But I'm too young for this!

Look at me, I'm 21. I eat well. Drink nothing but water (I have a soda about once every 2 or 3 weeks, and juice maybe once a week) and eat my fruits and (most of) my veggies. I'm only slightly over weight. I'm healthy.

So why in Heaven's name do I have gray hair?! I'm too young for this, seriously. And it's not just one, or two, or three, or even four. They are all over! It isn't really noticeable to the point that you could see them if you weren't even looking for them, but still. There they are.

After googling it, (because who doesn't google stuff like this?) I learned that early graying is sometimes a part of having Alopecia Areata, which I have. AA is an auto immune disease in which the immune system attacks hair follicles (usually on the scalp or beard area) and creates patchy bald spots. If it progresses to the entire head, it is called A. Totalis. If it covers the whole body (wouldn't it be nice to not have to shave arm pits or legs?) it is then called A. Universalis. I haven't had an outbreak since high school and have no bald spots that I currently know of, which is good, because I really don't feel like going back through the treatments again. (We chose the treatment of a cortico-steroid shot in the scalp. Or rather, several of them. Imagine, several injections in the scalp, at one time, and then every two to four weeks for almost two years. You can see why I am not eager to go back through that. I actually have nerve damage on the back of my head from this.)

Anyways. I'm all, you know, if I'm gonna go gray, it's all or nothing. Right now it's not bad, but I'm thinking, maybe, when it starts to get noticeable, I might just go and make my hair completely pale silver. lol. That could still be awesome looking! And very striking, no?

I know Siaga has a few white hairs here and there in his mane and tail, but they always grow in the same place, so if I pull them they grow back just as white in the same spot. These are slowly getting more progressive, showing up more and more. *sigh* I really am just too young for this.

We're getting there.

Siaga's gained about 25-50 lbs since I've changed up his diet and had his teeth floated. Considering all the changes we've made, I may never know what caused the issue in the first place, since we've treated him for parasites, both external and internal sorts, I've had his teeth floated, upped his grain intake (Well. I'm giving him 5 cups of timothy pellets along with 3 cups of grain, no sunflower seeds, a weight boosting supplement, a calming supplement to help keep him from burning off calories before he stashes them as fats and muscle, and an Omega-3 oil supplement.)

Anyways, he's almost back up to par, maybe another 50 lbs or so and he'll be back to normal.

The next cause for concern is that he has a reaaaaally thick layer of dandruff. Its thick, really flaky, and oily. In places, the winter hair is coming out faster and so those areas feel really gummy where the dandruff is more easily felt and seen. Boy needs a bath. A really good one. I also cut his mane short, to make scrubbing it clean easier.

Pony must be sore

Because after having his teeth floated, he's off his hay a bit, but still eating his grain.

I don't see any hay balls from quidding, so it just seems that he's eating, just not as much as I would like. I gave him three flakes Tuesday night, and Wednesday morning he had only eaten about half of it. I left that there and then I threw him another flake for the night later and gave him his grain, (have been placing his grain in his bucket tucked inside an old tire to prevent him from flipping it) and this morning he had left the stuff in the net and eaten about half of the spare flake and almost all of his grain, but not quite all.

So I left that hay and gave him a smaller portion of grain. I'm assuming that his bite is a lot different now and possibly he is very sore from the floating. He does at least seem to be drinking his normal amount of water, thank goodness.

Edit: After going up for evening feed, I discovered that not only was his grain bucket empty, but so was his hay net, no hay on the ground, and only an inch of water in the bucket! So maybe he is not so sore now. Plenty of hay, normal grain ration, bucket full up, woohoo.

And things went without a hitch

No sedative, but Siaga didn't need it. He walked right into the stocks, stood nice and still while we strapped him in, and then didn't fight it a bit while the guy did his work and filed down his teeth.

We then treated him for ear mites and lice, in case it's lice and stuff causing his extremely dry skin and weight loss.

Looking for him to be a lot better in a few weeks.

The Dentist? Say what, mom?

