Mistake

I really don't like to make mistakes. I really hate to make mistakes that someone else has to carry the burden of that mistake. I absolutely hate making a mistake that causes Ashke pain or fear. Hate it.

I made a mistake on Monday.

I decided to try to leave the wound exposed (after trying the betadine compression wrap) to see if it could dry out and scab up. He was starting to show some sign of pressure sores on the front of his shins from being wrapped. I liberally sprayed the wound with a spray on bandage, Alushield,

It was a mistake. When I went out on Tuesday night the wound was inflamed, the leg swollen and Mr Biteyface was in residence. I cold hosed for twenty minutes, treated with betadine (which he wasn't happy about) and rewrapped it.

I went out again last night and unwrapped to treat the wound again. I found:

 It looks bad because of the Alushield (which does not work. Saiph, you can say you told me so.)

 It is drying out and looking better.

I really need to cold hose it clean tonight and then treat with betadine and rewrap.

My plan is to leave it wrapped until it is healed. The bandage should get smaller as we go along. I will need to watch for pressure sores on his cannon bones, but I just don't want to risk pissing it off again. He is sound now at the walk and trot. I will see how he does at the canter during my next ride.

Progress

On all fronts.

Ashke whinnied at me four times between the door and his stall today. He seemed in good spirits and stuck his head in his halter for me. I dumped feed in his bucket to keep him still while I cut off the bandage, then walked him to the wash stall to cold hose. The only part of his leg that is still swollen is right where the injury is. The rest of his leg is tight and cool. The wound is still a bit warm, but the redness has receeded and over all the wound looks clean. I need to treat it with Betadine to get it to dry out and form a scab. Saiph said that Betadine is the best thing. That will happen tomorrow. Hopefully, in a few days it will have a scab and I can start leaving the bandaging off of it most of the time.

 Ashke was great in the wash stall. He followed me around as I moved muck buckets and brooms, then positioned himself against the wall, turned his head and watched me as I ran the cold water over his leg. He didn't fuss, but relaxed as I rested my head on his flank and talked to him as the water washed off the wound.

 Overall, I think the pain has diminished a lot. I was able to probe the edges of the wound without him trying to move away. There is one little spot that is still kind of bloody but there was no blood in the bandaging or when I washed him off. It just looks a bit redder than the surrounding tissue.

The edges are not the bright blood red they were the last bandage change and he was less reluctant to put weight on the leg as I was wrapping it. 

Tomorrow I will start to treat it to get it to dry out and form a scab. Once we have a solid scab, I will see if the BO will do a polo wrap on that leg before turnout and then take it off afterwards. I know it still needs some protection, but I don't want it wrapped and wet all of the time. I'm hoping to be able to ride tomorrow, but the weather doesn't look like it wants to cooperate, so it will be an arena ride, at the least.

The other projects I'm working on:

 From this.

To this.

All of the old, disgusting carpeting is out of the house now. J pulled it and the tack strips/staples out this morning while I was driving all over town. When I got home, we painted the stairs, the risers and the wood on the sides with a patio/flooring paint. It did pretty good on the cheap ass MDF board they made the stairs out of. We still need to install the laminate flooring in the hall upstairs and on two landings, plus pull the carpet from the three stairs between the dining room and the living room so we can paint those as well. We will do this tomorrow, if the weather stays crappy. It really needs to be done. We need to install quarter round between the side of the stairs and the trim, which we will do prior to painting the trim. We should have the stair treads before the end of the week, so we can match the paint color for the trim to the carpet color. After we paint, we will install the stair treads and then this project will be finished. Finally.

Remember this?

We used some of the left over paint from the hall/dining room to repaint the mantle. The two colors and the damage done by the dog was making me cray cray. I did not want to spend a lot of money since we want to replace the mantle with a wooden one. When we lay the upstairs floor, we will also pull out a piece of bamboo and finish the floor in front of the fireplace. 

So, Ashke's leg is a blessing in disguise, because I know that I would not have wanted to work on the house instead of ride, even though the work we have done has made a huge difference in how I feel about being in the house. I didn't realize how oppressive living in a tore up house was making me feel. J also managed to fix the gas fireplace, which is on as we speak, and clean the glass. It looks awesome. 

Next on our list is the upstairs bathroom, which is going to require professional help, and then the basement. The bathroom needs the tub pulled, the wall taken down and the plumbing behind the wall fixed (we think there has been a leak since the tub was originally installed), the sub floor replaced, and then everything put back in, the wall tiled and new lanoleum installed. Yeah, doesn't that sound like a freaking nightmare?

