Far From Frightful

The weather outside is amazing. Warm, sunny, no clouds. Hardly any wind. I hope it stays like this forever. The temperature is simple amazing.

And the mud has dried up. Way to set off the New Year!

In my last blog I mentioned that Graffiti's eye didn't want to open during feed. I didn't notice any heat, swelling or draining that day so I let it be after investigating it a little further. For the most part she'd have that eye open and was looking around. But she'd also keep it closed which was a bit of an alarm for me. I'm getting into the habit of panicking at the small stuff, especially things that involve my horse. So when this turned up, I kept it on my mind to keep watch over it, but I wouldn't let myself get worked up either.

Last night I went to feed and I noticed some yellow goop gathering near her tear ducts and there was a trail running from her eye. So she had started draining. Perfect. I grabbed her and brushed away the goopy eye buggers and pried her eye open. There was nothing inside of it. Again, she was using it fine. It was slightly more squinted than the other eye, but she wasn't in so much discomfort that she wasn't using it at all. When I got home I asked Trent about it and he said that he had noticed it earlier but she wouldn't let him catch her for him to check it out. He thinks she poked it on a stick in the pasture, and although I think that has some good reasoning behind it, I also have to add that I think something blew into it from the harsh windstorm we had just the other night.

He tells me not to panic, of course. And I go into planning what I'm going to do about this. Trent is so relaxed about this kind of stuff that it helps me relax about the things I really shouldn't fret over but do anyways due to my annoying pregnancy hormones. I swear. They cause more anxiety than a cat thrown into a dog fighting pit. He tells me to just let it be, it'll heal itself. Of course I just can't let it be. I have to fuss.

So this morning I drive down to the drugstore and grab an eyedropper after feed. Feed went well. Nothing out of the ordinary is ever happening there anymore. Everyone has settled down into their ow routine. So after I come back I grab a bucket of hot water, a wash rag and the eyedropper and catch Graffiti. She doesn't want to come out of the shed. I do the backyard horseman thing and trudge over the dirt thats still a bit wet and sinkable and turn around before pulling on the lead. Finally, after a 5 minute tug-of-war, she leaps over the dirt and comes to me. I hold a hot compress to her eye for a bit and then flush it out with that warm water using the eyedropper. She doesn't seem to appriciate this, but she doesn't do any heavy protesting anyways. Afterwards she looked a little worse off, but thats because her eye was all wet and sorry looking. She still uses it regularly. Still watches things. Still keeps her eye open for the majority of the time. Its not hot or swollen. Just draining and looks a bit irritated. I think she'll be ok. I just want to make sure.

I also did some heeding exercises with her. By about 10 minutes she was stopping right when I stopped without me having to touch her. There was no pressure on the the leadrope. She just stopped off of my body language. I also just had to lean forward and reinforce every once in a while with my stick to get her walking again. We were making such great progress that I felt like trying to trot her, but by that point the puppy we found at Christmas was being chased out of the pasture by Shiloh and Shiloh was causing all sorts of havok. So I thought that was the end of our training session for the day.I didn't do any "space" exercises...and by all means, I thought I'd have to. She's a space invader (hahaha) but she doesn't know she's doing it. By the time our little heeding session was done, she was respecting my space a lot better and didn't bother to come into it.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed for her eye and I'm hoping tomorrow's weather is the same as today so we could do some more stuff. She seemed to really enjoy the attention. And who wouldn't? I'm awesome!

I'll also try to get some more pictures by tomorrow. My camera's batteries ran dry and I just have to find replacements before I snap anymore shots.