Before proceeding, I cannot say thank you enough for all of your kind words & support - I have read & re-read them, each one a mini-life buoy amid some seriously rough seas. I even read your well-wishes to Solo, I think he definitely appreciated them (
at least he appreciated that I cannot read to him & squirt nasty medications in his mouth at the same time).
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Normal is an unbelievable treasure |
Posting delays inevitably result as I struggle to fit work, which forced me to travel last week, & 8-hr intervals of equine nursing duties into days with insufficient hours. But I can tell you that Solo is home. Beautifully, wonderfully, shiny-ly (
it's a word now) home.
He's gone back for his first hospital follow-up, during which we got to get rid of the catheters that had been keeping the abscess drain tracts open. The endoscope revealed much healing & no additional signs of new infection, which was a first...& a very welcome one.
We've just finished (
I hope) the course of antibiotics. I am flushing those tracts daily & he has to stay on a special gastric medication until his albumin levels return to normal, as he developed some colitis in the hospital due to the combined stress & intensive pain management medications.
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Home. Free. |
But Solo is feeling good. He looks fantastic. Grazing with Encore, napping in the shade, rolling heartily after a tasty meal - all without my having to tape his head together anymore (
perhaps I will be able to show you all the phases in a future missive). He gets to be a horse. And while I am physically, mentally, & emotionally exhausted, while we still have hurdles to clear & work to do, this is a very very very good thing.
Because when I look out my window, I see what I feared lost, so many times, on so many trips to Raleigh, in so many hours with that cold vise of fear around my chest. I see all the best parts of me embodied in a chestnut larger than his own life:
A Haiku For Hope
Softly shines again
That heart who defines for me
Every part of Home.