The basement is going to be at least a year from now. We need to put the pool table in storage, then rip up the carpeting, the second floor we installed, the insulation layer we put it, and the sub floor. Then the new subfloor needs to be installed (concrete backer board), and a radiant heat floor put in, then the laminate flooring installed over the top. A fresh coat of paint, a bar put in at one end of the room, and then the pool table will come back inside. The basement room has always been twenty degrees colder than the rest of the house. We installed a layer of insulation between the sub floor and the second floor we put in (there were four inch holes between the edge of the subfloor and the wall in some places, plus filled all of the holes with foam insulation. Then a few years later we installed bale insulation between the joists under that floor. I have no idea if they are still there, because that was before the construction work was done on the caissons. But either way, that room is still cold. It will be nice to finally be comfortable down there. A radiant heat floor should be perfect.

Finally, we need to replace the laminate in the living room with some other laminate that isn't as soft as the bamboo we chose. It has been destroyed by the dogs. I think both J and know what kind of flooring we want, but it is last on the list. The joys of home ownership are still better than renting.

Starting Over

Ashke is healing as quickly as can be expected. The tear in his flesh has healed over and the only thing that needs to grow back is the hair. It is still a bit warm, but not hot, with no signs of infection, so I think it has sealed internally, and a scab is beginning to form. Ashke has been in turn out since last week, at least on the days when the mud is not too deep. It does seem to be drying out and his bandage was free from any discharge or blood when I changed it last night. I think once we have a healthy scab over the skin it should be much less bothersome to him.

Wednesday marked the first ride since April 10th, which is 23 days since the last time I was on him. I swear he heaved a huge sigh of relief when he saw the saddle come out of the tack room and all but inhaled the bit when I offered it to him. We rode for about 10 minutes in the arena and then I took him outside to ride the edges of the field. I had expected to walk, but instead I got jiggy, fire breathing dragon horse. Not that he was rude about it, but he would not hold to a walk to save his life. Once we hit the edges of the field he grabbed the bit and burst into a gallop which I allowed until he started to feel ragged, then slowed him and asked for a walk. I asked for a walk for the next  twenty minutes while he pranced and danced and tried to extend his trot. Finally, about 3/4 of the way around he settled into his distance eating, go forever on the trail walk and held that while snorting continuously back to the barn.

He wasn't totally sound at the start, but by the end of the ride the hitch in his stride was very minimal. I could feel it but I'm not sure anyone could have seen it. He was, however, fairly out of breath and sweaty. I don't think we rode more than a mile and a half over 30 minutes but that was enough to give him a decent workout. Hopefully, starting over with the conditioning shouldn't be too horrible.

Thursday I rode again. This time we were indoors and Ashke was very good. We did walk and a little bit of trot. He was sound at the walk and a little stiff at the trot. We worked on walk pirouettes and square halts and square turns. He was very good and maintained contact for the most part. We still have some stiffening of his neck and throwing his head a bit higher when turning to the left, but overall he has gotten better. Even with not being ridden.

He was sound at the walk after our ride, flipping his head and acting all impatient. There was no swelling and no additional heat in the leg. He will have Friday off, Saturday will be a bandage change and then Sunday, maybe we can do a short, mostly walking ride off property. We could do the South Platte from Adam's County, which should be really pretty and incredibly flat.

Win, Place, Show

Win: Nyquist (yes, this is probably the most expected pic, but he also has the most experience and has not lost a race.)

Place: Exaggerator (I don't like that his last couple of races were on the West Coast, since I don't think those horses race as well in the Derby, but he's got good experience.)

Show: Creator (10 -1 and I love how he looks racing. Grey though, so there's that)

And my long-shot is Oscar Nominated.

Here's to mint julips and funky hats.

When Your Horse is Lame

I spend most of my free time (time not taken up by work, sleep, cooking, shopping, etc) with Ashke, and with J when its the weekend. We ride at the barn during the week and J and I get out on the trails on the weekend. I have held to a four day a week schedule for a couple of years now and this has been the rule of thumb since I brought Ashke home. Except for the past six or seven months. There seems to be a conspiracy to keep me from Ashke, the barn and riding. There have always been times in the past four years when I've put riding on the back burner for other things: T's obligations at school, my mom visiting, Broncos games, but this year has been especially brutal.

