Spaying a Mare

[Rel6]

I did not do a true bute trial but wish I had because I am curious what the results would have been. The first day she came out not 100% behind, we buted her and she maybeeee looked a little better the next day, but not what I’d expect for being on bute. This was before we connected the dots on it being heat related (which seems so obvious in retrospect as it was within a week of her starting her Spring transitional heat).

I am hopeful the behavior isn’t habitual, because even before the spay she wasn’t exhibiting it while out of heat. It didn’t carry over once she was done ovulating. It just came back so incredibly quickly and before any other signs of heat. For example, the incident that tipped my vet into recommending spaying was a sudden explosion of rearing, striking out, double barrel kicking at people, and generally refusing to keep any feet on the ground when bringing her in from turnout. Vet came out 24 hours later and confirmed she had literally just started to ovulate. She had been coming in and out quietly on a loose lead for the 3 weeks prior. Nothing was going on to set her off, and when barn owner texted me to tell me what happened it was to say that she had not been herself and it was very out of character.

The one behavior that I do think had started to become habitual was defensiveness around her flank area. When in heat, she would pin her ears and cock a hind leg if you even stood near her flank (not hind end, not girth area, but right between the two). You definitely couldn’t touch her there without her being upset. Out of heat, the past few months her instinct would be to start to have that reaction and then almost deflate then she realize she wasn’t actually hurting there at the moment. You could watch her take a big sigh and then relax into enjoying being curried there (she is nothing if not expressive…).

Two weeks in to being out of heat the reaction would be gone entirely, but then she would cycle again and we would be back to square one. Her surgical incisions are exactly in the spots she was the most defensive of so she had that same behavior after surgery. Yet even two weeks post-op she is more comfortable with me grooming and touching around the area she had surgery in then she was a week out of heat. It makes me think that for her, ovulation was more painful for her than being two weeks post-op, which just makes me sad.

She is, and has always been, a very smart and sensitive mare and I have no expectation that will go away (and I wouldn’t want it to!) I am just hopeful the explosive/unpredictable behaviors that we only saw around her heat, and the pain/discomfort around her heat are helped. We are also going to work with a local professional who specializes in ground work who came recommended to try to work through anything that may have started to become habitual.

[awaywego]

I thought of doing a bute trial for my mare too but have been hesitant to try it because of the potential to distress her stomach so was thinking about putting her on Equioxx instead. Would love to hear if anyone has done a bute trial on a distressed ( ) mare.

The other thought about doing bute or equioxx is that of course we wouldn’t know for sure where the pain that’s been helped really is.

It’s always something like that though - it’s hard to really eliminate all the variables. Like, my mare seems to be settling down a bit now - she’s just “regular” girthy versus really trying to nail me when I tack her up now I assume it’s because we’re now deep into fall and she’s not having heat cycles like she does in September but who really knows!

[Guyot]

So I’ve tried bute but didn’t get any real response. But just 10 robaxin 2x daily make a huge difference for my mare.

Which makes sense if it’s a muscle tightness caused by cycling. I find robaxin helps me during my period for cramping much better then Advil as well.

[erinmeri]

@Virginia_Horse_Mom

How are they during anestrus over the winter months? Do their symptoms disappear?

LOL. Last year my mare cycled once in winter. So… whether or not there were follicles produced, she was winking and peeing and being a ditzy jerk. The year before I don’t remember that. However, here in the Northeast, she also had the winter zoomies, which are a lot like her heat zoomies. So… tough to tell whether she was truly out of heat, ever, in Winter. Or maybe she was just cold and frisky. Who knows… I spent most of my horse years in California where we don’t have this winter issue regardless of gender. This year we are on injectable Regumate (thanks, COTH friends for that tip!), so I am hoping for a better outcome.

For reference, my girl isn’t particularly mareish, is a love bug (who hates grooming and girthing), who is excitable but rational… but who was sometimes really difficult on the ground and under saddle when in heat. She also had a weird habit when cycling of chuffing (low nickering noise) and then rearing (or threatening to) out of nowhere when I would pet her face when she was in heat. It was scary and came out of nowhere… like a cat asking you to pet it and then scratching you. She is doing AMAZING on Regumate (oral first, and now injectable for convenience and safety of barn staff) and we don’t have ups and downs anymore, and no more scary “pet me, just kidding!” surprises.

