Better Me Now = Better Mare Later.

I had a bit of a rough time this past Rolex weekend. Not being there brought a lot of things to my attention that I wasn't quite ready to face, and I subsequently spent a lot of time sleeping and pretending like I honestly didn't care about the things that were bothering me. But I do. I kind of snapped out of my weekend funk yesterday finally, and realized I haven't talked about any of the important or interesting things that have been happening to me in the past week. Despite the financial difficulty of doing so, I've finally taken some initiative and am working to fix some of the things that have always plagued me but I've never really bothered to do anything about.

In short, I finally went to go see a chiropractor for the first time in my life.

It wasn't pretty. A week ago Monday was my first appointment, and I completely love the practice and the doctor herself. Dr. B is a fun, bouncy, bubbly, singing, funny woman with a good soul, and all her techs are always smiling, which I severely appreciate at the end of a long and stressful day. At my initial appointment, they were very thorough with me - they did a physical exam, a thermal scan of my back, and a few radiographs for good measure as well. While doing my physical exam, Dr. B tested my ranges of motion (which are extremely poor), felt for pain on my part, found what was out of alignment, and told me what a huge disconnect I have from my brain to my nerves to my organs. She could tell from what my body was doing which side of me was worse, but I honestly couldn't. There was such a disconnect in my mid-back that all I could do was identify that something was hurting. Dr. B took all the information from the physical exam, the x-rays, and the thermal scan, and formulated a blueprint with it. What she found wasn't very pretty. I have degenerative changes in my mid-back and neck, and quite a number of things out of alignment, torqued, pinched, and in general not-where-they-should-be, including a section of my lumbar spine that was completely locked (probably a byproduct of when Metro kicked me in the hip so very long ago). Given the incredible daily pain I am in, all this makes a lot of sense. This could have been corrected long before I ever got painful. Fortunately for me, we caught it at a pretty good time where we can realign everything properly and prevent further serious damage from happening in my back. I mean honestly, I'm 25. Should I really have the beginnings of arthritis in my spine?? Awful. As added fun, I also have very mild scoliosis. Sweet! I guess maybe that explains why I wake up crying in the middle of the night in pain - and also why I sit so crookedly to the right in the saddle. Seeing the degenerative change on the actual films was the scary part. I certainly don't want that to get any worse than it already is.
I'm on an intensive program right now which takes me in there 3 times a week for a month. My honey commented in a rather alarmed way last night after my appointment that I was suddenly ridiculously taller (it was scary, I felt like one of the Avatar people), and that's the way it has pretty much been after every appointment. I am taller! I am standing straighter, I am more comfortable. THAT is a very new thing to me. I had honestly forgotten what it was like to not shift uncomfortably every few seconds while standing or sitting. However, this isn't a quick fix by any means. Even after my adjustment last night, I was sitting in a chair in the office for awhile afterwords getting a bit of a lecture on spinal nerves, and the normal electric pain returned. Simply sitting upright in good posture is so foreign to my joints and muscles (did I mention I slouch like a sack of potatoes?) that it causes me excruciating pain right now. I have to try, I have to practice for my body's sake, but good lord. Thankfully, once I got up and moved around, my back felt like a hundred bucks again. Not a million bucks, mind you... but it's a start.
The bad news is that my insurance offers me pretty much no help at all for this, so I am on my own. And it's not cheap. I think I can manage to do it, but yikes. It's not easy. BUT I'm not showing this year, so I'm not trying to squirrel money away for show season and feeling crappy about spending it elsewhere, so if there was ever a time to get this sorted out, it's now. I have to do this. I can't live in pain any longer. I am starting to feel really, really good after my appointments - which currently include getting adjusted, getting electro-stim and also getting heat therapy - and the prospect of being able to live and function pain-free is so, so, SO exciting. I honestly don't remember what it is like to not hurt day in and day out. I can't wait to find out.

(A super-sexy picture of my dog and I wearing questionable outfits and hiking in questionable places)
The second thing I am doing - running in the Avatar Shoes, as a few of my readers like to call them! I've really only just begun in earnest, and I've been taking it pretty lightly until I got my chiropractic situation sorted out, but now that we are under control there, I feel more comfortable getting a little more serious about it. Running in the Avatar Shoes (or Vibram Five-Fingers, as they are actually called) is different from anything I've experienced. I am still adjusting to them slightly, seeing as I am so used to the old incorrect running style used with big, squashy running shoes - a heel-first landing. Yep, with horses this is the proper way, but with humans, it is not! Landing mid-foot first and then letting your heel make contact with the ground is shock absorbing, efficient, and comfortable, versus a heel-first strike where all the shock shoots directly up your spinal column, or a toe-first landing which makes your calves want to explode. Running improperly in these minimalist shoes is impossible to do, simply because it hurts! A padded heel takes a little of that uncomfortable shock if you land heel-first while running. When you have zero padding there to save you, it just KILLS! I'm working this week on formulating a better workout plan; I will keep you updated.