The last time I rode was the weekend before Mom flew in for T's birthday. We did a short jaunt on the Teller trail with L, and then a ride at Barr Lake while J fished. I figured I might be able to fit a short ride in one of the weekend days my mom was visiting, but then Ashke wrecked his leg. I might, based on how the wound looks, be able to start riding him this weekend, but that is still up in the air. Until then, I am grounded. At that point, he will have had four weeks without being ridden and based on how he acted yesterday, he might be explosive.

So, how does one go about filling time when not able to ride? Well, part of my time was spent with Mom. And most of her time spent with us was taken up with sewing new curtains for our house. I guess she was tired of our window treatments. J and I have lived in the condo for 16 and a half years. In that time, we have replaced all of the carpet in the house with hardwood, except for the stairwell and hall going upstairs. Eleven or so years ago, we repainted the front room and redid the floor with bamboo (do not ever use bamboo if you have dogs - it is incredibly soft despite advertisement and the dogs can score the wood with their claws). We also repainted the kitchen and put up some backsplash in the kitchen. The original window treatments had failed in the kitchen and upstairs (honeycomb blinds that melted in the UV rays of the sun after about eight years) and was failing in the living room. Our upstairs windows are covered with blackout curtains and then cloth curtains over the top. In the kitchen we had blackout curtains covered with a fleece baby blanket covered with Teddy Bears over the top. (I did not get a before picture of that window. It was special though.) We used the fleece blanket because it was heavy and blocked the cold from coming in the window.

It was not pretty, however and we jumped at the offer of new curtains. J and I picked out material and Mom made the curtains.

The window faces east and it is bright and cheery now.

I don't even miss the Teddy Bears.

The living room was covered with faux wooden blinds (original install) that had seen better days. Lily, our boxer-malinois mix, has pummeled the edges, causing the brittle material to shatter into pieces, while trying to see out. This caused us to cover the outside of the blinds with white sheets, and the inside of the blinds with dog crate parts to try and keep her from shattering them completely to pieces. 

Yes, it was a white trash as it sounds.

Mom made it beautiful again.

We still need to address the floor in the living room and the fireplace (which has a loose front glass panel and needs to be serviced). When we painted the room the fireplace was entirely closed off (you can feel the air blow through the fireplace into the house) with insulation and a faux wall, completely hiding the fireplace. We need to have the fireplace serviced and either fixed or replaced, plus the framing outside the house that hold the insert needs to be insulated and sealed so the air doesn't flow through into the room. (This condo was not well constructed.) Hopefully, we can fix the mantle and the fireplace before next winter.

Due to the horse being laid up, I suggested to J that we paint the dining room, the stairwell and the upstairs wall. We also needed to pull up the old carpet and decide what we wanted to do with the stairs. The stairs are steep and already a menace, so putting hard wood was not really what we wanted to do, but carpeting just the stairs was going to be an issue, so we needed to come up with a working plan for those stairs. J and I aren't getting younger and my mom visits several times a year, so having non-slick stair was important. After much discussion at Lowes, a quick internet search of Amazon, and some consideration, we have a game plan. 

We started Saturday morning by tearing down the wallpaper in the dining room. 

I had completely forgotten we had painted the wall before we had hung the wallpaper.

This wall took four coats of paint to completely cover the green.

This was the bottom stairwell, that I started painting eleven years ago, hated the color and stopped.

We've just never found the time or energy to fix it. The hole in the wall was from an twin boxspring that careened down the stairs at some point.

You can't really tell, but this wall was an off white-greenish looking paint.

Lots of damage due to Lily scratching the walls with her claws. 

Don't ask.

 The wall in the dining room. The color is beige (called sweet sand).

Fresh paint in the hallway and the disgusting carpet that needs addressing this coming weekend.

I didn't get a pic of the stairwell, but it looks so good now. I can't believe we let it go as long as we did without addressing it. Next weekend we are pulling carpet and laying laminate in the hallway, the upper landing and the lower landing. The actual stairs are going to be painted with a patio/flooring paint prior to the landings being laid, then we wait for the stair treads to be delivered from Amazon. We chose stair treads with the bullnose finish in mocha and will match the carpet color to a light brown for the trim. The trim with also be the same color in the dining room, something that will match both the treads and the art work we have in the living room. There are eleven stairs in the stairwell to finish this way and the stairs between our living room and dining room to be finished the same way. 

Then maybe we will have company over again . . .

Crack Addict

I think animals can be good patients as well as bad patients, when it comes to injuries. In the past, Ashke has been pretty good. He was calm and relaxed in the stall when he had the gash over his eye that required stitches, he's been good about doing the physical therapy needed for his right hamstring and left stifle. Over all, he is a very sweet and kind horse that seems to roll with the punches.