Also, she is a buckskin “sex goddess”, who couldn’t help herself or stay rational when boys were nearby (not on the level of @NancyM’s blonde lady, but slutty and ditsy and attached enough to her boyfriends to annoy) and now seems wholly unaffected by male company. No more boyfriends!

[erinmeri]

Also wanted to add that while it sounds like the OP explored all options and consulted with top veterinarians, including specialists… I do agree that absent a definitive diagnosis, especially without consulting experts or second/third opinions, I would be leery of going to such extreme measures. I tend to base my treatment decisions on diagnostics.

[Rel6]

While I agree that ideally you would be able to pinpoint a definitive diagnosis, the impression I got is that although technically an elective procedure, you wouldn’t be able to just opt to spay a mare without having gone through a lot of other options first.

My repro vet who made the recommendation told me a surgeon wouldn’t consider spaying unless you could show the issues were tied to the mare’s cycle either through marked improvement on Regumate, or if the mare was cycling through Regumate (like mine) confirming the mare was in heat via ultrasound during periods where she was experiencing the behavioral issues. She explained that without any indication the issue trying to be corrected is repro related, there is no likelihood of the surgery working and surgeons are really hesitant to do it. This was the second repro specialist I had worked with - we were about 6 months into dealing with this and it wasn’t until the behavior was getting truly dangerous and unpredictable that spaying was ever on the table, and even then, only after the vet had confirmed for herself via ultrasound it had presented at the onset of ovulation. (She had also previously ultrasounded the mare out of heat and was able to observe for herself some of the differences in behavior and comfort levels).

Cornell reiterated the same thing - they advised me of the risks (both of the procedure itself and of it not making a notable difference), but said that given her extensive history both of the correlation of discomfort and behavioral issues with her heat cycle and the lack of any other findings, they did think she was a good candidate for it.

I totally agree with what you’re saying, and maybe others surgeons or animal hospitals are more willing to spay with a less extensive work up. But I did get the impression from both my vet and Cornell that this would not necessarily have been an option for my mare if we hadn’t first exhausted so many other options, treatments, testing, etc. Believe me - I want nothing more than for someone to tell me exactly what is causing this. The repro specialists said she could have nothing diagnosable and just experience really awful, painful heats with incredibly large follicles. Other options could be an issue with her pituitary, which can effect hormones, but could only be diagnosed through an MRI where she would have to be put under general anesthesia (vet thinks this is highly unlikely).

The repro specialist at Cornell is interested in presenting her case to a few other repro specialists and endocrinologists to see if they have any other theories, but other than that we wait and see the outcome once she is fully recovered and back in work.

[Guyot]

@Rel6 Did you end up spaying your mare? My mare has been of course wonderful all winter on regumate… looking like she’s ovulating over the regumate this spring and I’m considering the surgery for her.

[Rel6]

I’ve gotten a few messages and requests for an update so here goes. It is certainly not the ending I wanted, but I have no regrets and hope this may help others.

My mare was spayed in October. Cost was $4k, she spent 48 hours at Cornell, and came home looking much more comfortable than I expected. No complications and healing was straightforward. Two weeks of stall rest/hand walking, two weeks small paddock turnout, and then she was back to work and normal turnout. She lived on trazodone 2x a day for the first six weeks, and was aced on top of that for her first few times out and first few rides back (with vet approval).

The lay up was the easy part. Putting her back into work was difficult. She looked much, much sounder, and some of the heat-specific u/s behavioral issues disappeared (such refusing to go forward/balking when I asked for the trot). Her behavior on the ground improved as well. Even on a high dose of trazodone and ace though, she never seemed relaxed. On the lunge, she would be trotting along happily and then panic and bolt at nothing. Under saddle, I could not trot her without some type of buck, spin, or spook. At best I had an unhappy horse who wasn’t actively trying to dump me.

