I knew it wasn't going to be good, but I was hoping for the best. I had my friend Heather (also an equine veterinarian) recheck Harley's eye today. She believes that his eye has ruptured and the eye is no longer viable. :(
That, unfortunately was his good eye. Now he has hardly any sight at all. We don't know what happened initially, just brought them in one evening and noticed his eye was all swollen and puffy. The original injury happened about 6 weeks ago. We doctored it on our own for about a week, because normally we get it back to normal within 3-5 days, but not this time. We called Heather on a weekend because my boss was out of town and Heather was on call. She thought it was a trauma injury and confirmed that what we were doing was the best option. She said to expect improvement within a week or less. Another week goes by and it's no better, so I have my boss come and do a recheck. He decides the eye needs to be debrided, but refused to sedate him, and didn't do a very good job. He told us to continue treating his eye with the ointment, and put the PRP in his eye twice daily. We didn't have much luck with the PRP because it's a liquid, but we did our best. The eye took a definite turn for the worse after the debridement. We continued the treatment and Banamine. Still no improvement...fast forward to this weekend. I'm home and had a chance to get a really good look in Harley's eye in the daylight and am shocked at how truly bad it looks. There was what looked like a greenish bubble on the cornea and a bloody-red outline on the bottom section. The eye also constantly tears. Heather thinks the rupture has occurred recently, maybe today or yesterday. But it's too late to do anything other than put him on antibiotics and continue what we've been doing. If we can prevent infection, the eyeball should continue to shrink and eventually (hopefully) become very small and pain free. Worst case scenario is that we're unable to control the pain and we'll be forced to have the eye removed. I really don't want to do that, so we'll just take it one day at a time. I don't think he's in horrible pain, and neither did Heather. Since the eye has ruptured, the pain should be lessened and hopefully healing will be encouraged. Just sucks. Wish I would have had her out last week before it got so bad. If only...
But I can't do anything about that now. We'll continue taking care of our boy the best we can and pray for the best. Heather had to chuckle at what a cheap date Harley is...the hardest part of a thorough eye examination is holding his head up.
That's my boy. :)
Showing posts with label blindness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blindness. Show all posts
Monday, March 18, 2013
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Keep on, keeping on
The dogs and I have been keeping up with our walking activity on most days. How exciting...not. But, I have noticed that my legs seem to be more conditioned, which is encouraging. Out of 7 days last week, we walked only 3 days because we had a fair amount of rain, and I do have to look somewhat presentable at work. The trails are quite muddy in the park now, so our walking is limited to the pathways that have wood chips or on the sidewalks and roadways. Technically, the park is still closed for winter so that works in our favor because there's no traffic to contend with. The dogs are loving it! I enjoy it too, but would certainly look forward to my walks more if I had someone to walk with. The dogs aren't much for idle chit-chat.
Last weekend, our son Justin was here from Nez Perce, Idaho. He has a buyer for the Porsche that we've been storing for him, so bye-bye car and hello camper. Justin brought down an old camper for his dad to fix up. It's the strangest thing. It's really more of a 1/3 camper, as it's only about 4 feet long and fits inside the pick-up box with about a 6-8" hangover on each side. It has 2 seats and a little table in the center and windows on each side, and a full-sized door in the back. There's a slider window in the front that matches up with the slider window in our truck. You can remove the table and it converts to a single-wide bed. We're thinking to use it as a dog-hauling camper. :) Cool!! I'm sure the dogs won't agree, but they'll get used to it. They are just too big to be in the cab with us when we go on trips or whatever. Annie sprawls all over between us and poor Ruby ends up on the floor, or sitting atop of Annie. Just a little too cozy for our comfort! So after hubby replaces some of the wood, which has dry rot, we'll make good use of it.
My friend Claudia delivered our second order of fresh produce from Bountiful Baskets. You don't have to order, but if you want the produce, it's available every other week. We did pretty well with the last delivery, eating up almost everything that we got. Except for the two sweet potatoes and a few remaining apples, everything is gone. We ate the spinach a couple of nights ago, and oh my!!! It was heavenly!!! I'm going to be preparing fresh spinach a lot more often...delicious! I rinsed the leaves, removed the large stems and cooked it in a frying pan with about 1/2" water, a pat of butter and about a teaspoon of minced garlic. I didn't even add any salt or pepper and it was just too good to be true!!
Here's this weeks' bounty of goods. There's a 5 lb. bag of baby Yukon Gold potatoes, 2 large pieces of broccoli, 2 bunches of lettuce, some Fuji apples, oranges, lemons, limes, blood oranges, 2 papayas, a piece of ginger, a coconut, 2 pineapples, 2 vanilla beans, carrots, leaks, bananas and some fresh mint. I think that's about everything. Whew! I love having all this fresh produce to pick from. :) I'd never seen purple or yellow carrots before, but they taste the same as the orange ones. Who knew? I think I'll try making chips or mashed potatoes out of the sweet potatoes. They are not favorites of mine, or my hubby, but we'll eat them so they don't go to waste. And, they're really good for you.