Yup. Siaga will be getting his first ever floating tomorrow morning. I'm nervous, he'll be going to a new place, and in the trailer with the three horses in Brenda's possession, two of her own and one she brought home from the trainer's that she took the third horse to. She's trying to sell this one.

Anyways. I don't have any sedative for him, and Brenda assures me that he'll be just fine, they put horses in stocks and do it so they can't hurt themselves. But I'm still a nervous wreck because just because they can't (or shouldn't be able to) hurt themselves physically doesn't mean they won't, and doesn't at all mean they won't be traumatized by the experience. I'm going to watch the other horses go through it first, I think, so I know whether or not I feel Siaga should get a sedative for this.

It really needs done, since he's never had it done because I couldn't afford it (no kidding, you know how things come up at just the wrong time, like, Yeah, I'll get Siaga's teeth done this month... Oh woops... I got fired, now I have no spare money at all) and and and AAAAAH

So stressed about this.

Getting back to UTD

Siaga is now up to date on his worming (Ivermectin for spring time) and his vaccines (a 5-way including Rhino) and is also back on Dumor weight booster.

His body condition is still lower than I would like, though it's not exactly terrible. I think the goal is for him to gain about 50 to 75 lbs, if not 100lbs.

I did the math the other day, about that one guy at Whitewater who said he fed 8 horses on 27 bales of hay all winter. Siaga is one horse and slightly under weight. Through December, January, and February, but not March, he went through 24 bales of hay.

How in the hell does a person justify giving that little to their animals, and then riding a 9 mile trail twice around in one day? I just don't get it. *sigh*

Day went like this

Busy morning of packing up and getting everything ready. And then Brenda was here with Spirit. It took us about 45 minutes or so to get Siaga to go in the trailer. Normally, he throws a small fit, but typically he gets in after a few minutes. So once in, we shut him in and went to the park, and then spent a few minutes going out of the trailer, and back in, and we did this every time after.

For the most part, the ride was uneventful, but we did have a few oh god moments, where he got too close to trees or took me under low branches or something, but the worst moment was when we got to a small ditch at the bottom of a gully.

First time across, I had to get down and walk him across, where he basically jumped on top of me, though he didn't hurt me at all. And then we got to a log and I got back on, and then on the way back we had to cross it again and .... oh yeah... we flew.

He gathered himself and I sat deep and held on to his mane and the saddle and over we went. He then proceeded to bound up the hill with me holding on for dear life. I was shaking so badly after that, no idea how the heck I stayed on, but I'm seriously glad I did.

We did get in a few minutes of trot, too. And he didn't try to kill me, so that was good. But I still need a lot of practice with that at my lessons.

Back at the trailer, we untacked and he got a bath, and then back in the trailer and homeward bound. And you know as soon I let him out he laid down and rolled like crazy.

Big things

So I helped my instructor with the little girls lesson again yesterday before my own. And then we decided that I would start coming out on Fridays to have my lessons and also work to work off the cost of the lessons.

In yesterdays lesson, I had my first ever not lunge line lesson. We worked on changing direction without really using my hands, which is a hard, hard, hard habit to break when primarily, this is how Siaga is directed and pretty much every other horse I've ever ridden. And then we worked on trotting too, and let me say, it is a WHOLE OTHER BALL GAME when suddenly, you don't have to worry about just balance, you also suddenly have to worry about direction and keeping the horse going at the same speed and tempo. Rose is one of those lazy horses and she speeds up, slows down, speeds up, slows down, A LOT.

Second big thing? Today, Siaga and I are going to have our first real trail ride in Houston Woods. His firsts today will include meeting the Paso's (probably just Spirit and maybe also Dulche) and riding in the trailer with them, going to the park, riding on a trail with a bunch of other horses, and riding a longer distance than he has before.

I Google mapped the distance around the block here, it's 2.5 miles. This is the longest ride he's been on, this measly 2 and a half miles. So this should be interesting.

I'm sure he'll have plenty of other firsts, but these are the ones I'm certain he will experience.

Oh... what a day I will be having.

On the plus side, I think that if he decides its ok to follow the paso's, then he'll do just fine, you know, that herd mentality.