I was going to write things about how Fetti and I had a lovely hill ride on Sunday. We’d started playing with the Equicore bands. We were starting up very low-key interval conditioning to bring her fitness back this winter. Nothing spectacularly exciting, but a plan in place, things to work on.

Instead the trainer at new barn called me Tuesday afternoon. Fetti was down and looked colicky. I headed out. She called again when I was on the way over. Didn’t look great. I met the vet at the barn.

Trainer had seen her down once, thought it unusual but maybe she was napping? Fetti got up, whatever, no problem. Next time trainer came by Fetti was down again and she called me. I would have had concerns if she were down once, but I absolutely cannot blame them for not calling over a horse that might be napping. She wasn’t thrashing, she wasn’t rolling, she was just.. down. I think I can count on one hand the number of times I ever caught Fetti lying down. Not that it never happened, that just wasn’t her normal. Heard you coming, got up.

The vet noted, I think, a bit of a distention on one side of her belly – RH. Her heart rate was high. She was pacing and uncomfortable. IV banamine did not make a significant dent. We tubed, found a bit of gas but nothing obvious, and discussed. They could set her up with IV fluids but basically didn’t have any solid answers. Was hauling to a clinic an option? Yes – and I am so so grateful that right now I’m in a place where it was. They gave her some more meds to keep her kinda comfortable on the drive over, I grabbed a random other boarder to yank the bedliner out of my truck, dropped it basically right where we pulled it out, and the vet helped me hook up my gooseneck trailer. (Learning to do this solo is on my list, but apparently I have leveled up to doing it well enough that minimal assistance in a crisis is sufficient.) Fetti loaded, because of course she loads – other boarders were expecting problems, I think – and we drove.

Partner met me at the clinic, and the intern got us started while we waited for the vet to make it in due to some communication snafus. Respiration still high. Pulse still high. Clearly uncomfortable. I don’t remember what number they pulled, but it too was getting worse. Ultrasound pointed towards active internal bleeding, but also seemed to show a thickened small intestine. We moved forward with a blood transfusion in hopes of stabilizing Fetti and buying us time to get a better picture. There were still a lot of question marks when we left her there, but the vet put it as basically 50/50 – either she improves or she doesn’t. Transfusion wouldn’t solve the underlying issues, but we should see some improvement.

I was able to be very clear: I don’t want heroic efforts to save her. I want her to get a good shot. I want her long-term quality of life to be there. And if she deteriorates fast, don’t keep her alive just for me to get there to say goodbye.

Vet called the next morning with a status update. There was some progress. There didn’t appear to be active bleeding now. But something was still very wrong, and best guess at this point was that an internal membrane (?) had torn, and the intestine had ended up through that hole. The intestine would – if the theory was correct – need to be removed surgically. This wouldn’t be easy or straightforward, there still wasn’t a ton of confidence in exactly what was going on, and her pain level was still not under control (they didn’t think it was terrible as she wasn’t thrashing, but with stoic pony, in hindsight, I think it may have been higher than it was coming across). Best-case odds of surgery weren’t terrible, but weren’t amazing.. and this had been complicated and confusing from step one. Once I took surgery off the table as an option, the only viable path forward was letting her go.

They were comfortable managing her pain until we made it out there.. but frankly, she was mentally checked out. She didn’t acknowledge we were there and she was clearly hurting. She went quietly and calmly. It was the right call. I don’t have any regrets. I don’t think getting there sooner or checking on her on Monday would have helped; I think by the time she showed symptoms, it was already too late. I don’t think there was anything more we could have done while still keeping her best interests in mind. It just really, really sucks.

Eleven years with her and I could have so happily had eleven more. Dreams and plans and moseying rides even into semi-retirement. For years I’ve arranged much of my life around her schedule and making that time. Now I’m heartbroken and lost. Partnerships aren’t built overnight and we’d reached that comfortable zone where communication was easy.

“But what about Polly as your next riding horse?” And that’s where this really sucks – I don’t know. Polly is still off at training as we try to troubleshoot lameness with a rider. I don’t know what her prognosis is short-term or long-term. I am grateful I had a few years with both of them to work on that transition, and that I’m not starting from scratch with Polly now.

I’m looking at borrowing a friend’s (sane, safe, reasonably boring, not a ton of mental work) pony for the next month just to keep me occupied. Hopefully by then I can bring Polly home and start working on riding work, but.. at this point.. who knows. When you love hard, you grieve hard too. This just sucks all around.

She was the very, very best first pony I could have asked for.