Here's one of our dinners from last week. Steamed green beans, spaghetti squash with a little butter, salt & pepper and a hamburger. Oh my, the spaghetti squash was delicious!! I'll definitely be buying that more often. And so easy to prepare. Just cut in half (this is the hardest part) and lay face down in a shallow pan with some water. Bake for about 30ish minutes or until you can easily scrape the squash out with a fork. So good! Oh, and don't forget to remove the seeds. Silly me, forgot that part! :)
We had a very quiet weekend. We took our little horse trailer down to the local car wash and pressure washed the mold and dirt off of it, and washed our truck too. Amazing how much better everything looks when they're clean! We stopped at the local feed store and bought a few bags of Purina Senior for the horses and then stopped at the grocery store on the way home for some milk and some bread. I love how there's so much less shopping to do when fresh produce abounds. Justin took us out to dinner to our little Mexican restaurant in town, and it was delicious. My hubby ordered his usual Taco Salad Cazuela and JP and I ordered veggie burritos. My favorite!! They grill all kinds of fresh veggies, add some rice and beans and roll up in a giant tortilla, add some burrito sauce and top with sour cream and guacamole. So good!!
Good grief, all I'm doing is talking about food. Sorry...told you it was a quiet weekend. :)
I haven't yet ridden little miss Sugar, but I want to. I think our weather's supposed to clear up a bit, so maybe I'll get a chance this week. I hope so! It sure doesn't take much rain to muck everything up again. We're still doctoring Harley's eye. He has a corneal abrasion in his left eye, which formerly was his best eye. Now, with this most recent injury, he's seeing pretty much nothing. I feel so sorry for him. It's actually been much worse since my boss came out and debrided his eye. I'm not sure if that made it more sore, or if the eyeball itself suffered more damage when the abrasion was being scraped. All I know is that we've been faithfully putting the medicine in his eye morning and night, and he's been on Banamine twice a day for pretty much 2-1/2 weeks now. Without the banamine, the eye still swells dramatically, so I'm still giving it to him. I can tell that it's still painful because he's always squinting and the eye tears all the time. I don't know what else to do. We keep his fly mask on if it's even a little bit sunny out, not sure if that helps or not. I've had to put the bell on Kadie again, because poor Harley totally freaks out if he doesn't know where she is at all times. It just breaks my heart to see him upset and uncomfortable. I hate to think what he's going to be like when something happens to my sweet, old girl. I can't even bear to think about that. Harley's my baby. He was born into my arms and he's just the most sweet-natured horse ever. Shouldn't have happened to him. I just hate it! But there's not a damn thing that I can do about it. I pray all the time for healing and recovery, but for whatever reason, my prayers are not answered where Harley is concerned. Faith isn't always an easy thing. And especially when someone we love is hurting. Sure wish I understood why...not that it matters. It is, what it is.
This is a picture of my sweet Harley peaking above his beautiful momma's neck. He still had his sight then, and we had no idea what was looming in his future. His mom had bum luck in her life too. She had laminitis or chronic founder. We were never able to figure out why because all tests came back negative, she had never over eaten any grain, or spring grasses, wasn't overweight, none of the usual suspect things. She never had retained placenta either. The only thing we could theorize was a cause, were hormonal changes that occurred each spring when she began having heat cycles. We tried for years to keep her sound, but eventually had to let her go. She was a perfect horse with unsound feet. She was an angel and I still miss her to this day. I still feel blessed to have loved and cared for her though. And she loved her boy, more than anything, she loved Harley. They were quite the pair. He looks very much like her. Dear, sweet Scooter. Her registered name was Mis Star of David and she had an impressive pedigree in the ApHC with several famous horses in her lineage. We got her because she was built like a tank and had the most beautiful coloring that I'd ever seen...she was my dream horse. I rode her only a handful of times, and then sweet Scooter gave birth to a little Harley. I was right there when he was born, and I'll remember it always. Incredible, awe-inspiring miracle of birth. I'd never even seen a puppy or a kitten being born before that. I was all alone that morning, and I was terrified and so very excited. I stayed with Scooty the whole time, petting and talking softly to her, and then when the foal was halfway out, she took a break. I cut the sack from Harley's nose and he looked into my eyes and blinked several times. I was in love! We'd planned on selling the foal, but there was no way! When Scooter was rested, she finished her job. True to his nature, Harley layed there nickering and looking around for almost 2 hours before he even thought about getting up. When he was ready, he got up and nurses. He still prefers sleeping in to waking up early, even now. That's my boy! He's relaxed and always takes time to smell the roses. :)
Blessings everyone,
Lorie @ Cingspots
Last weekend, our son Justin was here from Nez Perce, Idaho. He has a buyer for the Porsche that we've been storing for him, so bye-bye car and hello camper. Justin brought down an old camper for his dad to fix up. It's the strangest thing. It's really more of a 1/3 camper, as it's only about 4 feet long and fits inside the pick-up box with about a 6-8" hangover on each side. It has 2 seats and a little table in the center and windows on each side, and a full-sized door in the back. There's a slider window in the front that matches up with the slider window in our truck. You can remove the table and it converts to a single-wide bed. We're thinking to use it as a dog-hauling camper. :) Cool!! I'm sure the dogs won't agree, but they'll get used to it. They are just too big to be in the cab with us when we go on trips or whatever. Annie sprawls all over between us and poor Ruby ends up on the floor, or sitting atop of Annie. Just a little too cozy for our comfort! So after hubby replaces some of the wood, which has dry rot, we'll make good use of it.
