Selling a Horse, for real.

By Patty Wilber

One of the things that many horse trainers do is facilitate the sale of horses.  While I have sold some horses, this has never been a big strength of mine, so when it became clear Judith needed sell Beauty (because she is retiring from the horse business), I did not really know how I was going to effectively help her.

Enter Colleen!  Colleen volunteered to help with the sale process by taking photos, making a video, distributing the video, AND making first contact with potential buyers. Wow!

This is what she came up with (we just added “Sold” to the title in case anyone was wondering!), and right away I had three potential buyers and one of them ended up being a fit! Holy cow.  That went really well!

Beauty has been very settled and happy here at the house, so she looked good here when our buyer came to see her.  I then took her to the Green Chile Show run by the NM Paint Horse Club in Stanley over the weekend. (A lovely show and thank goodness it was indoors, as it was hot.) I did give Beauty a dose of a calming agent, but I hauled her alone, and put her in a stall.

She started by circling her stall, kicking up a large cloud of dust, and  annoying her neighbor.  I was rolling my eyes, and thinking, “Well, here we go.”

The neighbor was also the on the unsettled sort side, and after a few minutes, she gave the stall wall a resounding kick which seemed to convince Beauty to settle down somewhat!

Beauty (plagiarizing her new owner’s words) is a little like a needy puppy who wants attention all the time, so I saddled her up and rode her around pretty much right away, and then instead of putting her up to fret in her stall, I stood with her and watched a bunch of cattle classes. That seemed to allow her to settle in at the show, reasonably well.

I showed her in Appaloosa Green Ranch Rail and she got a first and a second!  Then, we went in Open Ranch Rail and I got really nice downward transitions, even if she was a little speedier than I would have liked. Her pace, per se, was not really the trouble, but I think a little bit more relaxed mien would have been even prettier.  She earned a second under one judge though!! She got national points in both classes!

Then we went for Green and Open Ranch Riding.  She was —gasp— alone in the arena, which had a Very Scary Corner.  The very scary corner gave us a bit of trouble in that we did not smoothly execute all of our pattern while she was trying to avoid said area, but I did reprimand her with my spurs on her second go, and she responded by saying, “FINE!! i will go!” and farting. Loudly.  This did not earn us any placings in either class, but except for the corner demon, the she executed other parts well! I was very proud of her for her second show ever and first indoor arena! Also, I showed her in a bridle, one handed, and she had been only been doing that for about two weeks.

We came back the next day to fill a class of halter, which I have not worked on with her, so getting her to stay posed was a challenge, but she was not a fuss budget, and she does tend to stand fairly square, naturally.  She really did not see the point of holding that pose for long periods of time.  Nevertheless, she pulled a second under one judge and got some more points!

The day after the show, her new owners came to get her and I was happy/sad to see her go. I will miss her, but she found a great home with Nicole! I was glad that I knew Beauty well enough to warn Nicole that Beauty would take the move a little hard, at first! But she is starting to settle in.  Beauty especially likes it when Nicole hangs out with her!

We might have a new competitive pair in town!

Breast Cancer Treatment Update. I spoke too soon last week!  This week I am having some issues with pain and numbness in my thighs and one arm.  This may well be related to the drug, as it is a listed side effect.  This is making me really cranky!  This last drug was supposed to be the easiest one! Hmpff!

I have been in touch with my wonderful care team at the NM Cancer Center.  We will decide on how to handle the next infusion, next week.  The choices appear to be: Stay the course (not happening, so not really on the list); lower the dose; switch to straight Herceptin, which is less effective but also has fewer side effects; or stop treatment all together. I favor the last one, right this minute, because I am just tired of trying to survive the treatments.  I do need need more data before I actually decide.

The original tumor had spread to the skin.  Bad.  The initial drug treatments killed almost, but not quite all, of the original tumor.  Bad.  This may suggest that my Her2 receptors are slightly mutated and do not match the drug perfectly. Bad. The margins were clean following surgery. Good.  My lymph nodes were clean.  Good. I did radiation.  Good. There is no evidence that there are any cancer cells anywhere else, however, in some number of cases like mine, (maybe around 20%?) cells, that cannot yet be detected, have migrated to other sites, so this last treatment is to target those, should any exist.

But right now the side effects are worse than the disease and could potentially become permanent and debilitating.  I want to live well, not just survive, so…bleh. What to do?

Be cranky!!