Saturday, I noticed Jack was hanging his tongue more than usual. Since his
extractions, he always kind of pokes it out of his mouth, but this looked... Different.
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| Fuck |
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| My |
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| Life |
I have no way to tell when he actually broke that tooth off. He didn't seem to be in any discomfort, was still eating and drinking as normal, but naturally I shot off an email with some photos to our vet. Just my luck, I got an auto-reply because she was out of the office on vacation, so initially I planned to call up on Monday and see what they wanted me to do. But bless the vet, she was still checking her email, so she had the office pull his rads from the last visit and she reviewed them. The tooth that broke off is one we had planned to extract later this year, but we were trying to give him a little recovery time (also let my wallet recover).
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| Absolutely COVERED in beet pulp, alfalfa pellets, and his special senior feed. Definitely still eating! |
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| His old man whiskers make me laugh, even if I also kind of want to murder him. |
As is frequently the case with horses, they're really good at messing up our plans ;) so instead of waiting until later this fall for another round of tooth-pulling, Jack has an appointment later this month to pull the root of the broken tooth, and anything else that looks suspect based on new radiographs. Based on the way he bounced back from losing all the tops, I'm not super worried, but it is always in the back of my mind that he's no spring chicken. I'm just going to focus on getting as much alfalfa into him as possible between now and then, because I'd like him to go in with a little weight cushion, knowing that adapting to losing even more teeth might be rough on him.
Horses, man. This is why we can't have nice things!
Jack is lucky to be living with you. Or, possibly, this is why Jack chose you as his person.
ReplyDeleteAwww thanks! I like to think he hit the jackpot with me... I don't think any sane person would have bought an 11 y/o trainwreck OTTB out of the situation I found him in, ride him for 3 years, and then essentially retire him as the world's most expensive pasture ornament for 10+ years (and god willing, many more!). Key word being sane ;) haha. But despite all our challenges, he was my first horse, he taught me so many things, and he will have a home with me forever as long as I can keep him comfortable, regardless of what it costs.
DeleteAww, poor guy (and your poor wallet!)
ReplyDeleteAt least this time it's just him going in, not the double whammy of both geldings at the same time... lol. But yes. My wallet cries.
DeleteHonestly, I am shocked that Irish's teeth have not caused difficulty. Of course now I cursed myself. But these old man horses they are such treasures and worth all the aggravation.
ReplyDeleteHe's a TB, right? Keep an eye out for this :( older TB geldings seem to be the most prone! But yes, Jack is a treasure, and he's worth ALLLLLL the aggravation! :)
ReplyDeleteHi, I've stumbled across your blog a few times but haven't commented before. But one of my friends just went through this with her older (25 years) WB. She had all his front teeth out in one go a few weeks ago and reported he pretty much immediately looked 5 years younger and seems MUCH happier. His body condition is now much better than it's been in a long time, with having those teeth out the only difference, no diet / lifestyle changes, mostly because he was already being treated to a life of luxury, as it seems your Jack is as well :) Hopefully you'll also see a great improvement after the last of his yucky teeth are out!
ReplyDeleteWelcome! Jack is also 25, so they've got that in common! Jack is a pretty happy go lucky guy by nature but I did notice after the first extractions he went from half-heartedly picking at his gorgeous 3rd cutting alfalfa to eating a lot more of it now, so that was an almost immediate improvement! I had just chalked it up to him being finicky about hay, but he was telling me his teeth hurt and I didn't realize it :(
DeleteFingers crossed he feels even better after we get the bottom ones out. Thanks for sharing about your friend's horse, it's always comforting to me to hear about horses in the same situation who responded so positively to having the affected teeth pulled!
It was the same for my friend, it wasn't really apparent how much his teeth were bothering him until after they were out. I'll keep my fingers crossed for Jack!
DeleteThat is so good to hear! On one hand, it makes me a little sad I didn't notice anything sooner -- he's always been kind of a finicky hard keeper, and he's older, so I thought slowing down was pretty natural. But he was clearly so much perkier even after the first procedure that I'm hoping he'll feel about 10 years younger by the end of the month ;) thank you for the well wishes!
DeleteOh man! Poor dude! Guess he didn't want to wait for that dental work.
ReplyDeleteYeah apparently his calendar was a bit different than mine! ;)
DeleteAggghhh horses! My mare decided a summer ulcer flare up was what we needed to spice things up so we're dealing with that surprise right now
ReplyDeleteDang it Mae! They just delight in emptying out wallets, don't they?
DeleteAwwww Jack why!!!!
ReplyDeletePretty much. Whyyyyyyy?
Delete(Because horses, that's why!)