I knew putting her back into work would be difficult, but two months later, off all drugs, in a full work load (if at a lesser intensity in deference to her decreased fitness), I saw no improvement at all. I did try putting her back on Regumate, which did not help (previously it helped, but she would cycle through it). I tried working with a local pro who specialized in groundwork and desensitization. I stopped riding her for a bit and paid my then-trainer to be the only one on her. At the end of that, when I couldn’t trot her without a bolting/bucking combination, the trainer basically asked me why I was doing this to myself. And for the first time, I really did not have an answer. It had stopped feeling fair to both me and to her to work towards getting her to do a job she was now miserable doing.

Cornell had only one real suggestion left, based on the lack of findings on the original exam, her normal pathology report, and all the other diagnostics we had done over the past year being normal: do an MRI. Their last working theory was some type of tumor somewhere (possibly in her pituitary or adrenal gland) causing her abnormal cycles and erratic behavior. They weren’t confident about that based on her young age, and it would require general anesthesia. I elected not to do that.

Instead, I emailed four of the top breeding facilities on the east coast to see if they needed a tease mare. After three different repro vets vouched for one of them that was interested (a vet friend also personally knows the person who runs it), I agreed to sign over ownership and ship her down so she could start life as a tease mare. She left at the beginning of the year to go live in a big field with a herd, and come in as needed to flirt with stallions. I was heartbroken to say goodbye, but comforted knowing she was going to be in a situation where she would be happier.

I have never regretted the ovariectomy for two main reasons. First - and I didn’t mention this previously because I did not want to deal with pushback on it and wasn’t considering it at that time - euthanasia had been brought up by one of my vets if her behavior continued to deteriorate. I was in a position where I truly felt if she had one more outburst while in heat, I would probably (and rightfully) be asked to leave my boarding barn for safety reasons, and I am not sure how I ethically could have brought her elsewhere knowing she was rearing, kicking, and striking people. So, in a sense I do believe that the surgery saved her life in that she was easier to handle afterwards and I could continue to have her in a barn where she is handled by other people (my ability to have a horse is dependent on boarding).

Second, the $4k surgery is a small price to pay to give her a chance at a second career she will be much happier in, and much less than paying to retire a 5 year old. I would have retired her personally before doing any random “free to good home” situation, and never would have offered her as a riding horse. Sending her as a tease mare or recipient mare to a well-respected facility was the only situation I was willing to look into, and I had more interest than I expected because she had already been ovariectomized.

The thing that bothers me the most is not knowing. Not knowing what exactly happened when she went into heat almost a year ago that changed her personality so much, and left her so unhappy. And having to accept that I will never know. I miss the horse I had a year ago so much.

So to everyone who messaged or asked for an update, I wish you all the luck, I’m happy to answer any question about my experience now that its not quite so raw, and would also caution you not to read into my experience all too much. I genuinely think this was a freakish medical anomaly that has stumped 3 repro vets and a therio specialist, and not any type of typical results or presentation. I think we were the worst case scenario - not a probable outcome.

[And, to leave it on a bit of a brighter note - after all that I felt a bit burnt out of horse ownership and wasn’t planning to look right away. But I desperately missed having something I could ride (safely) and figured I would see what was out there within my limited budget (for this market!). Last month, I purchased a coming 5 y/o gelding who has been so incredibly kind to me. It was absolutely a case of right place right time with how crazy the market is, and riding something that is happy to do his job and so eager to please really highlighted for me just how bad the behavior had gotten with my mare.]

[beowulf]

Oh no. That is not the update anyone here was hoping for. Hugs to you. Best of luck with your new guy. Sometimes a change in horse really highlights how much we put up with and really puts it all into perspective.

[awaywego]

Thanks for sharing @Rel6. I’m sorry that things didn’t work out as hoped. I have been struggling similarly for a while with my mare - who also was continuing to cycle on Regumate. I keep waiting for something to make it clear to me what I should be doing with her, so I applaud you for knowing when to say when.

