William is in The Wars and I miss my Appointment!

Yorkies Sandy and Pepsi have been reserved and will be leaving us on Sunday to go to live with Yorkie mad people Maggi and Rick in Wilmslow. They are dear little dogs though very lively for their age and as I have always said - I prefer the placid old dogs. I am amazed at their rapid recovery from yesterdays operations, what stoical animals they are. We humans are not nearly as brave, well I 'm not anyway.In fact I was meant to have my B12 injection today and I failed to keep the appointment.How stupid is that? I will work up to going on monday.It cannot be left any longer, the dizziness is starting so as always that will force my hand!
Dear Paddy has not been so brilliant today, his back legs seem very weak, I took him for his first trip to the beach and I was sorry I made the decision because for the first time in ages he almost collapsed.Time to put him  back on Metacam I think.That always helps him when he has bad episodes.

Jeremy cat seems a little better today so we will just be keeping a careful eye on his progress. We also had a feral mum cat spayed yesterday and released her back to her home , her kittens remained  here to be put up for adoption.Although the photo shows three, there are four but one little tortie female was determined to hide away.Ther are only 6 weeks so are young enough to domesticate fairly quickly, older than this and it can be a problem unless you have a great deal of time to spend handling them and getting them used to humans. Another litter will be arriving next wednesday - it is very late in the year for us to be only just admitting kittens of adoptable age.I hope at least some of the people who have been waiting for us to get them in, still want them .

The Physio lady Gillian came out to work with William (above)and guess what - she recognised him ! She has worked on him in his previous home and even has xrays etc of his back problem.We have been told by her  that he panicked being loaded into a horsebox and in his panic he fell over backwards! A horse doing this is a terrible sight, some of you may have seen photos of racehorses toppling backwards, they are so heavy there is a great likelihood of serious damage being done and in Williams case this was exactly what occurred. He suffered nerve damage which initially prevented him from urinating etc  though slowly he recovered from this accident. Unfortunately it left him with a fear of horseboxes(completely understandable) and a recurring problem with  back pain. He also has a weakness in one of his fetlocks which causes his leg  to occasionally give way from under him.
 The owner who appeared to be a very caring person and who took me in totally  then sold him to someone who wanted to ride  and jump him, when they said they did not want to keep him, she brought him here IN A HORSE BOX and  told me that he would be ideal for a novice rider! Her lies could have resulted in serious injury to both horse and rider and I am just thankful nobody was badly injured though poor William is clearly suffering from  having someone on his back,  albeit momentarily .(thank goodness she jumped off quickly)
6pm:
 I have just called out the Vet Dafydd after Vanessa called me to look at William, he is standing on his own in the field and he is pawing the ground with one hoof, his front right leg appears rigid and he seems unable to move it at all. What next?
8.30pm:
The Vet has just been and has given William a pain killing and anti inflammatory injection. After studying him moving and dragging his front leg, he believes that it is nerve damage and is likely to be related to his other problems. He is on a weeks stable rest and will have painkillers twice daily for a week, he will return then to have another look at him. What will be the prognosis? My wish is that these episodes will be infrequent when he is totally rested and that we will be able to treat him when he has his bad times.What I will never do is keep an animal alive if suffering constant pain.That goes against all I believe in, we are here to relieve suffering not just to keep animals alive with no quality of life. I feel very sad for this beautiful horse who at 14 years is in the prime of his life but I am also optimistic for his future with us.