A sutures-n-saline kind of day

This photo has nothing to do with this story … although Sugar did watch with mild interest while veterinarians attended to today’s trauma in the barn. Sugar’s photo is here to ease you gently into this post. If the sight of blood offends your sensibilities, stop reading now.

*** pausing for your decision ***

I was at the shop when my phone rang. “Hello?”

My husband’s voice: ”Your horse needs you, badly.”

Those are panic words. Those are instant-action-required words. Those are words that had me high-tailin’ it back home and ordering him to call a vet.

And this is what I saw when I entered the barn.

This is a 10-inch gash on my horse’s right-front shoulder that peeled back her skin and exposed the muscle beneath. The red you see is shoulder muscle. The black line running through the middle is a gash in the muscle itself.

This should not happen to any horse, especially not an 84-year-old lady (28 in people years) who is living the high life in a plush retirement home. Normally, her days consist of leisurely strolls toting kids and her keeper. She takes her meals in a lush, green pasture with a babbling brook.

For at least the next two weeks she will be confined to a stall with twice-daily wound flushes and penicillin injections.

 She will not be happy … but she will heal, I hope. It’s a bad time of year to have an open, draining wound.

Incidentally, this is what ‘blood red’ looks like.

There was a lot of blood. First, the vet clipped the hair around the gash. Then she scrubbed it with a saline and iodine solution. Next, she used blunt-edged scissors to trim the damaged muscle and skin. There was just enough skin left to suture together and protect the flesh beneath. She left the bottom open so the wound can drain.

A tranquilizer helped Cara relax and injections around the wound prevented pain. Throughout the ordeal she stood quietly, occasionally swaying to and fro, with her head dropped heavily in my lap.

There were about eight stitches to the muscle, and eight or nine on the outside. Twice a day I will insert a syringe into the hole and flush the wound. We’ll smear Vaseline all over the leg to protect it from the constant drainage. We’ll do our best to keep the flies off and away.

And poor Cara — who used to be a cranky, middle-aged lady but mellowed into a kindly old woman who patiently endures my children — will get the best treatment I can provide.

Because this is my fault. A bossy little mare may have forced Cara into a corner, but I’m the idiot who thought one of these on the front of a stall door was a good idea. Handy for lead ropes and fly masks. Not even sharp … but it’s not blunt enough to prevent trauma upon impact, either.

Have any hooks hanging around your animals? Remove them now. Convenience isn’t worth it.

Robin, the vet, was great. Not only did she help my hurting horse, she and her assistant? vet-in-training? patiently answered every question my kids asked. Including: 

A truck with a water hose in it? How does that work?

What are all of those bottles?

You have a refrigerator in your truck?

I’ll keep you posted … literally  … on Cara’s progress.

Poor old girl.