Rescuing Horses

Every now and again I say to myself, "Stop it! Stop spending every last cent you have, or thought about keeping said money on horses. It's stupid."  Then I smile at myself and go back to doing exactly what I've been doing for years.  I am either rescuing or keeping horses. It's not really a hobby as much as it is an addiction. I've looked up both behaviors and feel that I need a lot of mental help with this one. I must subliminally think I have money in the bank, I'm not sure.

Currently, I'm assisting a good friend of mine to help restore a horse to his original glorious and fantabulous shape and body score. He's an ex-racehorse, and by that I mean literally he was racing one day, and the same day he lost what would be his last race, he was thrown out to a kill buyer who was waiting for horses like him right there on the track.  This horse, the one I'll call Callan, is a four-year-old Appendix horse out of Florida. For those of you who may not know what an Appendix horse is, it is a horse that is bred to race specifically from a racing Thoroughbred and a racing Quarter Horse. I thought perhaps it was just the breeding, but after speaking to the folks at the Jockey Club I was corrected.  Quarter Horses actually run faster than Thoroughbreds, and they are a bit thicker, and they tend to have somewhat shorter backs and legs, making it easier to turn. Thoroughbreds tend to speed up in the stretch and make up the time on the long, while Quarter Horses are apt to be good at turning and making the cut in and out of other racers.  It's a good plan, right? Not always.  Animals who don't consistently win are often thrown away, given away, or put down.

Callan's story began in Florida where he was racing. We can only surmise at this point, as we don't yet know his registered Jockey Club name or number. Working from the story I received from the lady who is caring for him, and the information on the lots number tags stuck to his backside from the lots he's been traded to, as well as the recorded medical Coggins report that was pulled in Florida the day he was sold to the kill buyer, I have deducted that Callan was racing on or around May 28, 2019.  He must have lost that race or didn't finish high enough to make his owners happy, as he was sold to a man named Jack Darling in Williston, FL who is known for being both a kill buyer, and he's been in trouble for literally altering the tattoo information inside the horse's lip.  I can't tell yet if Callan has an altered lip tattoo, as he won't let us near his mouth yet. It could be that he has been hurt, and he won't fall for it a second time.  Jack Darling took Callan to Dr. Billy Hendrix of Levy Animal Clinic on May 29, 2019.  He had his blood drawn for the Coggins report, and his name was listed as "Spidey" owing to the fact that he is a Rabicano roan Sorrell with spider-webbing type roan patterns on his hips.  The test proved to be negative.

Because a horse's Coggins takes about 3-4 days before it's back from the laboratory, we can deduce that Callan was not sold or shipped to his next destination until about June 2 or 3.  He has two sticky butt tags, one of which is a Texas-registered tag with the number 501.  He received it when he arrived at the Lonestar Kill Pen in Justin, Texas, just west of I-35 and north of Dallas.  On this lot, for some reason, and we don't know why, he was left unsold and not claimed for about 40 days, or he was transferred to a hub during this time where he may have been unkept and allowed to fight for whatever food was available. You can't know who runs these hubs, how many horses they corral, and what type of hay they feed. You can be damn sure they don't offer grain, and they don't give enough. Callen, a normally 1150-1200 pound horse is now standing at 15.3H tall and about 800 pounds or less.  He is a literal bag of bones with just enough meat to give us hope that he will survive.  His ribs are all showing, his hips are past the point of protruding, he's in bad shape.

After the hub and/or pen, he was rescued by a group of ladies who find it their calling to help as many as they can. My friend was given permission to either pick him up or have him picked up and delivered to her place. He was delivered on July 11th and I saw him for the first time on Sunday, July 14, 2019.  I tried to walk away as I knew I was on a tight tight budget this summer, but I couldn't, and I knew I would not be able to do so. I told my friend I will help her all I can, and I will either find others who can help, or I'll get a temporary job for the last 4 weeks I have left before school starts up, to be able to help her recover this gelding.  He spoke to me, and when they speak to you, you don't really have an option.  She has others on her property that also need help, but Callan reached me the second I saw him.  He allowed me to pet him, groom him, and give him a treat, but mostly he just wanted me to hand him the hay so he didn't have to reach down for it. He wanted me to stay, to pet him and tell him he was going to be OK.  I prayed over him in Jesus' precious name, and KNOW he is going to make a full and wonderful recovery.  I named him Callan as it means "Battle", and he certainly has been through one, and has another to muster.

As his body score is currently between 1 and 2 I don't want to post his photos. I will do so in a subsequent post when he has fully gained his weight and I can show you the before and after photos; the before he was loved and after he was surrendered to Jesus to bring back to life.  I can't imagine the hard times he has gone through. He's probably never been actually loved. He was bred to run, sold, and trained. He was forced to perform, probably drugged to perform, and then when he couldn't beat another horse or two, he was left to the kill buyer's mercy.  Apparently, the buyer thought he could get a little money for him, so he sold him to the lot, which make more money off of him, and he was sold to the rescuers.  I will, of course, give a donation to help them continue their quest to help as many as they possibly can.  Callan will from July 11, 2019, when he arrived at my friend's house, know love.  He will never not be loved again.  (I know, poor grammar...I get it.)  When Callan survives, and he will, I will take him home with me.