And lastly, for those of you wondering, I AM actually riding some right now. A few of you expressed concern that I wouldn't have much time in the saddle while Gogo was off, and for the most part, this has proven to be true. I'm not really much into riding other horses unless there is something in it that I can then take and put into Gogo at a later date. I never wanted to be a trainer or a teacher by any means... I really just don't enjoy that sort of thing beyond doing it for myself. And riding horses while on the clock is good, but I usually have so many other things to do in a day that it just seems like one more thing that will make my very long workday even longer. However, I've found that I actually have been enjoying my random bits of saddle time on other horses for once. The one horse in particular that I've been on a bit and that I hope to ride a bit more is this one, James:



James is a silly guy.




He feels a little like riding a wet noodle (he is 6 going on 3), and he is your typical goofy goob type of gelding. I am so not a goofy goob gelding lover - I am all about those snarky mares! - but James is a ham and he's a NICE horse. I rode him in front of my boss the other day, which is extremely nervewracking but apparently went well enough because she asked if I wanted to ride him in our clinic with Jeff Cook next weekend! (She even said she'd pay for half!) She did pick on me for being a defensive rider (well come on, do I really want to ride Gogo like a sack of potatoes?) and for riding "like a dressage rider"... well, maybe because I ride dressage! XD This will be very good for me, although it might be horribly embarrassing because the last time I jumped was in September. Hmmmmm we will see.


As for Gogo, she is getting spoiled rotten with baths and primping, grazing and cold-tubbing every morning and every afternoon, and her treadmill of course every day around noon. She is feeling good - a little too good even, remember what happens when she feels like that? - and as a result has been more obnoxious as ever. The other day I didn't come over and day good morning soon enough apparently, so in order to get my attention, she clamped her teeth down on her stall door and rattled the thing. She NEVER does that because she knows I will knock her brains into next Tuesday if she ever so much as thinks about putting her mouth on anything that isn't food. Cheeky wench.

But I have to say, her feeling good is making me also feel very, very good.

End of December Analysis

I apologize for not doing this a little sooner - I am one sick puppy right now. Time to go over all our December goals! Well, they weren't really goals - more like guidelines - but we were able to accomplish them all, which makes me feel very good. Baby steps, baby steps.


December Goals:

1) Continue successful walk work under saddle, building to 30 minutes and working on very simple on the bit work
Success! We progressed to very simple serpentines and large circles, and even a few very shallow leg yields. I don't do much, just because I don't dare risk stressing those legs, but walk work is relatively low impact, and at this point in our rehab, we're safe to carry on with slowly increasing levels of difficulty.

2) Take our first trot steps in 3 months and not be lame/freak out
Success! She feels great! Except she's... a little high energy. So there's been some freaking out, but as of late, it's been completely curbed. Thank you drugs. Sweet.

3) Fully plan out rehab schedule for the next 3 months
Success! Well, for the next two and a half months, anyway. We're set through the first week or so of March, tentatively. As I'm at work right now, I don't have a screenshot of Gogo's Fancy Daily calendar, but I will get one up later. I've never shown you guys The Calendar! It's pretty epic, so be prepared. If you guys think I'm an organized freak now, this is going to take that image to a new level.

4) Start looking ahead to next show season and make very tentative plans
Success! I've tentatively decided on all the events I want to do next year, but not branched out into other things just yet. I want to also pick up a dressage show or two (probably schooling, because I'm not pointchasing there so I see no reason to spend extra $$$), maybe a schooling jumper show (but now that I have a huge array of gorgeous and expensive jumps at my disposal, I don't think I'll end up doing that), a competitive trail ride (just for fun, why not, she'd be great at it!), and a couple of hunter trials/hunter paces. Now that I've written all that out, it seems like a lot, so it'll be likely I won't end up making concrete plans for half those things. But as it stands, the tentative eventing event schedule is as thus:
May 29: Mystic Valley Hunt Club H.T. (N)
June 25-27: Groton house Farm H.T. (T)
July 24-25: Fitch's Corner H.T. (T)
August 5-8: Millbrook H.T. (T)
August 14-15: GMHA H.T. (T)
September 9-12: AECs! (T)
October 2-3: UNH H.T. (at whatever level we're ready for!)
Obviously, this is all soundness pending. But I'm feeling very, very good about the upcoming season. I have no idea when Area Championships are going to be, but I'm a bit sour from the past two years of disaster at Areas, so maybe we'll just be skipping those til our luck improves!

5) Have Gogo chiropractically adjusted
Success! And it wasn't nearly as horrible as I expected. Mostly what he said was that her posture was bad from standing around like a lazy lump in a stall for 3 months, which isn't really surprising. But her SI stuff wasn't too dramatic at all, which I was very happy about!