My friend Claudia delivered our second order of fresh produce from Bountiful Baskets. You don't have to order, but if you want the produce, it's available every other week. We did pretty well with the last delivery, eating up almost everything that we got. Except for the two sweet potatoes and a few remaining apples, everything is gone. We ate the spinach a couple of nights ago, and oh my!!! It was heavenly!!! I'm going to be preparing fresh spinach a lot more often...delicious! I rinsed the leaves, removed the large stems and cooked it in a frying pan with about 1/2" water, a pat of butter and about a teaspoon of minced garlic. I didn't even add any salt or pepper and it was just too good to be true!!
Here's this weeks' bounty of goods. There's a 5 lb. bag of baby Yukon Gold potatoes, 2 large pieces of broccoli, 2 bunches of lettuce, some Fuji apples, oranges, lemons, limes, blood oranges, 2 papayas, a piece of ginger, a coconut, 2 pineapples, 2 vanilla beans, carrots, leaks, bananas and some fresh mint. I think that's about everything. Whew! I love having all this fresh produce to pick from. :) I'd never seen purple or yellow carrots before, but they taste the same as the orange ones. Who knew? I think I'll try making chips or mashed potatoes out of the sweet potatoes. They are not favorites of mine, or my hubby, but we'll eat them so they don't go to waste. And, they're really good for you.
Here's one of our dinners from last week. Steamed green beans, spaghetti squash with a little butter, salt & pepper and a hamburger. Oh my, the spaghetti squash was delicious!! I'll definitely be buying that more often. And so easy to prepare. Just cut in half (this is the hardest part) and lay face down in a shallow pan with some water. Bake for about 30ish minutes or until you can easily scrape the squash out with a fork. So good! Oh, and don't forget to remove the seeds. Silly me, forgot that part! :)
We had a very quiet weekend. We took our little horse trailer down to the local car wash and pressure washed the mold and dirt off of it, and washed our truck too. Amazing how much better everything looks when they're clean! We stopped at the local feed store and bought a few bags of Purina Senior for the horses and then stopped at the grocery store on the way home for some milk and some bread. I love how there's so much less shopping to do when fresh produce abounds. Justin took us out to dinner to our little Mexican restaurant in town, and it was delicious. My hubby ordered his usual Taco Salad Cazuela and JP and I ordered veggie burritos. My favorite!! They grill all kinds of fresh veggies, add some rice and beans and roll up in a giant tortilla, add some burrito sauce and top with sour cream and guacamole. So good!!
Good grief, all I'm doing is talking about food. Sorry...told you it was a quiet weekend. :)
I haven't yet ridden little miss Sugar, but I want to. I think our weather's supposed to clear up a bit, so maybe I'll get a chance this week. I hope so! It sure doesn't take much rain to muck everything up again. We're still doctoring Harley's eye. He has a corneal abrasion in his left eye, which formerly was his best eye. Now, with this most recent injury, he's seeing pretty much nothing. I feel so sorry for him. It's actually been much worse since my boss came out and debrided his eye. I'm not sure if that made it more sore, or if the eyeball itself suffered more damage when the abrasion was being scraped. All I know is that we've been faithfully putting the medicine in his eye morning and night, and he's been on Banamine twice a day for pretty much 2-1/2 weeks now. Without the banamine, the eye still swells dramatically, so I'm still giving it to him. I can tell that it's still painful because he's always squinting and the eye tears all the time. I don't know what else to do. We keep his fly mask on if it's even a little bit sunny out, not sure if that helps or not. I've had to put the bell on Kadie again, because poor Harley totally freaks out if he doesn't know where she is at all times. It just breaks my heart to see him upset and uncomfortable. I hate to think what he's going to be like when something happens to my sweet, old girl. I can't even bear to think about that. Harley's my baby. He was born into my arms and he's just the most sweet-natured horse ever. Shouldn't have happened to him. I just hate it! But there's not a damn thing that I can do about it. I pray all the time for healing and recovery, but for whatever reason, my prayers are not answered where Harley is concerned. Faith isn't always an easy thing. And especially when someone we love is hurting. Sure wish I understood why...not that it matters. It is, what it is.
