2 for 1 Post (The Stretch!)

My Story

Holiday wrestling practice has been a huge success! I was worried we'd get 2 or 3 kids tops, but the first day there were 8! It felt like an actual practice!

I was so excited I even did some live wrestling. It was kneeling that killed my sweats, though.

The seam split down to near my knees! Thankfully, I had a pair of shorts on underneath that day. 

We had six practices scheduled for over break. I missed the one right after Christmas Day (the first practice I've missed so far this year!).

Carrie's Story

"I've got to go!" Carrie said. "Sarah has a horse down!"

And she was out the door.

Sarah posted on Facebook about the whole ordeal. I'm going to repost it here:

Let me tell you a universal truth: when shit hits the fan and a horse needs help, the horse community will always come through. Today I learned that first hand.

We very nearly lost my sweet boy, Brego. This morning I found him down in his paddock. He wasn't sick, he had fallen into what is best described a sink hole. In truth, it was the grave of Moon, who passed away about 4 months ago, but the massive amount of rain we got over the last 2 days had caused it to collapse and fill with mud. Brego must have stepped on the previously firm ground and it just sucked his entire left side into the hole. As soon as I got to him I knew I could not help him alone, so I sent out a 911 text to every local horse person in my circle. Within 20 minutes Carrie, Matt Earman, Ashton Beebe of Indian Summer Guide Service were with me and we were brain storming how to get him out. We couldn't get straps under him because his left side was literally buried. We tried a little bit of forward movement but his leg position made it so that the only way to get him out was to slide him up and back. We contacted Scottsville Volunteer Fire Department, who arrived in no time, along with Steven Morris and his shiny new tractor (so sorry about the mud, Steven) and Anne and her husband. I had already called Dr. Aly of Afton Mountain Equine because I was concerned about shock and hypothermia, who was on scene to guide our rescue.

The brilliant Carrie MacRoary came up with the game changer; cut the belly bands on his blanket, tie the straps to them and pull his blanket out from under him, bringing the straps with it. It worked really nicely and we were able to get several straps under him, which were anchored to the tractor bucket. Brego was slowly lifted up and slid back enough to get his front leg out. We then repositioned the straps and the tractor and pulled in a slightly different direction and were slowly able to get his back half clear too. Then we rolled him onto his 'good' side and let him rest. He was so cold and absolutely caked in mud. We were getting ready to lift him to standing but he decided he'd been down long enough and jumped to his feet, albeit with a lot of wobbles. But he was up!

No obvious injuries, and miraculously weight bearing on all 4. Shivering, which is a good sign, but so, so cold and scared. Such the bestest boy, he walked calmly with me back to the barn. We covered him with blankets and brought in hot water and Ellie scrubbed as much mud off of him as she could. It was so thick we used sweat scrapers to get some off and broke 2 doing it. He happily ate his hay and drank the warm water we brought him. We set up heat lamps to try and help him warm up and I left him this evening wrapped in 2 fleece blankets and a heavyweight turnout with a hood. The shaking has slowed and he is warm, eating drinking, and at check-in 10 minutes ago he had pooped, which makes me more comfortable overnight at least. He isn't out of the woods and I have some concern about respiratory infection, but I will check in with Dr Aly tomorrow and see how he is doing then.

I am so thoroughly humbled by the amount of people who just dropped everything and came out to save my boy. The Scottsville Virginia community is everything a small town should be and I'm so glad we chose to make our lives here.

Carrie came home a shivering mess. She'd called to request a hot bath and went straight for it upon arrival, her teeth clattering all the way. Carrie hadn't taken time to really layer herself against the cold in her rush to help. She spent the rest of the day recovering. I love how she's so willing to help. She's not going to weekly gatherings, but she'd made her presence known amongst the local horse lovers. 

Weeks later, I can tell you that Brego made it. There was no news of a lasting injury. He's back out in the fields with his buddies and hopefully staying away from any and all mud pits.