January Goals:
1) Continue sound trotwork and build to 20 minutes of trotwork - 50 minutes of riding total a day (we are at 40 now with 10 minutes of trot a day)
2) Talk to the vets about when to schedule her next ultrasound (I'm thinking instead of mid-January, we want to shoot for mid-February before we start to canter)
3) Take our first little hack outside (flat ground, around the barn)
4) Set up show budget and breeding budget - how much do I need to save, how much each month, etc?
5) Add incline work on the treadmill



Sweet!


By the way, who am I going to be seeing at Area I's Annual Meeting? It's coming up fast (next Saturday!) anf if any of you guys are going, let me know!

Party on Wayne

Sorry I've been missing for long - I am TOO BUSY! But there you are, that's life at a big barn for you!



As December wears on I am feeling increasingly excited for the upcoming year. When the clock rolls over to 2010 we'll be just beginning 10 minutes of trotwork (if she continues to be sound, of course), and I'll be able to really put my goals for next year all in order. I have some pretty lofty ones, but if she continues to be sound there's no reason to think we can't achieve every one of them. I've got eyes for all the bigger events around here - Groton House, Millbrook, Fitch's, GMHA, Stuart - and of course, hopefully the 2010 AECs. That is a bloody long way to go for a show but that's the hopeful plan, if everything goes well. I feel a little behind the ball due to the fact that as of January 1 this past year, we were gearing up for heavy dressage work in anticipation of the earlier start to the season. The old saying is that shows are not won in June, they're won in January, and I completely agree. We won't have this chunk of time to work on new things and advance like we normally would be able to. As that stands, it may put us back a season but that's all right. You never know how these things work out.

Dr. A came out today to work on Gogo and one of my boss' horses. Even by Dr. A standards he was a little weird today, and I think my boss wasn't totally sure what to think because he told her that Athos had liver qi stagnation. I don't even know what that MEANS! Well, I mean I get the idea of qi (and my own qi is... seriously off) but I had to look it up to understand it better than how he explained it. But it does make sense - I guess this is responsible for soft tissue issues, digestive upsets, and the like... all things this horse is displaying currently. It was very interesting to see Athos standing in the crossties totally covered in acupuncture needles! Poor kid. As for Gogo, there was less crazy Chinese medicine and more chiropractic work to be done with her, but it was surprisingly less than I thought. As predicted, her SI had some pain, but not nearly what I expected. She had mild soreness around her withers as well, which surprised me until Dr. A mentioned that her posture was pretty bad. That hadn't occured to me.... I guess it makes sense though. Standing around in a stall for 3 months like a bump on a log will definitely bring out your weaknesses, and if your topline isn't strong to begin with, well... you start to sag around the middle! Here's where Dr. A got a little weird again... he took three polos and made a sort of body wrap that I cannot describe with words - I will have to get a picture of it! This supposedly makes her more aware of her body and that she has a butt and that she needs to bother using it. She'll wear this 3 or 4 times a week on the treadmill. My suspition is that she is going to get used to it and not care, but you never know. We did some belly lifts with her and BOING! Her back went right up to where it's supposed to be and she actually held it for awhile. We will need to do PLENTY of those to re-engage her abs as she gets back to work.

All in all I was pretty happy with the news. Athos did not fare so well. We'll be keeping an eye on him... he is his own mystery. We actually have a couple mysteries and I would like to write about some of these horses some more when I have time. They're all fabulous but some are just... odd.


The progress we're making is fantastic. She went out yesterday in the medical paddock for the first time without Ace (which was actually a staff miscommunication and my guys went to go bring her out for me before I could get over there with drugs), and she was GREAT. Obviously this is not going to work every day, but there you are. The blue mullen mouth bit of this past year has been switched out for a big-girl bit again, the double jointed loose ring, and she is going fantastically in that, as I thought she might. The blue bit was a training device and it served its purpose. Nevertheless, as it was blue, I am of course sad to see it go. Work under saddle is GREAT, and she is behaving herself - hooray! Or well, mostly. ;) And the best part is that we are finally starting to wean her off wraps. She is going in them nightly only, and during the day those legs have stayed very tight and cool. I LOVE THAT!

Happy, happy progress. Of course now that it is December, it is 17 degrees... that's the crappiest part of the whole deal.


Off to see a horse off to surgery (yikes).... enjoy the awful weather!

End of November Analysis

A few days late, but hey, better late than mever ;) I've not been keeping goals since this injury because quite frankly, I only have one goal: get Gogo sound. And I can do the very best that I can but sometimes it's just up to fate in the end. However, with things looking brighter, I am going to go ahead and do my December goals, and hope that all of them will come true:


December Goals:

1) Continue successful walk work under saddle, building to 30 minutes and working on very simple on the bit work
2) Take our first trot steps in 3 months and not be lame/freak out
3) Fully plan out rehab schedule for the next 3 months
4) Start looking ahead to next show season and make very tentative plans
5) Have Gogo chiropractically adjusted


Dr. A's wife literally just called me right now as I was typing out "get Gogo chiropractically adjusted" and we set a time for this Saturday at 10am. Thank GOD for that too because boy does she ever need it. Now that we have bone scan images that show definite asymmetry in her pelvis we need to really do something about it!!

