Wow! Its March??

I can't believe how time flies! Its already March!! I hope you and your ponies are beginning to enjoy the sunshine and the outdoors again! Well I wanted to continue filling you in on me and Simon's story.

In the last post I told you all about Simon's weight gain issues and the struggles we've had with that. But this past September we began yet another journey. In November we moved Simon to a new barn. We were extreamly happy with our old barn yet the riding conditions were not optimal (no arena) and he was almost 20 mins away from our house. We moved him to a farm now only 5 mins away with an indoor arena! With all of the sadness of leaving our old "home" I was excited to be able to ride throughout the winter and have Simon much closer for WHEN he gets hurt (just about every other day :P) So we packed up our things and moved to the new barn. Simon settled in great and he loves playing with all the other throughbred's in the barn!

So your probably thinking.... "well what this new journey your embarking on?" Before we moved Simon he started developing a "hitch" if you will. While trotting he would out of the blue, begin hopping on three legs with his back left leg held up. He would walk out of it, yet everytime he trotted he would begin to hop! We had a eqine chiropractor come out thinking that his back could be the issue. Long story made short we didn't have a great experience with the chiropractor and Simon was still the same. We did some more investigating and called up the vet that vet checked Simon before we adopted him. He said that sometimes when racing throughbred's develop something like this its generally a stifle issue. They begin training more in the opposite direction to when they hop. So we moved Simon to see if more consistant work would make this issue improve. Sadly, it didn't. he seemed to get worse, and eventually hit a point when every time I put my leg on to ask him to move forward he would pin his ears, buck, kick, try biting my leg, and backup. We had 2 vet's out. One said it could possibly be a fractured pelvis and he would need 6 months stall rest. We knew there was no way Simon would go for no turn out! So we went to seek a second opinion before we considered putting him on stall rest. The second vet did a much more through examanation and spent close to 2 hours at the barn! She did a rectal exam establishing that he did not have a fractured pelvis. Other than his apparent symptom's (refusing to move forward) she had no clue what was wrong with him! About to leave she listened to his heart and said that was the only irregular thing about him. She had never heard anything like it, and nither had I! She said that could be related to his issue yet without further testing we wouldn't know. On top of which IF this was the issue there was only one,high risk, expensive cure. Upon many tears and thought we decided to give Simon some time off to see if the issue would resolve its self.

During this time I began riding two other horses at the farm. Graceful Afleet (aka Afleet) and Summer tooth (aka toothie, or Summer). I'll talk more about them in my next post but the exciting news is I will be trying out eventing this show season on Summer! I can't wait to embark on a new adventure outside of the hunter jumper scene! 

As for Simon it's been about 3 months since our last vet visit. And I can say he is doing much better! I honestly can't put my finger on why he's no longer refuses to go forward and hasn't hopped in the past 3 weeks! I can only attest this trial to God! I truly believe he "injured" Simon for me to experience riding two new horses and now, being able to event something I have always dreamed of doing! I mean two vet's drawing at straws? So we are moving onward! He is back into light walk trot work and canter work on the lounge line. As for my next few posts will be about Afleet, Summer and our eventing!! 

Enjoy the warm weather and mud! ;) 

Simon in the new indoor getting kisses :D