This is a picture of my sweet Harley peaking above his beautiful momma's neck. He still had his sight then, and we had no idea what was looming in his future. His mom had bum luck in her life too. She had laminitis or chronic founder. We were never able to figure out why because all tests came back negative, she had never over eaten any grain, or spring grasses, wasn't overweight, none of the usual suspect things. She never had retained placenta either. The only thing we could theorize was a cause, were hormonal changes that occurred each spring when she began having heat cycles. We tried for years to keep her sound, but eventually had to let her go. She was a perfect horse with unsound feet. She was an angel and I still miss her to this day. I still feel blessed to have loved and cared for her though. And she loved her boy, more than anything, she loved Harley. They were quite the pair. He looks very much like her. Dear, sweet Scooter. Her registered name was Mis Star of David and she had an impressive pedigree in the ApHC with several famous horses in her lineage. We got her because she was built like a tank and had the most beautiful coloring that I'd ever seen...she was my dream horse. I rode her only a handful of times, and then sweet Scooter gave birth to a little Harley. I was right there when he was born, and I'll remember it always. Incredible, awe-inspiring miracle of birth. I'd never even seen a puppy or a kitten being born before that. I was all alone that morning, and I was terrified and so very excited. I stayed with Scooty the whole time, petting and talking softly to her, and then when the foal was halfway out, she took a break. I cut the sack from Harley's nose and he looked into my eyes and blinked several times. I was in love! We'd planned on selling the foal, but there was no way! When Scooter was rested, she finished her job. True to his nature, Harley layed there nickering and looking around for almost 2 hours before he even thought about getting up. When he was ready, he got up and nurses. He still prefers sleeping in to waking up early, even now. That's my boy! He's relaxed and always takes time to smell the roses. :)
Blessings everyone,
Lorie @ Cingspots
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Sum sum summertime
...and the livin' is easy...NOT!!!! Wow, have we been busy. I always dream of more downtime, less "to-do's" and more socializing, soaking and sipping. But - whatever - that's my life! I'm not complaining, well maybe a little. :) It's been almost a month since my last blog post, and there's more to update than I can possibly remember. I'll give it my best shot though...
My sis had eye surgery for the 3rd time and she's finally doing somewhat better. They say she may always have blurry vision in that eye, but will try corrective lenses and see if that helps. I'm just happy that she's not looking at more surgeries anytime soon.
Ruby got spayed on June 16th and all is back to normal. Big sigh of relief...I was quite worried about the surgery for some reason, and am thankful and relieved that she did well and is totally healed up. I took a day off work and spent the day in Salem. Just me and Annie puttering around, it was fun. We went (I went) shopping for a few new summer clothes, went to Costco and stocked up on some groceries, went to a huge park and had a very long walk and even went through the massive rose garden they had there. It was a beautiful day and I really luxuriated in having a day off work mid-week. Felt like a stolen day...loved it!! It would have been positively perfect had I not been worried about poor, little Ruby. But, I said my prayers for her protection and left it in God's hands. Always helps!!
My hubby and I took a week off from work the last week of June and over the 4th of July weekend. 10 days off in a row. Sounds like a long time, but it sure did go fast. We had our grandson, David the entire time. We are definitely not accustomed to having a child around for that length of time. Parts were enjoyable and parts were intolerable, but all-in-all, it went fairly well. I'm very glad that grandpa got to spend some quality time with his grandson. David loves being around the horses! He's an animal lover at heart, and that's wonderful and quite helpful being at our place. We have cats, dogs, horses and the llama. Dave got to ride Siri a few times, brush her and he loved that, so did Siri. We spent a day at the beach, went out for seafood dinner, had a long walk on the beach and gathered seashells. We spent another day at the lake, swimming and hiking. It was fun, but I found myself wishing we'd had a boat. There were soooo many people there and I missed the solitude that I remember from years past. So many more people moving to our part of the state. I don't blame them, it's a beautiful part of Oregon, but I prefer less crowds and less rules everywhere. *sigh* Guess I'm showing my age again... I bought 15 lbs of sliced, fresh strawberries and made a double batch of jam. YUM!! I put the rest in freezer containers for using later. $30.00 for washed, sliced berries is quite reasonable compared to the cost at the farm stands. Everything has gotten so expensive. But, we'll sure enjoy those berries come winter time.
We also bought some Windsor Cottage stones and built a 14' long x 30" wide raised flower bed in the front of our house. We made it about 16" tall, so it would be comfortable for sitting. It turned out really nice. I just bought a bunch of flowers for planting at the local garden store today. I just need to pick up a load of planting soil and I'll be all set for mass plantings. We still have enough stones to build a v-shaped raised garden bed on the other side of the house by the front door. That one should be a quicker, easier version compared to the big one. It's really going to add some pizazz to the landscape, and I can't wait to see the end results. My next idea is to put up some planter window boxes under some of the windows, but that's for another time.
We have our winter's supply of hay all neatly stored in the barn too. Our hay was delivered last week and it took us and 2 paid helpers, 2 evenings working to finish the job. We got about 12 tons total of new hay, and have about 2 tons left from last year. That's considerably less than the 20 tons we put into the barns last summer, but money was a bit tighter this year so we'll just feed as long as it lasts and worry about buying more later, if and when we run short. We more than likely will have to buy a few more tons, but I'm not going to worry about that now. Next big project will have to be the firewood for the winter...the work just never ends, does it?? Sometimes I envy those people who live in little homes in the suburbs...they just don't realize how easy they have it, but then again, I love living on our little farm in the country with all its' privacy and peaceful surroundings. Nothing in life is ever perfect...but it's our life and I really do love it, even if it is filled with work. I don't have to pay for a membership in a fancy athletic club to get exercise and that's a fact!