I'm counting down the days not only until Christmas, but to when I get to start trotting again. 11 days!!!


Guess this is a short post. But that's all right because any news about Gogo is always good. ;)

Official AEC Countdown: 15 Days!

The AECs are now only 15 (almost 14) days away. Gogo has had the past three days off due in large part to a major chiropractic adjustment that she had on Monday. It was a sort of last minute thing, but I am REALLY glad I got it done. Something was telling me she needed this one last little boost to put her fully back on track, and it looks like I was right. Score one for me (score zero for my pocketbook).

Dr. A is seriously awesome. I mean, seriously. Gogo was pretty tired and butt-sore as hell on Monday, which was understandable as it was her first big effort since the Doxy took such a hard toll on her a few weeks ago, and the courses were tough. She had some fill in all four legs despite wraps and poultice the night before, and since she's found she has a right leg after all post hock injections, and is figuring out brand new ways to unload it, her left side needed some major work. In fact, when Dr. A ran his hands down her scapula on her left side, she turned around and almost bit him! Gogo, biting a human! I think that's never happened before in her life, I didn't know she had that in her! Her neck and shoulder were pretty locked up on her left side, so he did some major work there, and various points down her mid to low back needed work as well. Her sore, sore butt had some serious acupuncture and B-vit injections done to it, on both sacral points and on several varying places on her left side including points on her low back and hip triads. Those muscles worked very hard, and while there wasn't much to adjust there, it needed a little love. The part that surprised me was that he needed to adjust her navicular in her RH (I didn't know you could do that!), and that there was some crazy stuff going on in her LF that very easily could have turned into a major injury. Her accessory carpal bone (the big one at the back of the knee) was out of alignment, putting stress on her suspensory. As a result, she was sensitive to palpation there (and I about died when that happened... having lost my last one to a neverending suspensory, it's an evil word to me). Dr. A was quick to calm me though, and said that he would see what we could do chiropractically. As it turned out, once he adjusted her accessory carpal bone, the sensitivity went away. Her navicular was also jammed, so he adjusted that too with his funny chirpractor hammer thing. I was SERIOUSLY relieved and eternally grateful to both him and my funny little intuition - as Dr. A said, a misaligned accessory carpal bone is a common way to stress out - and injure - a suspensory, which I didn't know. To play it safe, we decided to give her the following two days off and to ice, liniment and wrap her. Good news - the following day, I palpated the crap out of that suspensory, and she wasn't sensitive in the slightest to anything I did. She also jogged out sound as could be, and the fill disappeared. I feel as though we may have narrowly avoided something that could have turned into a very bad situation. THANK YOU DR. A SERIOUSLY. As per all the other things he adjusted, she's been standing with her head and neck lower than normal, especially when she wasn't feeling well, and after all that adjusting he did, her head and neck were back to the height she always used to hold it at when she scared non-horsey friends for looking so tall (she's barely 16.1 and a half so looking tall really means something... she's a shrimp compared to everybody else here!). I think she is feeling good and comfortable all over now, given her improved posture, but I'm seriously glad I had that adjustment done. She needed it. It cost a little more than he usually charges me, given the tons of acupuncture he did, but I see it as such - I'm not shelling out $400 for shoes every 6 weeks, so $150 every three months is a good trade off!!

The other really interesting thing he did related to the kinesiology he and his wife do. You can read a little more about the kinesiology he did last time here. (And I like that post because it talks about everything falling into place before Groton House, and how I felt like we were ready to play with the Big Boys there and how we had a good chance of doing well. Yea we did!!) I told him about the Lyme, the Doxy, and the aloe juice, and he asked about her diet. Then he did something I didn't expect - he checked her through the kinesiology to see if each feed was actually agreeing with her GI system. Gogo, as of Monday, was eating 2.0lbs of Gro N' Win (Buckeye's ration balancer) and 1.0lb of Triple Crown's Complete, spread out over 3 meals. The Complete, I told him, was just a source of empty calories and could be replaced with anything. The Gro N' Win was the only important part. He took a handful of the Gro N' Win, placed his cupped hand over her croup, checked the energy through his wife, and found it to be good. He checked the Complete through the same method, and found it to be in disagreeance with her system. We checked the other available grains that we feed that I would consider giving her as a source of empty calories, and found Senior to be in disagreeance as well, but the Safechoice was good (it's a low starch medium fat Nutrena product... even though I'm not too keen on it because it's a "least cost" product, which essentially means that as long as the company gets in the required percentage levels of whatever they promise on the feet bag, they can use whatever ingredients they want to achieve those means. And they can and do change without warning, and from batch to batch of grain. For instance, during the beet pulp shortage? Beet pulp disappeared from it. This isn't something specific to Nutrena, any feed company can be guilty of it. I would TOTALLY chose Nutrena over Purina any day, just so you know, I'm not ragging on them at all!) I wasn't really keen on any of them, but figured I needed to go with the one that agreed with her system. He tested the aloe juice as well, and found that to be fine. I know it sounds REALLY weird, but hey, I believe in a body's energy flow so I think there's something to it.
As it turned out, Shannon had been talking about barley as a product that a woman she used to know swears is great for putting condition and topline on horses, and I've heard similar comments elsewhere. While barley itself doesn't have anything particularly glaring in it that would bulk up a topline (lots of carbs, not too much protein, about 11-13%), and as a stand-alone grain isn't good without other supplementation, we figured that on top of the Gro N' Win, why not? We'll give it a shot and see what it does. As a whole, unprocessed grain (except for being crushed prior to bagging), it's simple on the GI system, it's a decent source of energy, and it's inexpensive. If it doesn't work, we'll just pull it easy as pie. I used to feed Metro barley to go along with his Prime... poor guy needed nearly 15lbs of grain a day and as much hay as I could shove into him to keep condition when he was showing. Gogo, not so much! 3lbs of grain and she's likely going to balloon. I'm keeping my eye on that!

