Freedom!

Those of you that know Amarah's Dark Shadow's history can skip through most of this, but for those of you that don't...  Here it goes.  Will and I purchased Airiah in April 2012.  She was about a month away from having her first foal, a Raven baby.  We stalled her every night, until May 12, which was still about 2 weeks before she was due.  I was running getting the kids ready for bed and Will did chores, but decided not to stall her.  Needless to say, the next morning when I went out to see her, I thought, man, she doesn't look pregnant???  But, no baby was at her side, so we went in, got ready for church and off we went.  That afternoon it was still eating at me that Airiah didn't look pregnant.  It was a very hot May 13th, and Mother's Day to boot.  So, Tristan (just turned 4) and Jayden (just turned 1) and I went for a walk in the pasture.  Will was mowing, so we stopped to say hi to daddy and kept walking.  I wanted to find the horses.  We came up the hill behind the orchard.  Just at the top on the other side of the electric fence was a pair of ears sticking up over the tall grass.  My first thought was a deer, but the ears were pitch black.  I KNEW immediately that my instincts had been right, Airiah wasn't pregnant anymore!  We had a foal.  Once I finally got Will's attention to come over, we worked to get her up and on the right side of the fence. Airiah became very hostile.  She wouldn't let the baby near her, in fact she seem scared of her foal.  They had become separated and never got to bond.  

The troops were called for support, and we were more than blessed by all those who came to our aid that day.  Thank you to Judy Sceggel and Karin Meister (HorseMeister, Inc), Brock and Britney Reinebach (B&B Reinebach), Joe and Kim Groeper and of course my mom and dad.  

The next day Karin drove me, Airiah and Shadow to the UofI Large Animal Hospital.  Again, another huge thank you to their team!!  Our girls spent the next two weeks there.  I heard from Dr. Eva Christina Schliewert at least twice a day with updates.  In the end, we had to bucket feed Amarah's Dark Shadow (aka - Shadow).  She was such a sweet baby.  And Airiah's motherly instincts kicked in.  

Things went so smoothly, we moved the girls into the paddock with Palmer and Bella.  One beautiful July day, Will was out working in the yard next to the barn and watched (in that lovely slow motion that kicks in when something really bad is going to happen...) the "herd" come running at a gallop across the damn toward the barn.  This wasn't anything unusual, in fact they did it all the time.  But this time, Shadow went down hard on her front right knee, slicing it open.  We called a vet, who came out and advised us to wrap it.  Shadow's knee wasn't getting any better, in fact I thought it was much worse.  And the morning she wouldn't get up when I went out to feed her, we called Dr. Keller.  He came out right away, did xrays and determined that one of the bones in her knee was broken.  He advised taking her to UofI where we could get the best possible options for her.  We borrowed Ms. Judy's trailer and raced Shadow back to UofI.  They did more xrays and decided the best option was to put a cast on her leg and keep her stalled for 6 weeks.  Shadow did amazing through all of this.  She was not sedated for setting the cast OR taking it off (can you believe that!?!  Dr. Keller used a small electric saw of some sort.  She took it all in stride!)  The Dr's decided that Shadow would probably not be able to be ridden, but she would be able to be a brood mare.  Will and I were just thrilled that this amazing foal had made it through so many trials and came through them all so well.  And oh...  She was so beautiful and sweet.  

So, evey since the end of November, Shadow has lived in a paddock by herself, able to reach across the fence to her mom and Palmer and Bella.  She has a large stall she can get into any time she wants, but she doesn't have anyone to play with.  This was weighing on me.  

Today, Dr. Keller came to give Airiah the Pneumabort shot.  While he was there, I asked Dr. Keller's opinion about when he thought it would  be safe to move Shadow in with Airiah, Palmer and Bella, so she could socialize with horses.  He said we might as well move her now.  Her knee is as healed as it will get.

FREEDOM!! So today Shadow gained her freedom and moved in with her mom and half brother and sister.  They ran and played as siblings do.  It was a great sight to watch, and even better, Shadow didn't show any signs of her knee bothering her after all the running.  We tried to get some video of them playing, but you know...  Just like our two legged kids, the minute you turn the camera on, they stop doing whatever it was you wanted to record...  We will try again tomorrow.