No Escape

 I may or may not have mentioned, last May I downloaded the “Ten Percent Happier” app on my phone which guides you through meditation exercises. I have been fairly consistent in bedtime meditation; it does seem to help me initially drift off to sleep.

Nothing teaches mindfulness like horsemanship, however: if you’re not paying attention/being “present in the moment”,  both on the ground and in the saddle, bad things can happen! (And of course I know accidents can happen regardless, but a lot of the times these things can be traced back to lack of attentiveness - we’re trying to force the issue when the horse is clearly indicating they’d rather handle things another way)

But, as I expected it was mostly bad news for Bo yesterday. I knew I was not equipped to tackle this nasty tumor which is most likely his squamous cell carcinoma spreading to the superficial cervical lymph node:

It didn’t look any less ominous on CT (Bo’s upper neck in cross-section):

I had a nice chat with another Dr Major (no relation to our Dr M), their surgeon - I could hear the hesitancy in his voice as he talked about the challenges evident in this area; not to mention if he managed to leave nerves and blood vessels undamaged, chances of a clean excision are slim to none. He would perform a tracheostomy with the hopes it would not be permanent - in my experience I have never seen a horse with a permanent trach do well long-term. Certainly not practical for my pasture-dwelling ponies.

Then let’s not even mention this minor point: he estimated between $4-5K (which actually is a hell of a deal for such a complicated endeavor) but I cannot justify sinking thousands more dollars into poor Bo on a questionable outcome…

So I brought Bo home & we’ll love on him & feed him well (he’s lost 140 lbs) until I make the executive decision that “it’s time” - a decision I’ve made many a time throughout my career, a power I don’t wield lightly. I feel it’s one of the most valuable services I offer my clients: the ability to relieve suffering. Tuesday morning I had “2 in a row” - 2 elderly dogs who were suffering along with their owners.

While I was waiting for the awesome A & M crew to do their diagnostic work on Bo, I “played tourist” by driving around College Station, seeing how it’s grown/things have changed. Of course both off-campus places I’ve lived are long gone, replaced by new apartments or townhomes. And they were just beginning construction of the Association of Former Students (Aggies don’t call ourselves “alumni”) when I graduated:

And this used to be a humble jogging path back in my day; now it’s a carefully manicured park