We had plans to go watch fireworks on the 4th of July and were in the car ready to go when our neighbors started shooting off big, loud roman candles and such...Harley freaked, started running and that was that. We parked the car in the middle of our very long driveway and watched the illegals going off all around us and felt a measure of relief at being able to keep a watch over our little herd as well as the neighbor's 30ish head of horses as well. What a gorgeous sight to see all the horses running together in one big herd...much more spectacular in my humble opinion than the greatest of the fireworks!! It's all about perspective, right? I just wish I'd have had my camera because I could have caught some fantastic shots. I'll try and remember that for next year.
I'm still riding Ladde and he's doing wonderfully. I'm feeling more and more comfortable on him with each and every ride. Lately, however our consistency's been off because of all the other projects we've had to deal with. The weather has cooled this week and it's lovely riding weather, so I'll probably have a nice evening ride tonight. I'm looking forward to it.
Harley had a flare-up of his uveitis lately. It was bi-lateral, but worse in his right (good) eye. I managed to quiet it down very quickly, but the damage was done. He now has cloudiness in about 1/3 to almost 1/2 of his right eye. Prior to this outbreak, the damage to his eye had been in the anterior, or back portion of his eyes; meaning that nothing was unusual looking about his eyes. Somehow the fact that he didn't look any different from a sighted horse was something I was thankful for, but now his eyes are starting to look more typical of a blind horse. It breaks my heart to think that he has so little vision left. I still cry over his situation, but bless his heart, he seems to be adjusting to his lot in life much better than I am. I just keep praying that God will watch over him and keep him safe. So far, so good. I'm a firm believer in the power of prayer and am so thankful for our many blessings in life. God is good.
Well, I've run on a lot longer than I'd meant to. I really should try to post more often so that I'm not trying to catch up on a whole month's worth of activities. I've got a bunch of pictures that I've taken, but never seem to take the time to download them onto a disk so that I can transfer them to this computer. Someday, maybe I'll advance to the 21st century! Ya think? One can always hope...
I hope you're all enjoying our wonderful summer...it was a long time coming. May we all savor and enjoy it while it's here!
Blessings and good-bye for now...
Cingspots aka Lorie
My sis had eye surgery for the 3rd time and she's finally doing somewhat better. They say she may always have blurry vision in that eye, but will try corrective lenses and see if that helps. I'm just happy that she's not looking at more surgeries anytime soon.
Ruby got spayed on June 16th and all is back to normal. Big sigh of relief...I was quite worried about the surgery for some reason, and am thankful and relieved that she did well and is totally healed up. I took a day off work and spent the day in Salem. Just me and Annie puttering around, it was fun. We went (I went) shopping for a few new summer clothes, went to Costco and stocked up on some groceries, went to a huge park and had a very long walk and even went through the massive rose garden they had there. It was a beautiful day and I really luxuriated in having a day off work mid-week. Felt like a stolen day...loved it!! It would have been positively perfect had I not been worried about poor, little Ruby. But, I said my prayers for her protection and left it in God's hands. Always helps!!
My hubby and I took a week off from work the last week of June and over the 4th of July weekend. 10 days off in a row. Sounds like a long time, but it sure did go fast. We had our grandson, David the entire time. We are definitely not accustomed to having a child around for that length of time. Parts were enjoyable and parts were intolerable, but all-in-all, it went fairly well. I'm very glad that grandpa got to spend some quality time with his grandson. David loves being around the horses! He's an animal lover at heart, and that's wonderful and quite helpful being at our place. We have cats, dogs, horses and the llama. Dave got to ride Siri a few times, brush her and he loved that, so did Siri. We spent a day at the beach, went out for seafood dinner, had a long walk on the beach and gathered seashells. We spent another day at the lake, swimming and hiking. It was fun, but I found myself wishing we'd had a boat. There were soooo many people there and I missed the solitude that I remember from years past. So many more people moving to our part of the state. I don't blame them, it's a beautiful part of Oregon, but I prefer less crowds and less rules everywhere. *sigh* Guess I'm showing my age again... I bought 15 lbs of sliced, fresh strawberries and made a double batch of jam. YUM!! I put the rest in freezer containers for using later. $30.00 for washed, sliced berries is quite reasonable compared to the cost at the farm stands. Everything has gotten so expensive. But, we'll sure enjoy those berries come winter time.
We also bought some Windsor Cottage stones and built a 14' long x 30" wide raised flower bed in the front of our house. We made it about 16" tall, so it would be comfortable for sitting. It turned out really nice. I just bought a bunch of flowers for planting at the local garden store today. I just need to pick up a load of planting soil and I'll be all set for mass plantings. We still have enough stones to build a v-shaped raised garden bed on the other side of the house by the front door. That one should be a quicker, easier version compared to the big one. It's really going to add some pizazz to the landscape, and I can't wait to see the end results. My next idea is to put up some planter window boxes under some of the windows, but that's for another time.
We have our winter's supply of hay all neatly stored in the barn too. Our hay was delivered last week and it took us and 2 paid helpers, 2 evenings working to finish the job. We got about 12 tons total of new hay, and have about 2 tons left from last year. That's considerably less than the 20 tons we put into the barns last summer, but money was a bit tighter this year so we'll just feed as long as it lasts and worry about buying more later, if and when we run short. We more than likely will have to buy a few more tons, but I'm not going to worry about that now. Next big project will have to be the firewood for the winter...the work just never ends, does it?? Sometimes I envy those people who live in little homes in the suburbs...they just don't realize how easy they have it, but then again, I love living on our little farm in the country with all its' privacy and peaceful surroundings. Nothing in life is ever perfect...but it's our life and I really do love it, even if it is filled with work. I don't have to pay for a membership in a fancy athletic club to get exercise and that's a fact!