So we'll see what they barley does. It's gotta be better than the Complete, anyway! She is now eating this:
6am: 1 flake grass hay, 0.5lbs Gro N' Win, 0.5lbs crushed barley, sprinkling of electrolytes, DMG, raspberry leaf, 50 Doxycycline
6:30am-12pm: Turnout... as much hay and pasture as she can eat! (If she is for some reason in at 9am or 11am, she'll also get a flake of hay at each. We feed hay 6 times a day)
2pm: 1 flake grass hay
4pm: 1-2 flakes grass hay, 1.0lbs Gro N' Win, 0.5lbs crushed barley, sprinkling of electrolytes, Cosequin ASU, 50 Doxycycline
8pm: 1-2 flakes grass hay, 0.5lbs Gro N' Win, 0.5lbs crushed barley
She also often gets grazed at night on the really good stuff, mmmmmmmm.


We're back to work tomorrow with a nice relaxing hack (or maybe not so relaxing.... she has had three days off, you know!), and then back to dressage Friday and Saturday. Sunday we'll go on our conditioning hack, Monday we'll gallop, and Tuesday-Thursday we're back to dressage. I'd like to get just one last XC session in with her, but we may not be able to swing that. I want somewhere with a nice water complex with banks in and out, and I don't think I'm going to be able to find that with Town Hill now closed. We shall see!


15 days and counting!!!!!!!!!!!!!




(Gogo being a ham after winning a combined test at South Farm last summer.)

The Return of the Chiro Man

I am very thankful to report that Gogo's little puffiness in all four legs disappeared with poulticing, and all throughout the day there was no return of it nor was there any heat, so my guess was that it was just hot and stressful, and her little bit of time off was just the fix. Yesterday I wanted to give her a light workout on the soft, rubbery indoor footing, so I revisited this old exercise, but left the vertical as a big X. I figured if she felt at all strange, I wouldn't go beyond a little flatwork, but she felt brilliantly sound, so we progressed with the exercise a few times. You canter in to the big X, and then have four strides to transition back down to a trot, trot over the poles, and then halt. Again, I rode her in the snaffle (second time I've ever jumped her in it as opposed to her Waterford), and she was BRILLIANT in it. She did the exercise VERY well, and was very quiet and responsive to every half-halt and every transition. I worked hard on staying up in a respectable two-point right up to the base of the fence (it's soooo hard...!), and keeping her round throughout the entire workout as well, including right up to the fence. She performed beautifully (and I did all right too!), and we finished our quick 20-minute workout with a hack through the orchard with Harrison and Shannon. I cold hosed both fronts and re-wrapped her that evening, just to be safe.

This morning, her legs were still tight as a drum, and I had a lesson bright and early at 8am (which meant I was up at 4am cleaning stalls... blarg). Right off the bat, she warmed up well. After some walk-trot work, which she was very malleable for, Vicki asked, "Does she do reinback?" Well, in the past, reinback was a source of major fear for Gogo - something about confining her in front after Jeane ruined her brain just scared the daylights out of her, and before she realized she could go backwards away from the pressure, asking for reinback caused her to rear uncontrollably. I'd reintroduced the concept to her with the help of a groundperson, and schooled it VERY occasionally, but haven't pressed the issue. I've been re-re-introducing it over the past few weeks, so I took up Vicki's suggestion to see if we couldn't unlock the area behind the saddle a little more. And what do you know, after the very first reinback, we praised her like crazy, and she visibly perked up and stretched perfectly into the bridle when we walked off again. She just adores being told she's perfect! We did loads of transitions after that within and between all three gaits, and continued to halt, then reinback. We did then without Vicki's help either, and by the time we finished, we were getting clear and light steps of reinback (she tends to want to shuffle backwards in a walk-type footfall sequence instead of with diagonal pairs). The work inbetween asking for bits of reinback was quiet, relaxed, correct, and forward. I called it a day with one final, lovely reinback and a few steps of walk out of it. She was delighted with herself, and she should be!

