UPDATE: Cindy Lou

Cindy Lou has settled into her foster home and is doing well. She had her feet trimmed the first week she was rescued, and that helped her A LOT- she started moving much more comfortably and seemed more visibly relaxed. The farrier said that all of her feet were trimmed poorly and were all uneven, with large amounts of sole on all four feet, which indicates previous poor trims by a farrier. After all of her feet were rebalanced and her thrush was treated, she started to move more easily. Thankfully her hooves were relatively hard so she will not need shoes.

On an odd note, Cindy Lou seems to have zero idea about fly spray, and completely freaks out when she is sprayed- meaning she has not had that basic comfort in her past. She also is completely clueless about taking treats from someone’s hand- she probably was never offered even the basic treat in her past. That, thankfully, has changed, and she is now learning that people can be kind and gentle.

This past Monday the vet came out and she had her teeth floated. She did very well- she had a distinct wave that needed to be filed down, but now she should be able to eat and masticate her hay more easily which will help keep her weight up. The vet also gave her a Legend injection because of the arthritis in her hocks that had not been treated for quite some time. She will need to be on Equiiox for the rest of her life due to her arthritis, but with the daily medication she will be much more comfortable and will even be able to be lightly ridden with no pain.

Finally, Cindy Lou is starting to be more comfortable with herself. For the first week she was very upset that she was separated from her son, who she had been with for six years, but she settled down and made friends with Natalie’s pony, and then with her other horse. She didn’t want to go anywhere unless another horse was with her, which was fine, but we were hoping she would be comfortable enough to start exploring on her own a little.

A few days ago, she finally wandered out of her stall on her own, and meandered into the arena. She rolled a few times, then took a nap in the morning sun! When Natalie came out to feed, she just looked over at her, then went back to sleep- meaning that she was not only comfortable being alone, but is getting enough food so she doesn’t feel that she needed to rush over and eat her breakfast. That’s a huge change- she is settling down and has so much more self-esteem than when she first came in!