[Guyot]

@Rel6 I was sorry to hear of your mares struggle. Sounds like you did the very best for her in a tough situation. I am glad that the procedure did give her some small comfort and recovery was not to bad. If I end up doing the spay on my girl I will post back and update as well.

[cardinale]

Congratulations on navigating through a difficult situation and making sound decisions. Not always an easy thing to do but you spent the time to figure out which various options felt right and came up with a good solution.

[findeight]

Thanks for the update and starting this thread in the first place. Much good information, enjoyed the knowledge.

Couldn’t contribute anything as the few mares Ive come in contact with that were spayed were not mine and their history and reason for spaying NOMB. Glad you were able to give back by getting her another job and great home. Thats a good thing.

[Rel6]

Thank you all for the kind responses.

@awaywego: It took two trainers gently telling me before the third took, and me flinching at every sudden movement she made - no matter how innocuous - before I finally realized it was time to call it. But, I also know myself well enough to know that I needed to get to that point to be able to say when without wondering if I made the right decision. It really is such a personal choice and I’m sorry you’re in that position. I will say I never came off of her, and I think if I had (and especially if I had gotten hurt) it would have changed that timeline.

@Guyot: Thank you. I wish you the best and would definitely be interested to hear any updates. I did end up getting connected to two people in person who spayed their mares and were thrilled with their decision. I think the bad results get passed along by word of mouth more than the good for sure.

@findeight: I feel like I know more about the equine reproductive system than I do about my own at this point…knowledge I wish I hadn’t needed for sure! But hopefully this thread will help others, like so many have helped me.

[ThreeWishes]

Hugs @Rel6. You did EVERYTHING you could. You took care of your horse and searched beyond measure for solutions. She is alive and good. The fact that you sacrificed your own needs for hers is admirable and enviable. Thank you so much for the update. I wish YOU peace. I think your mare already has it.

[Guyot]

@Rel6
Update on my mare.
We did three pre procedure internal ultrasound which all showed “normal” during each phase of her cycle. I did not do a hormonal test as I had enough “proof” for myself that escalating behavior was associated with an increase in size of the follicles; and therefore willing to take the financial risk.

Speaking with the vets and their review of the information she was determined to be a good candidate for the procedure.
She was spayed last Wednesday and the surgeon found both ovaries to be completely abnormal. The right side has extensive scar tissue above the ovary. Additionally there was granular cell carcinoma on the right side.

Her prognosis is very good for immediate improvement in behavior and full return to work, with improving temperament over the next two months.

All in all the ovaries had been getting more and more diseased which the vets believe contributed to her escalating behavior.

Due to the fact that this is an elected procedure I had notified my insurance company and when the findings were relayed to me I contacted my insurance company again and they have opened a claim to review the case and fingers crossed they will pay since the state of her ovaries was indeed an issue to long term health.

Immediate improvement in her demeanor was visible to me when I picked her up. As she has been more comfortable each day from the procedure itself she is much more relaxed and less aggressive to other horses around her stall. Return to light work is two weeks out; with gradual return to full work load. I will update again when hopefully back in full work.

[Jackie_Cochran]

That is VERY good news.

May she heal quickly and well, and you enjoy your mare again.

[Rel6]

I am so happy to hear that update! I had so hoped to find something abnormal, and it sounds like you did and that it could provide an explanation (and it’s removal a remedy!)

Wishing your mare a swift and happy recovery

[findeight]

Thank you SO MUCH for this update…sometimes we girls are right about such things and it was certainly worth actually going in for a real look, maybe even lengthened her life.

[Guyot]

@findeight Yes! Even my regular vet was surprised and wants to see the pictures from surgery because she was like those ultrasounds, which she did 3x, looked completely normal. She was shocked with the findings.

The fact is they were both diseased, with the right ovary significantly more than the left. Nothing showed up on ultrasound… so how many vets are missing abnormal ovaries and horses are written off.

Even my trainer was like most people wouldn’t have invested in the surgery and would have walked away. I won’t say it wasn’t my last effort because it was. But I think this may be more common then thought… of all the vet hospital I interviewed before picking who did the surgery they are all only doing 4-8 spays a year. That is a very small group size for them to truly understand.