We had plans to go watch fireworks on the 4th of July and were in the car ready to go when our neighbors started shooting off big, loud roman candles and such...Harley freaked, started running and that was that. We parked the car in the middle of our very long driveway and watched the illegals going off all around us and felt a measure of relief at being able to keep a watch over our little herd as well as the neighbor's 30ish head of horses as well. What a gorgeous sight to see all the horses running together in one big herd...much more spectacular in my humble opinion than the greatest of the fireworks!! It's all about perspective, right? I just wish I'd have had my camera because I could have caught some fantastic shots. I'll try and remember that for next year.
I'm still riding Ladde and he's doing wonderfully. I'm feeling more and more comfortable on him with each and every ride. Lately, however our consistency's been off because of all the other projects we've had to deal with. The weather has cooled this week and it's lovely riding weather, so I'll probably have a nice evening ride tonight. I'm looking forward to it.
Harley had a flare-up of his uveitis lately. It was bi-lateral, but worse in his right (good) eye. I managed to quiet it down very quickly, but the damage was done. He now has cloudiness in about 1/3 to almost 1/2 of his right eye. Prior to this outbreak, the damage to his eye had been in the anterior, or back portion of his eyes; meaning that nothing was unusual looking about his eyes. Somehow the fact that he didn't look any different from a sighted horse was something I was thankful for, but now his eyes are starting to look more typical of a blind horse. It breaks my heart to think that he has so little vision left. I still cry over his situation, but bless his heart, he seems to be adjusting to his lot in life much better than I am. I just keep praying that God will watch over him and keep him safe. So far, so good. I'm a firm believer in the power of prayer and am so thankful for our many blessings in life. God is good.
Well, I've run on a lot longer than I'd meant to. I really should try to post more often so that I'm not trying to catch up on a whole month's worth of activities. I've got a bunch of pictures that I've taken, but never seem to take the time to download them onto a disk so that I can transfer them to this computer. Someday, maybe I'll advance to the 21st century! Ya think? One can always hope...
I hope you're all enjoying our wonderful summer...it was a long time coming. May we all savor and enjoy it while it's here!
Blessings and good-bye for now...
Cingspots aka Lorie
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Happy April Fool's Day!!
...or, as it's been more appropriately termed..."All Fool's Day". :) To me, this somehow includes all of humankind and is much more politically correct. Wouldn't you agree?
Shame on me...sorry, couldn't resist!
Anyway, thought I'd better drop in here and chat for a bit. My last posting has been a couple of weeks or so ago. I know...I'm not doing very well here lately. I do, however read my favorites a lot more often than I've been updating my own blog. I love reading about what all my wonderful blog buddies are doing.
Seems lately my life has been in a bit of a standstill for some reason. I get up each morning and greet the day, head off to the clinic and put in my time there, come home and along with my hubby, take care of the horses and the cats, then head inside for a quick dinner. "yawn" See what I mean? Boring, huh? Since the news about Harley, seems like my energy level has dipped to an alltime low. I know it's a bit of depression hitting me, and I will overcome, but it's there all the same. I've actually been feeling more tired than depressed. For a while there, I was walking several times a week, had started swimming with a friend, well I did once anyway... :) , with hopes of doing it at least twice weekly, and riding twice weekly. For the last month, I've hunkered down and done a bunch of nothing, or at least it feels that way.
The rain certainly doesn't help. It's been raining torrents lately...lake backyardy is looking like a great hangout for the local duck and goose population...sigh...it's spring, or at least the calendar says so, however our weather since spring has sprung, is far worse than most of our winter was. Sound like I'm complaining? Uh-huh, I am. I am so sick of rain!!!!! And mud, and grey!!!! I want to go lay in the sun and feel the warmth deep inside my bones, and get a sunburn. Yeah, soak up a lot of sun and wear summer clothes and complain about how hot I am...and fan myself like a true Southern Belle. Not some wrinkly old prune drowning in all this dreary Oregon rain!!!!
Okay, that feels better! Just need to vent a little and get it all out. Like a big, loud belch! Admit it - it feels good sometimes.
Thanks for listening...
Blessings ya'll
Cingspots, over and out!
Oh, just thought of something. Quick update on my Harley horse. Last week, I took a day off work and took Harley to an ophthamologist for a thorough eye exam. Diagnosis is chronic uveitis (cause unknown), secondary cataracts in both eyes and mild to moderate glaucoma in both eyes. There is still some vision in both eyes, but not much in his left, more in his right. In human terms, he would be declared legally blind. He sees shapes, shadows and changes in light, but no distinction. This has probably been coming on for possibly several, if not many, years...at least he's had time to adjust. For which, I am eternally thankful. Me, however...I'm still trying to get used to the idea. Blindness would suck. But Harley's so much more resilient than I will probably ever be. I am thankful that he trusts me so much. In fact, I feel honored that he trusts me. I love my wonderful, gorgeous Harley horse!! I just pray that I don't let him down. I hope to ride him again on Sunday, for the first time since finding out about his vision. I will be both our eyes, and we'll be fine.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Sad Day
I had this post all arranged about a wonderful weekend beach trip with a very dear friend of mine, pretty pictures and all...but I just don't feel like doing it today.