I also have happy news: the chiropractor came back and readjusted Gogo this afternoon, and I am very happy to say that it was nothing at all like the last time she was adjusted. Three months ago, everything in Gogo's body was majorly out of alignment, and it took some really serious adjusting to try and get it back to where it belonged. I wanted to follow up with another adjustment sooner rather than later given how major the work was last time, so I chose this time to go at a three-month interval; with luck, we'll go six months next time, although I will probably want her adjusted before the AECs. Let me tell you, Dr. Amery is a genious. Not only is he a skilled veterinarian and a skilled chiropractor as well, but he and his wife do a lot of acupuncture and applied kinesiology, which is completely fascinating to me. I've only seen him do it, never anyone else. He, being the wonderful guy that he is, patiently answered the millions of questions I always ask him when he's here, and even let me help do some applied kinesiology while working on her poll. For those of you who haven't heard of it (I hadn't either!), here's a Wikipedia article on it. Applied kinesiology is a sort of controversial alternative medicine form that goes along with chiropractic work; the point is to tap into the horse's energy, which can tell where there are weaknesses in the system. The concept is difficult to explain, but the idea is when there are disruptions in the neurons in a muscle, energy escapes, creating a weak response in the 'testing' the chiropractor performs. In the horse, it requires two people to do this: one person touches the horse and extends an arm, and the other puts their hand on the other's arm and touches the parts of the equine body in question. By both having their hands on the horse, they can create a closed circuit. I tried this with him, and he had me push up strongly with my arm, while he matched me with a downward push. That was a 'strong signal.' When he found a weakness, I found that I really had no ability to push up, and he could press my arm right down with no effort on his part. It was really weird! He then went on to adjust whatever he found was weak. While it sounds a little kooky, I totally buy into the thought that we all have a sustaining energy force in our bodies that we can tap into, and that can get disrupted, so hey, it makes sense to me. The actual adjustment went really, really well, considering how awful it was last time. Given the fact that she's just come out of heat, he found reactivity in the T-L junction (place where the thoracic and lumbar vertebrae meet) on the right side especially, which he expected was secondary due to soreness in the quadatus lumborum (which runs under the spine and connects with the ovaries). He found some reactivity in her left SI, oddly enough - I was sure it would be on the right! - but it responded well to adjustment. He did minor adjustments all the way down (some mid-lower neck, a sore spot on her poll where she banged her head, some mid-lower back), but found nothing seriously major besides some sore ovaries and a little reactivity in her left SI. She was WAY more relaxed this time about it all, and I was totally thrilled with the response she had to the treatment. PHEW. I was terrified there might be something horribly wrong and she's just really stoic!
Another thing he mentioned, when I told him sometimes I have difficulty with left bend, is that she's more upright on that foot, so her body sends differing signals to itself due to the fact that she loads that side of her body differently. There's nothing really that can be done about it except continue to work on improving her balance, and keeping the foot trimmed properly. I'll probably always fight an uphill battle to keep her as symmetrical as possible on both sides, but really, what horse (or rider, for that matter) is ever totally symmetrical? None, that's for sure!

I feel like everything is sort of falling into place before Groton House. I was worried about her hocks - now that I've seen her move and seen how sound she is, I'm not worried anymore. I was worried about her back and maybe there being problems I didn't know about - now that I've had her adjusted and there's nothing major this time, I'm not worried anymore. She's been so outstanding under saddle lately, and equally as cheery and lovey on the ground, and it just makes me feel like she's comfortable, happy, fit, healthy, and ready for a challenge. Knock on wood, but I think we're really ready to play with the Big Boys at Groton House, and have a good chance at doing well.

(Hunter's Run, 2008.)

A little bit of this an' a little bit of that

I've been back on Gogo since Tuesday doing dressae work. I wrote about that nice little ride on Tuesday, and since then we've been doing some experimentation, in very small increments. Unfortunately for me, I don't think Gogo really feels all that different after her chiro work. In fact, I think if anything she is feeling more defensive in her body. Vicki, I think, thought that since the work was so major, there was going to be a vast improvement in my horse right away - and there wasn't. She also said that sometimes it takes a horse up to two weeks to actually start to feel better and use their body in increasingly efficient ways. I kind of don't think this is going to be the case with Gogo. Oh well, at least we're eliminating the physical part of it.

