This definitely could be and I appreciate your honesty! I think I’m feeling a bit more impatient now because of the kicking-the-farrier issue. I can be there at the next appointment to sedate him because I’m off work that week, but after that I won’t be able to because of my job. I’m really stressed out about it so feeling like I need to get him at least comfortable enough to hold his feet for the farrier soon-ish 
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He was -4 and -5 in the hinds (I forget which one is which). Had a ton of sole depth so took off a bunch of toe, then put him in heart bar shoes.
His right front is a degree or two lower than his left front. So his right front has a frog pad, while left front just has a little leather pad.
Get a chiropractor to look at him a day or two before the appointment. All the postural changes could have pinched a nerve or pulled something out of place. He should be able to hold the adjustment for long enough to get through the farrier visit.
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You could retake rads and see what his angles are now, but I bet he is still negative without a wedge.
Yeah I think you’re right-which is why I might just cave and try a wedge anyways to see if that helps him. It seems like with a lot of NPA horses the farriers wedge them up, and then they get some immediate relief while they work on fixing the angles through trimming and slowly reducing the wedge.
There’s no way the change in trimming was enough to change 5 degrees!
The good news is that he no longer seems lame on his right front…although I won’t be surprised if it pops up again. Whatever is bugging him there seems to be finicky. But, for now he is sound on that foot again and I am considering trying to very very lightly hack him (literally down our tractor road and back).
His feet seem to be looking better in terms of strength, so KNOCK ON WOOD I think I can attempt putting him in a bigger paddock so he can get some more movement rather than just standing all day in his round pen, but I’m hoping maybe hacking him until I can get that sorted out could help. Or maybe handwalking.
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So, another update! My vet’s office was actually looking for horse volunteers for an ultrasound and palpation training course. No cost at all to the owner, so I brought my guy in and they did find something!
Looks like via ultrasound they found articular facet osteoarthritis on his lumbar spine (Just in front of the si). Worse on the left than the right which could be why his left lead canter is worse.
Time to start some digging and see if anyone on here and other forums have experience with this!
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That’s super interesting! My friends horse was recently injected at his lumbar facet joints in addition to the SI. Wondering if this is another area where we will see more horses with facet joint issues in the lumbar spine, something previously unknown or overlooked.
Keep us posted on how he does.
I’ll keep you updated. Truthfully, seeing as I’ve tried so much already I don’t see this making a difference either but I’ll try to not be so pessimistic about it.
Did your friends horse feel better after? Lumped in with the SI injections I guess it’s hard to tell which did the trick but good to know either way.
My sister in law has a horse with this. He also had visible scar tissue/swelling at one point on his back…
She did two rounds of shockwave two years apart. She also injected his back.
8 years later he is successfully competing in eventing at the lower levels. He is on Equioxx still.
Editing to add I also had a horse with arthritis in the lower facets. But my horse also had wobblers syndrome.
We found the arthritis before the neck issues. The vet from CSU told me she finds it to be fairly manageable but finds they do better actually as hunter jumpers than dressage horses, in her experience. It was interesting.
Well, I had a thread on this horse even though he’s not mine. He’s had a lot of issues and shortly after the lumbar injections, he started ulcer treatment, then EPM and is now brewing an abscess so it’s honestly hard to tell if he feels better, poor guy.
Thus far, I haven’t seen any improvement after the injections. He is still really crabby on the crossties, and anxious about cantering. I gave him ace once and he was fine and his canter felt nice, but off ace he just went back to his usual ways.
I am considering sending him down south and seeing where that gets us. He looks sound and fine on the lunge, he’s just super reactive all around. He was from the northeast initially before going down south where I bought him. He had stayed down there briefly with my trainer before coming up north, and pretty much as soon as I brought him up north he was really tough. I wonder if at this point it’s just environmental. Maybe he needs warmer weather, maybe he needs a different turnout situation…I don’t know.
My crabby one does worse when it’s cold and the ground is hard or muddy. I think he’s outside trying to balance and it makes him sore. He gets blanketed way heavier than anything else and is almost never hot. FWIW, I’ve had him in NC and GA and it didn’t help…
I can’t recall all the testing you’ve done but I just pulled E/Se on my guy as a last ditch investigation. No Lyme, no EPM titer that my vets will treat, but definitely kissing spines. Some days he’s great, some days he’s cranky and backsore and angry.
I wouldn’t keep trying to canter this horse - a green, out of shape horse is going to struggle to canter even without everything else your horse has going on. All it’s doing is making riding = pain and frustration.
Since his feet are improving, I’d keep it to gentle handwalks, isometric exercises, maybe walking hacks if his saddle still fits perfectly, and maybe invest in a back on track sheet he can wear at night (some people see huge improvement with this but you need more than 20 minutes in it). What I wouldn’t want to do is send him south and not know if his feet are being allowed to go to crap again - but turning him out for 6 months or a year is still not a bad idea. Finding a good place to do it where you can keep an eye on him is the hard part.
I feel for you. Clearly something is going on that hurts, and it’s stinks that they can’t just tell us.
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