Sad Days

Well I think I've finally come to the final understanding that Fox isn't going to be good for anything other than light hacking. He is sore again. Still perky but sore. As you know, I've been aware that this is a possibility but I've been putting the final decision off for so long, thinking he's going to get better, he's going to get better. Now I think I need to accept it.

My partner saw him sitting down like a dog in the paddock yesterday and I know some horses do that but he's never done it. Is this a result of his weak back end? I don't know, maybe he just decided to give it a try.

Fox was meant to be my dream horse, the horse that I started competing on, the horse that took me places. And it's all crashing down. I'm trying to stay positive but at this stage I don't even want to ride him in case I make it worse. I'm not going to stop taking him for walks and I'll still try and think in terms of rehab but I honestly think he's as good as he's ever going to get. He'll have good days when maybe it will be ok to pop on for a short ride and bad days when all I'll do is handgraze him.

I'm going to call the horse vets tomorrow and find out how much scans and xrays etc would cost. No-one else seems to know what it is and this may shed some light on things. Though I am wary of doing this for the stress factors of him being around vets and also the travelling. It's not a short trip, would be nearly an hour each way and if his hind end is really as weak as I think it is floating doesn't seem like a good idea. And what will it actually tell me? Sure it would be nice to have a diagnosis but the chances of them saying exactly what I already know are pretty high.

Aaaargh horses!