On Tuesday, I tried her in my Prestige and in the new KK Ultra bit (not actually new, but borrowed from the retired horse). That's a very minor change from the knock-off KK that I have - mine is a 14mm, Theo's is a 16mm. She liked it, that's for sure. On Wednesday, I decided to try Vicki's Custom Saddlery saddle, which I usually ride Rena in and quite like. We also had a different saddle fitter take a peek at my saddle - he said it's a hair too wide, which the other saddle fitter lady didn't mention a word about. He suggested a fancy expensive new Prolite pad with shims, but when I brought out my Supracor and showed him that, he went, well this actually works a lot better, so why am I even showing you this other pad? The complaint Vicki makes about my saddle is that is moves a little in back, and that it might be twisting slightly to the left. But was that Gogo or was that the saddle? So out came Vicki's saddle. Perhaps Gogo was feeling a little too good that day, but this is what I seemed to notice - walk and trot were EXCELLENT, completely amazing, but the canter? Explosive, humpbacked, head in the air, running nonsense. Hmmmmmmmmmm. I also made an effort to check the saddle that never moves in the mirror when I was walking, trotting, cantering by - what do you know, IT MOVED IN BACK. So that means it's Gogo, not so much the saddle. The Prestige does move more, but I really do think that it really is designed to do that, so I dunno. The other thing about twisting to the left? Vicki's saddle made me sit SO CROOKED to the left... so again, I think Gogo is pushing me over there, because I don't do that on other horses! Try a little bit of this, try a little bit of that. Gogo WAS totally wonderful at the walk and trot though, right away, so I think I might try it again today on her.

Yesterday it was back to my saddle and the KK Ultra. Well, we started off well, and continued to get steadily better and better - except we were still doing the teeth champ. I think at this point, I just need to ignore it and work on improving everything else. Something we were doing made it actually stop for a little while - we were working on trot-halt-walk-halt-trot-halt-trot-halt etc etc, rapid fire transitions, all while doing leg yields - all those transitions during leg yields. When I wasn't halting, I was giving halt-halts every few strides, and pushing her on, then half-halting again, then pushing her on. She stopped champing, rebalanced herself completely and started really thinking about what I was asking her to do. And she was EXCELLENT, I might add. I think I figured out that when she does it, for the most part, it's when she takes the contact out, gets heavier on the forehand, and leans a bit on the bit. Imagine that's you - now you have a piece of metal pulling at both sides of your mouth. I know if it were me and I was a neurotic mare, I'd lean on that piece of metal and bounce my jaw against it too. Interesting. Vicki also thinks that this new bit is too low, even though we had the other bit at this same level in her mouth and when we tried to raise it because it was also too low, she held all her tension in her mouth until we lowered it back down a hole. Then she was totally perfect. Sighhhh!

So today, we're going back in the other saddle and the KK. We're going to keep trying all these different combinations - different saddle, different bit, raising the bit, etc etc etc. - until we find the perfect combination. We'll see how she goes in Vicki's saddle today, whether or not there is a noticable difference. I REALLY don't have the money to get a new custom saddle right now... or ever, probably. And I love love love love love my Prestige too, and I REALLY don't think she's all that adverse to it.

[Insert neurotic twitch] off to my lesson.

Exhaustion

I. Am Exhausted. I've just worked two 16-hour days in a row... with pretty much no breaks. And tomorrow is going to be just as horrible! And then Thursday.... is my birthday! And Friday is show prep, and Saturday is SHOW!

This is going to be a pretty short update I think, because I'm going to crash pretty soon, but I at least wanted to say that Gogo's chest looks a MILLION AND ONE times better, and that I got on her today for the first time since last Wednesday. Since she had such major chiro work, I wanted to just take it easy, and started the ride with a 20-minute walk hack outside with Anne and her horse Salute. Back in the ring, we did mostly walk - which was good, because she was wiiiiiiired for sound at first - and then moved up into a tiny bit of trot, then back down to walk, then back up to trot, then back to walk, doing circles of varying sizes and changes of direction, feeling her slowly relax beneath me. I tried a KK Ultra on her today (I have a knock-off KK Ultra which she's been going in since last February or so) which was a 16mm instead of her regular 14mm, and I dunno if it was the Aurigan or the fact that the chiro majorly unlocked her jaw, but she was foaming like crazy, in a very good way! She normally doesn't do that! She definitely felt very different in her neck and withers, that's for sure. Behind the saddle, it took a little longer for her to stop feeling so defensive still. But finally, she stretched down into the contact at the trot and off we went, just getting in some consistant, relaxed, quiet work in a longer and lower frame, and Vicki said she could really see her hips swinging (remember how locked up they were). At the end, I quietly halted, and she was PERFECTLY balanced and square. I mean textbook, amazing, wonderful, flawless. And I dropped the reins, gave her a huge hug and was done with that! It feels to me like tomorrow she's going to start at this place where we left off. I certainly hope that's the case. So good news, good news! Goobers, relaxation, swinging back, cheerful attitude. That's the way we like it!