When you see a horse race and you cheer from the stands or from where you're watching, do you think about the one who came in last? Do you think about the one that came in next to last too often? Well, maybe people should start to think about them more often.  There are no roses for the losers most of the time. The red roan in the picture is a Quarter Horse, not an Appendix. He is a ranch horse, not a racehorse. When Callan makes a full recovery he will be trained to rein.

Matcha!

It's so funny, every time I think I've only been away from my blog for a few weeks, I look at the last post and it's been since WOW...that's a long time.

Well, I'm no longer teaching at the school I was teaching at, and to be honest, I thought about not going back into teaching after having come out of the school alive! It was without a doubt, the worst experience possible.  I was teaching 9th grade English at an inner-city school district that didn't have an ounce of integrity.  The kids were bad enough, but they are in fact only kids. The administration and the superintendent were as corrupt as they come!  The entire experience, since literally day 1, was an uphill battle that left me heavier than I was when I started, and without as much energy. I'm a very high energy gal, so that wasn't a good thing for me. The extra pounds were absolutely not welcomed.

Because I could see that I was gaining weight and having other stress-related issues such as daily diarrhea and the onset of mental depression, I had to get out of that place fast. I was under a contract so leaving wasn't an option. I began walking in my classroom, literally pacing to get 3 miles of steps in each day.  Sure, the kids thought I was crazy, but they needed me flitting about anyway from second to second, keeping them from cheating, Facebooking, texting, lying, and worse.  It was an on the feet, hour in and hour out job just to keep them from failing my class.  I still ended up failing 1/4 of the class(es) but that's another story.

It's mid-July now, and I have decided to take charge of the two things I can control; my food and/or calorie intake, and my exercise program.  I haven't been stressed since about June 1st, my last day of school was May 22nd officially, but I was suspended on May 9 for something I didn't do. Turns out it was so that I would not report what the administration was doing. I reported it anyway, not to the superintendent, but to the state of Oklahoma and to my union representative. I waited with bated breath until June 28 when I was paid my final check. The entire time I kept thinking they'll find a way to keep my money from me, but in the end, the school was obligated to pay me. We were paid for June and July 2018 in two separate checks and that money literally has to last me until I'm paid September 25 by the new district. Can I do it? You bet I can! I've learned to live with so little for so long that nothing is difficult now. Jesus is awesome like that.

So, back to the topic at hand!  I decided to lose the belly fat that I've picked up over the past several years, but was unable to force it to come off due to stress. I'm doing a mostly Keto diet, more fat, less carbs, very little sugar. I'm not t-totaling it, and I'm counting carbs. I'm just being mindful. I've added Matcha tea to the mix since I don't mind the taste of grass, and I feel that the research I've done on it is valid.  Matcha tea is supposedly much stronger, some say 130x stronger than regular green tea in terms of antioxidants.  It is caffeinated so I do have to watch that and be mindful of when I drink it.  Matcha tea is supposed to do wonders for boosting metabolism and burning fat. I'll see if it works.  I remember and recall the GREEN phase that everyone and their dogs were using for smoothies and swearing that they worked on both metabolism and belly fat, well, turns out they were using either kale powder or Matcha tea powder.  Both are readily available at any health food store, and at about the same cost.  I may have to switch to kale if the caffeine is the cause for the boost. I really don't need to overload on that.  I'm down to one cup of coffee in the a.m. now. I do try to sleep at night.

I measured my gut today which is something I've not done in years. It was FAR worse than what I had hoped for. You see yourself in your mind, and you think you're one size, then you measure or step on a scale and figure out you were only kidding yourself.  I know the number that popped up on the measuring tape is only that, a number, but it's a number I don't wish to associate with my gut size. I'm hoping to reduce it by 14 inches. Dang....just saying that means I'm fat. Oh well, I'm fat.  I fit into jeans that I've owned for a long time, and that's OK for now, but I want to get into new jeans that I've not dreamed of wearing for many years. It can happen. I can do this. I really can.  Because I'm now eating so much better than I was, I have caught myself at the store just passing by the aisles that have fatty foods, sugary foods, starchy foods...I just walk by.  I don't hate them, but they are not needed any longer, sort of like training wheels on a bike. I'm a BIG GIRL now, and can't eat that stuff.

I weigh about 185 now, which is literally where I was last year when I said I wanted to lose weight. I don't blame the school district, the kids, the administration, the work. I blame myself. I wasn't putting the energy into the cure. This year it will be so much better in so many ways.  I'll do a weekly update here to see how I'm doing. I won't say what the belly size number is, but I will tell you what I lose each week if I lose anything.   For now, it's Matcha powder in my smoothie and one cup of Matcha tea; literally pouring hot water over a 1/2 teaspoon of the powder. We'll see how it works.