providence strikes...

i was talking to our ferrier today about pops..she said she thought maybe his fetlock had clacified forward and it was too late to do much of anything about it. she said pops was in pain and we needed to really watch him for the proper time to put him down so he didn't suffer needlessly.

it totally freaked me out.

i called our vets and said i wanted an xray to see if the joint had calcified or not. then i called mo and talked to her about him...she said again..we need to get steve out to look at him (steve if you remember is who mo and i think is the god of all ferriers.)

no lie... i came home from my errands and was giving dusty her insulin and all of the sudden my phone rang right after i hung up from mo and it was renee down at the barn saying steve was here and wanted to know if i wanted him to look at pops feet. did god decide i was dinking around and being too wishy washy and sitting on the fence over pops and should get off my ass and do something about him so he sent steve over here right away????

too weird.

anyway...he trimmed the shit out of three of pops feet..right down to the long term and chronic laminitis changes...and now pops has 3 normal shaped feet. he didn't cut the front deformed one too much cuz he wants to see the xrays first and offerred three suggestions for treatment for him...(after the xray)...1, high doses of muscle relaxants to let that front leg's muscles and tendons relax (they have atrophied and contracted which is what is pushing the fetlock forward.)....2. a desmotomy (?)...surgically cutting the shortest tendon to let the foot drop back a bit....and 3. a high wedged bar shoe with a supporting front toe to give him stability and that can be shaved back to force the tendons to stretch out more....and we might even decide to do a combination of 2 or all 3.

i think the frequent minimal trimmings of the last 5 months were important to let the rest of pop's muscles and joints and bones readjust to a more normal configuration/alignment...but i think now we have to get more aggressive before wnter comes to get him as sound and as stable and as safe and as comfortable on his feet as we can so he can get on with his life the best that he can and put as much of his feet problems behind him as possible.

and i think i have to bite the bullet here and start making some firm decisions on his future medical plan. i have been so afraid to do the wrong thing that maybe we need to now start taking some risks if we want pops to have the best life he can.
steve wouldn't take any payment for trimming up pops today. he is going to make up several different kinds of shoes and after he talks to the vet will decide which one to try...he is such a good man.

man...rescue is sometimes full of scary..i don't know what to do kind of shit....but at some point, decisions with risks involved have to be made.

love you pops...we will give him an extra dose of pain meds today...he is probably going to need them....big sigh..i hope i am finally on the right thinking track for him now.