In other news, my Mudbeast continues to be muddy and beasty. She must have rolled like 85 times out in the mud today, and came in crusted in it, as usual. I love spring everywhere in the entire world EXCEPT AT THE BARN. Everywhere else, there are blooming flowers, bright sunshine, freshly melting snow and crisp new growth. At the barn, there's mud, hair, filth, sweatiness, and did I mention the mud? XD And now of course, it's pouring. Which is going to make the turnouts WAY more exciting and muddy tomorrow!

We'll be dressage-ing from today until Friday, and then jumping our guts out on Saturday, if all goes well. Sweet!!!

MAJOR Chiropractic Work A Go-Go

WOW. So I knew my horse needed to be worked on by the chiropractor, but I never imagined that it could be quite this much. Yesterday, Gogo was lucky enough to get to go out for almost 6 hours (a big deal in a barn with 16 horses on almost totally individual turnout and only four paddocks), and that helped a little with her chest edema - I figure her moving around on her own, choosing how to move in the way that is least uncomfortable for her for as long as humanly possible is way more productive than forced handwalking exercise, which could potentially continue to make the area raw and sore, for now. Dr. A showed up at around 1pm or so, and my horse was the second to go. He ran his pen down her spine and her eyes bugged out of her head and she scooted pretty far underneath herself. Uh oh. I knew she needed chiro work. I figured she probably needed it pretty badly. But that was NOT the reaction I expected out of her. "Oh boy," Dr. A said. Oh boy indeed.

Basically, her entire body was torqued a little out of whack. She needed moderate adjustments in her poll, which was a spot I thought would be huge, but it was less than I expected. Her jaw was totally locked in place, so he adjusted that too - no big surprise there. He took a peek into her mouth, even though she did NOT like that and pretty much tried to lift him off the ground several times, and noted that she's starting to get some small hooks on the inside of her lower jaw - ugh, she just had her teeth done in November! Small adjustments were made on both sides of her neck, and he also worked on her withers - all areas that were worked on last time she was seen by the chiro in Ohio, last July. Interestingly, he also adjusted her right knee, with an enormous 'pop' I might add - the exact same knee was adjusted last time too. That is also her flatter front foot (as opposed to the left, which is more upright), so I wonder what that has to do with it. And then, there was her mid-back region, specifically the area where her lumbar and thoracic vertebrae meet. You can see where that is here, right where the ribcage ends. (I'm completely fascinated with the equine skeleton, btw, and spend a lot of time drawing and painting and studying it. Yes, I did those by hand!). The saddle fitter had come out some weeks ago because of some concerns that the cantle of my dressage saddle has been rocking a little, and had basically said my Prestige was designed to move a little bit in back, simply because Italian saddles apparently do that. I blogged about that awhile ago, but for whatever reason, I can't figure out which post it was, so when I find it I'll link back to that. Anyway, so in that area, there's some loss of the integrity of her hair where the saddle sits, which was worrying me, so Dr. A had me bring my saddle out, girth her up, and walk her around, just so he could see what the saddle does. He's a bit concerned that it might be twisting a little to the left, which makes some sense because I feel like I'm usually a little bit twisted to the left - but I thought that was just me. He injected the area with vitamin B12 and lidocane, which will help to keep that area relaxed and determine if this is a saddle problem, an it's-just-Gogo problem, or something more severe, like kissing spines (which he said was quite unlikely, thankfully). On top of alllll that, her entire pelvis was rotated left, and both her SIs were locked down. This he likened to standing with your butt pushed way out - try it, and notice how it hollows out your lower back and locks up your knees. Because of this, he also had to adjust both her stifles. Some more stuff about pelvis adjustments can be found here. It was very obvious that she felt MUCH better after her adjustment - he moved down her body with his pen in the same way he did before after the adjustment, and there was a markedly improved response. Today, she was standing MUCH more square and comfortably in the aisle - she had been starting to stand with her right hind out behind her, and she was comfortable and square all this morning too.

Her funky chest edema is just too weird to be true still. She's going to have at least four or five days off, given the rubbing and her discomfort... and did I mention that we had a few minor chiropractic adjustments done, lol. This morning we had a 500lb dose of banamine and a half-hour of icing, which looked a bit like this:



Silly mare. She's so good about all this crap. The edema looked like this this morning:



Gravity pulled it even closer to the girth area. Oye, Gogo....

So we'll be doing handwalking, icing, and pain meds for the next four or possibly five days, until the swelling goes down enough for her to be comfortable again. Hopefully we'll be better soon, because our first little schooling jumper show is on the 14th, which is one week away. Obviously if we're not ready, we're not going, but I HOPE we're okay to go! At least her having a few days off gives me time to go get my tall boots repaired (zipper broke AGAIN, ugh!) and also gives me a chance to blog about some of the topics I promised I'd talk about but haven't had the time to yet - modern eventing was Daun's request, someone else (who was it?) wanted me to talk about stretching your horse, and I wanted to talk about BCS too.

Poor little mare...