Chubby McChubberson

As the title suggests Kika really enjoyed the break she got surrounding her stiffness/lameness prior to osteo's visit a while back and is now the roundly size of a house!
To back track a bit as it has been a good while since I updated, apologies in advance - time lapse between posts could lead this one to be wordy & long!
So from where I left off last post Kika wasn't healing as I'd hoped after vet's visit so the osteo was called in for a once over - in fact Miss K appeared to get worse, so I put a stop to the riding & did minimum lungeing until osteo could call out. With a plentyfull supply of hay in the field, I am sure you can now understand how Madam is after getting so FAT!

The osteo manipulated her a bit on 29th of June but raised queries over Kika's hairyness and said that if she wasn't better by the end of the week that might be best to call out vet and test for liver-related issues or Lymes Disease (evil tics ). She did say that she had a few blocages prior to manipulating her and that she did walk out better afterwards - but to keep an eye on her coat all the same as even though the weather has been very all over the place for this time of year here, her coat shouldn't be as poorly as it is.
Needless to say I felt like a Bad Mammy for putting her poor coat down to the changeable weather and not questioning it more!

After the required 2 days recovery time and some...4 days in total in the field as I had other things on which meant I didn't make it to the barn to bring her in from the field - went to check all was well with her outdoors alright, but didn't haul her in. So it was Wednesday last week (4/7/12) before I was able to lunge her and see if the osteo's tweaking had helped straighten her out, it had , so the decision was made to hop back up on Friday evening (unfortunately had something else on Thursday evening hence a little more delay).
As her coat still wasn't great I had contacted the vet on Thursday (5/7/12) to see when she might be able to come take her bloods to be tested - she was unfortunately going to be away for a long weekend so we agreed to meet Tuesday 10/7/12 (today).
I decided that as she wasn't lame and hugely fat she had to be worked in between so ploughed on with my plans to ease us back into work over the weekend. Needless to say my legs haven't thanked me since Friday as when Kika isn't rideable - I don't have anything else to ride...so my lazy muscles forgot all about what they be at and were complaining at being put back to use.
Thankfully all better as of this morning - no more John Wayne walking around the office for me! 

Lunged her for a good 20mins before hopping up for 10mins walk & trot on Friday - all went very well considering it was 4 weeks to the day she had been kicked (I last sat on her on the 20th of June). We had no temper tantrums despite riding in an arena neither of us are particualrly fond off - which I know in itself is ridiculous - but there ya have it...I am going soft in my old age and my self preservation instincts are kicking in.
As it went so well on Friday, I decided to dispense with the lungeing on Saturday and hopped straight up. 30mins of work later and we were both hot & happy, 15mins walk flexing etc, 10mins trot and then 5+ minutes cool down with some more flexing.
More of the same was done on Sunday with slightly less warm up walking, about 15mins of trot work and some canter work thrown in to see where we were at. Our canter still needs heaps of work, but I managed to stay relaxed(ish) in the saddle and not grip so much with my knees so although far from perfect it wasn't the worst pieces of canter work we have ever done.
It didn't help that I had decided to ride in my glasses instead of contacts - which in the heat/humidity was an awful idea as the galsses kept sliding down my nose so I ended up taking them off (friend was keeping me company - on hand to call ambo if necessary  ) - which meant my spacial awarness was slightly off and I had at least one near miss woopsy with the arena sides in canter...but Kika was very good, she can't be blamed for her numpty rider!

Last night I decided to re-aquaint Miss Kika with the pessoa in our attempts to trim her down as she works better in it than anything I could hope to achieve on her in the same amount of time. After an Oh-My-God freak out moment on her part where she almost snotted herself in her silly fear of a grey horse in luminous green numnah & brushing boots joining us in the arena. Thankfully I was still warming her up and hadn't attached the front straps, or she may have gone head over heals and undone all our healing as she pretty much lost the run of herself and any smidgeon of common sense she posses when the poor grey entered the arena - sometimes I can but laugh at her antics (obviously so long as she doesn't hurt herself, others or me!)

So very long story short - that brings us up to speed with Kika & my Kingdom...the vet was out at lunchtime (cue my mad dash across town on my lunch hour and means I have to stay a little later this evening in work to make up time), took her bloods & a stool sample for testing. Thankfully she thinks it unlikelyit was Lymes Disease and that although possible in horses it is extreemly rare and very difficult to diagnose - in fact she said it is often a 'last-ditch' diagnosis when all other avenues have been explored without an answer.

She didn't seem overly worried about Kika and her fuzzyness - she like me said it could be down to the odd weather conditions we have had this year, which made me feel less guilty about not acting on her furry coat sooner.
She said it could be worms (hence the stool sample), K was due a dose and in fact got it saturday week back (after the osteo's visit) so maybe that might have had something to do with it - thankfully Miss K has been blessedly sound since the osteo manipulated her - so fingers crossed all will indeed come back with good news. As my dear girl is as big as a house and cannot be doing with another break in work *faint*, am actually seriously considering ordering her a grazing muzzle to try and ration her hay intake.

All going well should have blood test results by the end of the week - fingers crossed