For a while now, I've been taking Harley to an indoor arena and riding him with a friend of mine and her horse. It's been going great and I've been enjoying this one-on-one time with my wonderful horse. We've been doing some bonding and building confidence in one another and getting physical exercise, and it's all been so very enjoyable.
I didn't get to go riding last Sunday morning because there was an unusual event take place during the morning feeding. My hubby and I were up pretty early, had a quick cup of coffee, then headed out to the barn to let the horses out into the corral where they could enjoy their breakfast in the sunshine. Nothing unusual...pretty much our morning routine, except on this particular morning, I was the one pushing the "roach coach" around dispensing the hay piles while my hubby released the horses from their stalls one by one. As is customary with our little herd, Shad (the thoroughbred) got out first and he came running and bucking out to the hay where he has a little taste and then, unable to contain his pure, unadulterated joy at his freedom, has to go gallywhomping off again being the silly goose that he is...normal stuff...however, when it was Harley's turn to come running out he came charging with a full head of steam straight at me. gulp...no time to react, except for a quick thought to dash behind the roach coach for cover...sounded like my best chance for protection at the time, except that when Harley got close enough for me to look straight in his eye, I knew he wasn't going to run over the top of me; he was instead going to go straight over the top of the roach coach full of hay...what the heck!? So, I quickly moved in the opposite direction and surely as if it had been his intent, Harley ran right over the top of the cart...as if it hadn't been there...as if he hadn't even seen it. Very strange...
So, I ran into the barn and grabbed his halter and lead to bring him back inside where I could survey the damage. He appeared to be okay but for a few minor scuffs and one small cut near his coronet band on a front foot. Good grief!! I say a quick prayer of thankfulness that he wasn't hurt and turn him back out for his breakfast. As I headed back out to finish depositing piles of hay and collect the roach coach, I realized I had left the gate open into a small paddock-sized grassy area which of course, Shad had spotted. Before I could get through the gate, Ladde and then Harley were all in the grassy area. I followed suit with the intention of flushing them back out into the corral where they belonged before heading back inside for another cup of coffee.
Now, the horses know before I say a thing that these are sweet, stolen bites of fresh, green grass and that they are going to be run out...so, without much prompting from me, one by one they run out. Harley was the last to leave, and he rounded the open gate with ease and proceded to run full-tilt out into the corral. Now, one thing I had failed to mention earlier; was that I had left the now nearly empty roach coach sitting right smack dab in the middle of the corral...well, Harley ran right into it again!! This time he flipped over and got his hind leg briefly entangled in the handle. Oh my word!!! I was in complete and total shock at what I had just witnessed and was so upset that he was hurt, I could barely think straight. What is going on!!?? First thing that crossed my mind, of course, was that he can't see!!
So, to make a long story somewhat shorter...last night my boss came out and did a full eye exam on Harley and he is indeed, losing his vision. Apparently, he has been losing his vision for a while now. How long, we will never know, but looking back over the last year or more...let's just say that a lot of questions in my mind have now been answered. So many occurances now seem so much more clear. I had occasionally wondered why my perfect little trail pony seemed to be so much spookier than he used to be; he used to be so much more sure-footed than he is nowadays...the list could go on and on and on, but you get the picture. I can remember quite a few times where the thought had crossed my mind...is he having trouble seeing? And then, as quickly as that nasty little thought entered my mind, I would dismiss it; certain that I was being paranoid, or it was just my overactive imagination...only now I know it wasn't. I can only say that I am so heartsick at the thought of my beloved Harley going blind. Oh how I wish it wasn't so!! He's only 12 years old, and he has so much life and energy, and he's just so healthy and vibrant!! It's such a hard diagnosis to accept, except somewhere deep inside...I already knew it.
I hate it!! One of the things I hate the most is feeling helpless, and right now I feel utterly and completely helpless. My boss took close-up pictures of Harley's eye and plans on sending them to some ophthalmologists that he knows, but told me not to get my hopes up. I know there are many advances in medicine in regards to the eye, but the prognosis is usually guarded at best. It probably doesn't help that he's an Appaloosa. Seems to be a pitfall of this beautiful breed of horse. I can only say that I feel so very, very sad about this. Not for me, but that my beautiful and cock-sure little horse may very well become blind and won't be able to see all the beauty that there is to see. I would appreciate your prayers for Harley.
I'm not nearly as confident of a rider as I used to be, and I'm trying to get over my feelings of fear and inadequacy, but this opens up a whole new host of challenges that we will need to overcome. I've never been a quitter, and I won't now, or ever, give up on Harley. A blind trail horse can be quite a challange, but if God's plan for Harley is to be blind, then we'll just have to get through it together and the best way we know how. Again, I humbly ask for all your prayers if you don't mind. We can use all the help we can get. I'm not the sort of person who can easily, or any other way for that matter, disgard an animal. They are family. Right or wrong, for better or for worse...we're in this for the longhaul.
