Rehabilitation process

A lot of walking on the right. 

To our relief after the 4 weeks of walking out only, he seemed to be ok. That is, he was very stiff on his shoulder, but it was healed. Now it would be just a matter of working it progressively more. But gently… easy does it. One day he would be completely fine and no sign of any unevenness or stiffness, then the next day he was completely stiff and restricted by the shoulder. All very normal I suppose, but oh so frustrating. We walked him long and low on the lunge and when ridden. Nice stretching and good pace, he could really stride despite his shoulder stiffness.

Pretty quickly I realised that riding was better at this early stage of rehabilitation. I could ask him to stretch more efficiently and keep him in as big a circle or oval as possible in the school whereas if I was lunging, he tended to avoid proper work by rushing off into trot and even canter as well as falling in on the circle and making the maintaining of contact with the lunge line almost impossible in a big circle. And we didn’t want to keep him in any small circle of course in the beginning. So, we rode a lot more than previously. Mainly walking in good pace and asking for a stretch.

Still lots of hacking, and introducing trot back into riding. Here in walk though! ;) 

Trotting we introduced first on straight lines. That is, while we were hacking out in the forest or the field. That seemed to go really well and there was no sign of any unlevelness. So, we gradually started to ask for trot in the school as well. First on the lunge and when it appeared that it was looking absolutely fine on the left rein, we started trotting him on the left also while being ridden. Trot on right while lunging was at first very unlevel. And we trotted him only very briefly on right to check for progress. Ridden trot on right in the school we introduced extremely carefully and trotted at first only on the long sides and just once or twice per session.

Even though he was unlevel on right trot, he was not sore on the shoulder anymore. This was subtly different type of unlevelness; to us it was clear that he was now very tight and restricted on the shoulder rather than sore. Careful observation on how his feet and hooves were hitting the ground revealed the difference: in February he was setting his right foot down tensely, now the right foot was just as relaxed as the left. It was just that the right shoulder muscle was tight from the injury and he obviously felt that he could not move the foot forward as freely as it was required. Hence the unlevelness.

Well, they say that shoulder muscle injuries in horses take a long time to heal and rehabilitate. They are right. In February I thought that, oh well, this one is just very minor really… just a very little bit of unlevelness… surely this one is not going to take that long to get better. Surely? Well, I know now better. It does take time! And you should take care not to over do things and be very patient about it. Push it, but not all the time and not too much… and remember to take stock and take a step back at times. After all, it is very easy to redo the damage… especially in the beginning.

We had a big scare one day when I think I was pushing him just that bit too much… He got tired and he stumbled… badly. He hopped a couple steps and then was very unlevel afterwards. Of course I stopped there and then and was blaming myself for not stopping just a couple minutes earlier… Darn one can be so stupid as to push it too far sometimes! It was quick action from us and luckily there was just a bit of anti-inflammatory pain killer left in his earlier prescription bottle. He got one dose of that and a day off. To our huge relief he was absolutely fine when we checked him next! But that was a good reminder to Take It Easy!

After two months of rehabilitation process we felt ready to send an update to Will. It was a compilation of the previous weeks’ work. Very good comments from Will. Also a good reminder that we should take a step back and let him get better before increasing any work on the right, that is, especially the trot. So we did just that and took a step back. Work on the right included mostly walking. Now we were again lunging more than riding. We slotted to lunging about 5-6 days a week and riding perhaps once a week. At this stage, when he was suppler and less uneven, it again was a lot better to lunge than to ride. He would now stay on a big circle and stride nicely on without trying to rush off or cut the circle small. So, very clear progress.

We did most harder work on the left rein. Gradually we built up a regime of 10 min walk on right, then 5 min trot on right. Trotting on as big an area as possible and keeping a close eye on his striding. If it looked like he was uneven all around, we would quickly stop and return to walk. But in fact he was slowly improving on the right trot with this regime. He seemed to be unlevel only on one or two spots on the arena; when he was taking a too sharp turn for his shoulder… Any smaller circle and he would be unlevel though… so we kept him on as big a circle as possible (up to 20x30-35m). And then we would turn to left rein after about 15-20min on right. First walking for 5 min and then trotting for 10min. On the left we would demand more and more gradually. That is, better pace and more stretch on the occasional smaller circles with more intensive work. Building up his fitness level this way. So, we did twice as much trotting on left as on right. This regime we kept for a couple weeks and it was working very well for him! The progress was slow, but there was very definite progress!  

The past week I have started to add a lot more canter into the process. We did introduce cantering earlier already, but mainly after quite a lot of trotting when he was thoroughly warmed up. I noticed already then that the cantering helped a lot to get his trot to open up better. But he was still bracing against it especially on the left, so I left cantering to minimum and indeed only did it when he was well warmed up. But now I have experimented with cantering pretty much straight after walking. Just a few strides of trot and on to canter. Mind you, again not any long stretches of cantering, but just a round or two or so and then back to trot. Establish trot and then again a couple more transitions. This seems to really help his trot work and especially on the right. Now there remains only a hint of unlevelness at occasions in trot. Canter seems to supple up the shoulder and help him work through his topline as well. On the right he also stretches to canter, which is brilliant. I can in fact now work him in a smaller circle (15-20m) without much problems also on the right hand. But I still keep the trot-canter sessions on the right at 5 min. Gradually does it, and I want to be sure that he is ok with this slightly harder work on right before increasing the exercise time.

On the left I do the same. That is, canter immediately after walking time. His canter on left is a lot poorer than on the right, but it still improves the trot afterwards. His trot is a lot better after these short bouts of canter. This gives me a lot better quality of work a lot quicker. That is, instead of working him only in trot and getting good work after maybe 5 min, I get the good work straight after cantering a circle or two.

So, canter definitely loosens him up better at the moment.

Maybe things change again in a couple weeks… this shows how dynamic you have to be in the rehabilitation process. Observation and analysis of your horse, how he moves and responds to different regimes is the key. One week this is good, next week something else might be better…

And what about riding then?

Yes, it has also gotten better. I can feel that he has more power, is more supple and can carry me better after all this lunging work. What unlevelness remains on the right in trot I don’t feel anymore when riding. If there is unlevelness, it is only slight nodding of the head on any occasional tight corner. In fact his right trot feels a lot better than his left. No idea why, but stretch is a lot more constant on the right and rhythm is better than on the left. We shall see next time when I ride what has happened!

But we are definitely getting there! Almost half a year on from the injury… As I said, these muscle injuries do take their time to heal completely! The people who have experienced these things before were not kidding when they said that it does take a long time.

Patience is what you need with these things… Luckily I seem to have some of it.

Oh and he indeed has not had any box rest at all. He has been together with his field buddy all this time, and now happily he is out day and night in a nice field with lots of good grass and a couple more nice horse friends. I think that that would do also good for his shoulder: graze-walking. Head low and slow walk… And herd environment is very good for his social mind. He is really happiest in a field with several horses.

Hoping that next update on our training I'll be again able to tell you all of our continuing progress. :)