Rather Excited

Good News So Far

As you recall from my last post, Chance was VERY lame.  It could have been a resurgence of his navicular, but I suspected, since he seemed sore on all four, that it was actually a recurrence of his Lyme disease.

After a some research and a better understanding of how the Lyme bacteria can hide and play chameleon in the body I decided that another course of antibiotics might not fix things.

For more information on how insidious Lyme is, this is an excellent presentation by Dr. Joyce Harman:  Lyme Disease in Horses.

After listening to an online forum presented by Dr. Harman, I decided trying some other protocol would be worth the effort.

My research in the past into colloidal silver as a good antibiotic which bacteria and viruses cannot resist, led me to this site:  Colloidal Silver for Horses  This is a veterinarian's site and he endorses the silver.

So, using information from both sources, I decided to put Chance on colloidal silver and colostrum to build up his immune system. I also ordered another herbal immune booster from Australia, but that just arrived a few days ago, so I will not yet put it into the equation.

After about a week or two of treatment, and a new set of shoes from Scott, my farrier, Chance did seem a bit better, but not quite.  So for about four days, I put him on a course of bute, twice a day, tapering down to once a day. He was much better on the bute and it may well have triggered the inflammation to subside.

I have continued the silver, colostrum, and immune supplements since. I has now been just a bit under a month since I started treating him.

I am excited and delighted to say that after a quick lunge to see how Chance looked at the trot, I saw a virtually sound horse!

So, I saddled up and took a short trail ride. I could hardly keep him at the walk as he just wanted to trot merrily off.

My seat was OK, but definitely not good enough to ride an eager horse for too long, but my brain was so happy I didn't care.

I need to work on my own seat until I regain all the riding muscles I need, but at last I have a horse ready to go.

I am absolutely delighted.