I am glad to find this tonight. I have a horse on pasture retirement in another state; while the care is fine, he has never thrived. He seems not to do well in a large herd situation. While he has a lot of issues, none of them are crucial, but when I visit I just don’t think he’s very happy or comfortable. I’ve been asking myself if I want to put him through another winter, but just put off any decision.
A week ago, I got a call that he was colicking. He has never ever colicked before. He got through all right, but it focused me on his iffy condition. BO told me he was going blind, and all he did was follow one other horse around. I thought she was hinting that it was time.
I had a long talk on the phone with his vet (great vet) and she agreed that with moving to a smaller lot and a lot of extra care he would go on, but she also felt he wasn’t thriving and would not improve. So I decided that I would make my last visit in a month or so, and vet told me she could handle all the arrangements.
I wrote an email to the BO, explaining my decision. I’ve never really connected with this BO–frankly I don’t like her–but since we have a mainly long-distance relationship, and the care is fine, that hasn’t been an issue.
But she immediately emailed me back saying she took care of all the horses, and saw them every day, and she would consider this my 30 day notice because she wouldn’t allow him to be put down on her farm, so I have to move him.
Of course this makes me feel more awful about something that’s already hard. Not to mention it will put my horse through a stressful move for no good reason. I have no idea where I will move him, and her email definitely made it clear she thought I was a horrible person. I guess I will have to be the bad guy, but I so wish I didn’t have to figure out somewhere to move my poor old guy.
I wanted one of those Black Beauty retirements for him, green grass and companions under the tree and all that, but instead he shuffles around and gets big balls of mud in his tail and the vet told me he was low horse on the totem pole, so he gets run off the hay bales. It’s not a great life, it’s just a life, and one day he will suffer if I don’t do the right thing for him now.
I just wish this BO wasn’t going to make it as hard on us both as possible. Bitch.