Blessings all,
cingspots :(
For a while now, I've been taking Harley to an indoor arena and riding him with a friend of mine and her horse. It's been going great and I've been enjoying this one-on-one time with my wonderful horse. We've been doing some bonding and building confidence in one another and getting physical exercise, and it's all been so very enjoyable.
I didn't get to go riding last Sunday morning because there was an unusual event take place during the morning feeding. My hubby and I were up pretty early, had a quick cup of coffee, then headed out to the barn to let the horses out into the corral where they could enjoy their breakfast in the sunshine. Nothing unusual...pretty much our morning routine, except on this particular morning, I was the one pushing the "roach coach" around dispensing the hay piles while my hubby released the horses from their stalls one by one. As is customary with our little herd, Shad (the thoroughbred) got out first and he came running and bucking out to the hay where he has a little taste and then, unable to contain his pure, unadulterated joy at his freedom, has to go gallywhomping off again being the silly goose that he is...normal stuff...however, when it was Harley's turn to come running out he came charging with a full head of steam straight at me. gulp...no time to react, except for a quick thought to dash behind the roach coach for cover...sounded like my best chance for protection at the time, except that when Harley got close enough for me to look straight in his eye, I knew he wasn't going to run over the top of me; he was instead going to go straight over the top of the roach coach full of hay...what the heck!? So, I quickly moved in the opposite direction and surely as if it had been his intent, Harley ran right over the top of the cart...as if it hadn't been there...as if he hadn't even seen it. Very strange...
So, I ran into the barn and grabbed his halter and lead to bring him back inside where I could survey the damage. He appeared to be okay but for a few minor scuffs and one small cut near his coronet band on a front foot. Good grief!! I say a quick prayer of thankfulness that he wasn't hurt and turn him back out for his breakfast. As I headed back out to finish depositing piles of hay and collect the roach coach, I realized I had left the gate open into a small paddock-sized grassy area which of course, Shad had spotted. Before I could get through the gate, Ladde and then Harley were all in the grassy area. I followed suit with the intention of flushing them back out into the corral where they belonged before heading back inside for another cup of coffee.
Now, the horses know before I say a thing that these are sweet, stolen bites of fresh, green grass and that they are going to be run out...so, without much prompting from me, one by one they run out. Harley was the last to leave, and he rounded the open gate with ease and proceded to run full-tilt out into the corral. Now, one thing I had failed to mention earlier; was that I had left the now nearly empty roach coach sitting right smack dab in the middle of the corral...well, Harley ran right into it again!! This time he flipped over and got his hind leg briefly entangled in the handle. Oh my word!!! I was in complete and total shock at what I had just witnessed and was so upset that he was hurt, I could barely think straight. What is going on!!?? First thing that crossed my mind, of course, was that he can't see!!
So, to make a long story somewhat shorter...last night my boss came out and did a full eye exam on Harley and he is indeed, losing his vision. Apparently, he has been losing his vision for a while now. How long, we will never know, but looking back over the last year or more...let's just say that a lot of questions in my mind have now been answered. So many occurances now seem so much more clear. I had occasionally wondered why my perfect little trail pony seemed to be so much spookier than he used to be; he used to be so much more sure-footed than he is nowadays...the list could go on and on and on, but you get the picture. I can remember quite a few times where the thought had crossed my mind...is he having trouble seeing? And then, as quickly as that nasty little thought entered my mind, I would dismiss it; certain that I was being paranoid, or it was just my overactive imagination...only now I know it wasn't. I can only say that I am so heartsick at the thought of my beloved Harley going blind. Oh how I wish it wasn't so!! He's only 12 years old, and he has so much life and energy, and he's just so healthy and vibrant!! It's such a hard diagnosis to accept, except somewhere deep inside...I already knew it.
I hate it!! One of the things I hate the most is feeling helpless, and right now I feel utterly and completely helpless. My boss took close-up pictures of Harley's eye and plans on sending them to some ophthalmologists that he knows, but told me not to get my hopes up. I know there are many advances in medicine in regards to the eye, but the prognosis is usually guarded at best. It probably doesn't help that he's an Appaloosa. Seems to be a pitfall of this beautiful breed of horse. I can only say that I feel so very, very sad about this. Not for me, but that my beautiful and cock-sure little horse may very well become blind and won't be able to see all the beauty that there is to see. I would appreciate your prayers for Harley.
I'm not nearly as confident of a rider as I used to be, and I'm trying to get over my feelings of fear and inadequacy, but this opens up a whole new host of challenges that we will need to overcome. I've never been a quitter, and I won't now, or ever, give up on Harley. A blind trail horse can be quite a challange, but if God's plan for Harley is to be blind, then we'll just have to get through it together and the best way we know how. Again, I humbly ask for all your prayers if you don't mind. We can use all the help we can get. I'm not the sort of person who can easily, or any other way for that matter, disgard an animal. They are family. Right or wrong, for better or for worse...we're in this for the longhaul.
Blessings all,
cingspots :(
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