gotten all the imaging from my main vet (Dr A, keep up here) and the novel that I'd sent them on the history from this past year. She replied, "Yep, we're going over his xrays again right now!"

Which immediately made all my hopes plummet. I was like, here we go again. How interesting that we don't see anything either. We haven't been able to come up with any new ideas. Get a bone scan. Why didn't you do this or that. It's just his shitty hind end, you're going to have to wait it out. 

Of course neither of them actually said that, but I was all aboard the spiral out of control train. Legit already having a hopelessness meltdown. Between all the shit with Bobby and then all this shit in the past year with Opie, my brain is officially tapped out on getting answers from vets.

looking so good for being so useless

The next morning they came out, and I once again ran through a quick (lol) list of the things we've tried and treated. Dr H palpated all his parts and pieces in the aisle and said he felt absolutely nothing of concern. Great. He said he'd looked at all the imaging and everything was super boring--he hadn't even brought his xray machine because there wasn't a single thing that popped out that he would want to investigate further. Greatttt.

So we brought him into the ring where he watched him walk around a couple laps, did the tail pull neuro test, and then had him go out on the lunge.

Guys he looked SO BAD. SO FUCKING BAD. I started crying. It was the worst he's looked this whole time.

Lame af LF, stumbling and tripping and weird uncoordinated movement in both hind legs. We wrapped that up in a hurry and had him do the tiny circle neuro test. He was okay to the left. To the right, his RH kept going waayyy underneath himself with a hip drop that made him look like he was about to fall over.

Obviously at this point Dr H declared him neuro. In fact he thought he'd probably been neuro this whole time, he's just also had other things going on that we were chasing instead. He said Dr A and I did all the right things in the right order--no doubt his SI did need treating, and continuing to do the work I was doing was a good thing because if you don't watch him move he looks great--but the neuro was kind of skipped over. 

Dr H works with a different lab than the clinic Dr A works for so I had different options than just Marquis. A blog reader sent me info about this place awhile ago (thank you!!) that I had kept bookmarked, but honestly the website is super sketch and I didn't explore any further. It's a little different than the standard EPM testing, and they do their own compounded treatment.

We got his results back Monday and not surprisingly he came back positive for all the things--which most horses are going to test positive to exposure, but combined with how badly he's been doing it seems like a solid assumption that this is what we're dealing with. We got the black market (aka not FDA approved so they're not thousands of dollars) meds ordered and when those get here we'll will start the 10 days treatment. He'll have a follow appointment six weeks after that, and we'll likely do another round of treatment. 

In the meantime, in an effort to keep his muscle building and brain work going, he's been doing work on the longe line. He actually looks completely fine when he's in the vienna reins. The first couple steps are lame, but when you make him get to work and start moving out, there's nothing exciting to see at all. 

going right without falling over!

It's hit or miss how bad he is when he's not rigged up. He always stumbles behind, but some days that's all he does and otherwise walks and trots around looking sound. Other days he's so neuro he can't coordinate what his legs are doing. He's had days where he can't turn right unless I'm leading him by the head on his right side and basically showing him where each step goes. He had a day walking ground poles where you could see him come up to them and just straight up buffer. Like he knew the goal was to get to the other side but he couldn't get his brain to figure out how to make his legs do that.

It's depressing and it sucks, and I hate it for him because every time he sees me he's like, "Yay what's todays activity let's go do things!"

he was so excited to get to be in the ring at the same
time as his favorite riding bro

I think he's also probably developed some chronic compensation. Him picking up the trot lame and then transitioning quickly to soundness feels more like a habit now. He's also been getting ridden and worked with either me or the vienna reins holding him up/together, so he's going to have to get strong and coordinated in a lower frame again as well. And, of course, is EPM going to be the final answer in this chronicle? The LF could be explained by it, but it could still be something else we haven't figured out yet. 

Hopefully this will wrap this shit up. We're all over it at this point.