That has all changed with this barn. He is a turnout seeking demon horse, like a crack-smoking junkie looking for his next high. The first day of his injury Ashke stood balanced on two feet, keeping the left hind off the ground while simultaneously banging the bottom of the split door with his right front with his head hanging outside. Very talented, my little crack-smoker is, and demanding. Once the ground outside was dry, he was allowed to go into his run (10 x 10) for the sunshine and the socialization.

He was still not happy. And like any addict, he started searching for a way to get what he wants, whether it was a good decision or not. That is how addiction works, you know. I don't know if he did online research or just queried his neighbors, but my crack-seeking idiot managed to finagle his way through the double looped and secured chain on the back of his run and set himself free in turnout yesterday.

 He was a mess.

He rolled in the mud. He played with Cory. He evaded arrest when the sheriff came to return him to his stall, preferring to gallop madly around the turnout field with his head flung high than to politely acquiesce to his capture. Yes. Chasing happened. I'm pretty sure the words "freedom or death" rang in the air as he made his point. I'm sure the BO was not happy with him. We suspect he had 30 to 45 minutes of freedom before he was finally bound under law.

I couldn't believe how he looked when I pulled him out of the stall. He was a disaster. His mane was rubbed and pulled, his tail a mess, and the places that weren't mud caked were covered with pee. J took his bucket to wet while I pulled him out of the stall. He spooked badly as we walked past where she was and swung his leg into one of the tack boxes in the aisle in front of the stalls. He felt like a bundle of dynamite as I tied him to the hitching rack. He pulled back hard as I brought out the grooming box, blowing and snorting like something was going to eat him.

He is not a good patient.

After grooming him, pulling most of the braids out so as to not lose any more mane, brushing out his tail, we tackled the leg. The swelling had gone down enough that the bandaging was sagging around his fetlock, and covered with mud from turnout. Ashke was a snorty, bitey mess and let both J and I know he was happier just ignoring the large wound than to have us treat it. He was shaking with the anticipation of pain as I carefully cut off the bandage. There was a bit of blood, but considering his antics in turnout, I am not surprised. The main wound has sealed and a lot of the swelling has gone down. Once I got the water on it, he stopped shaking and I was able to actually feel around the wound site without his reflex lifting of his leg.

 There is a flap of skin that will have to be removed, I think. I doubt very seriously there is any hope for it now.

The redness has retreated as well and I couldn't feel any heat in the leg after twenty minutes of cold hosing.

 When I replaced the pad with the antibiotic ointment I was able to put a bit of direct pressure on the wound, holding the pad in place, while waiting for Ashke to place his foot on the ground. He did and left it there while I wrapped the leg and fetlock with a thick cotton gauze, then vet wrap and finally Elastikon. The vet wrap allowed me to apply a bit of pressure without feeling like I was cutting off circulation with the Elastikon.

Wrapped and back in his stall.

Ashke will be restricted to his stall for the next three days (as will all of the horses since we are having another snow storm in Denver) and I will rebandage again on Sunday. I have to take his antics as a sign that it is healing and not causing him a ton of pain, considering he was galloping wildly away from the BO. Although I do think it was sore when we were changing the bandage. He has not had any pain reliever since last Sunday.

Rewrapped

I went to the barn to check on Ashke today and found that the bandage had slipped down his leg. The leg was slightly swollen about the wrap and I decided it would work best to try again with the wrap job. I walked Ashke over to the wash bay and unwrapped his leg, which he was mildly protesting, then cold hosed for almost 30 minutes. The slight swelling at the top of the cannon bone went down and the overall swelling in the leg went down.

The leg after 30ish minutes of cold hosing.

Ashke was protective of his leg, but not pain reactive. There was no discharge and the wound smelled clean. The slight bleeding that happened on Sunday did not happen today. The swelling was pretty localized to the wound and he was walking sound on it. The biting of everything around him was minimized and he ate the treat in his bucket eagerly while J was holding him. 

Second wrap

I used Elastikon this time, to keep the wrap from slipping. Ashke weighted the foot for me while I was wrapping and the Elastikon should stick to his hair on his leg and keep the bandage from slipping down. Ashke didn't want me to touch the wound while I was bandaging, but it was more of a toddler's reaction to being bandaged (Owwww, mom, that hurts. And I haven't touched the cut yet.) than the pain he was in two days ago. Overall, I am very pleased with how it looks and with how quickly it is healing.