Twice in my last three blog posts, I’ve mentioned “my chronically sick horse” and “my foundering horse.” So I figured it’s time to officially introduce Bravissima. Here she is, eating — what she does best, and what she clearly enjoys most.
At five years old, I fell in love with horses. Specifically, black Arabian horses (thank you, Walter Farley and The Black Stallion). There was no doubt in my mind I would one day own a horse. At 15, I got that chance when I bought Bravissima, the mare I’d been riding, and falling more and more in love with, for the past two years — and she just happened to be a black Arabian. At 25, I got the news that she was foundering, a potential death sentence for horses.

She had only just turned 18, and, according to the vet earlier in the spring (when the “only” chronic conditions she was dealing with were cushings syndrome — a treatable tumor on the pituitary gland — and stomach ulcers), she was supposed to have another healthy ten years ahead of her. But founder is a killer. Remember Barbaro, the Kentucky Derby winner who broke down on the racetrack and was eventually euthanized after months of grueling rehabilitation? He didn’t die because of that fractured leg; he died because of the founder that developed afterward. Founder is a complex condition that isn’t well understood even by the world’s top veterinarians, but what we do know is that it’s extremely painful, and extremely difficult for horses to overcome. There is a triangular shaped bone inside horses’ hooves, and founder is what it is called when that bone pulls loose from the connective tissue and begins rotating, so that the sharp tip presses into the horse’s sole. Imagine stepping on a triangular lead fishing weight every time you moved. That’s kind of like founder. While horses can recover, there is no cure.

But Bravissima is a remarkable horse. She’s smart, tough, and best of all, unfailingly cheerful, even after being on stall rest for the past six months. Even with feet that are sore every day. Even when she’s been poked with more needles this year than in her previous 18 years combined. Everyone at the stable has been wonderful, helping taking extra good care of her, brushing her, braiding her mane, making sure she gets her medicines. Our vet and farrier are committed to seeing her back to one day being able to graze free in a pasture. We hope.
As difficult as it has been knowing that we may at any time be faced with the decision of whether ending her life is the most humane option, I’m not fooling myself into believing that it’s the same as dealing with a life-threatening or life-altering condition in a person. It doesn’t come close to caring for a parent with dementia or a child with terminal cancer. But nursing my little mare since that horrible diagnosis in June has given me a much greater understanding and empathy for both chronically ill patients and their caretakers. It’s made me truly grasp how emotionally fatiguing it is — for both parties — and how each day, each second is all we can be sure we have left on this earth. Platitudes about embracing every moment and living life to the fullest ring hollow when anyone is faced with the reality that tomorrow or next week is not only not promised, but in some cases, not likely. It’s hard to embrace a moment when you’re holding your breath, hoping against hope that it will somehow never end.

I would like Bravissima to live, of course, for another ten years — or twenty. My friend had a horse that lived to be 43 years old, long enough that my friend’s first daughter will be able to remember her. I would like my future children to have the chance to remember Bravissima. They might: Bravissima has already come through so much, and she seems to be faring well at the moment. Not once has she shown a glimmer of giving up on herself, so we’re not giving up on her, either.
Every time I visit Bravissima, I simply pat her little South America-shaped star — the star that’s the exact replica of her sire’s. And kiss her face — the face that is the exact replica of her famous grandsire’s, and bears the family resemblance he passed on to so many of his offspring, along with an outgoing personality, a sweet gentleness, a conniving, impish streak. I just enjoy her, and enjoy how much I have gotten to enjoy her. When you really think about it, even if I lose her now, I’ve had ten years with the wonderful horse I always wanted. How many little girls grow up dreaming of horses? Most of them. How many realize that dream?

In truth, we never know how long any one or any thing has to live, whether caught in the clutches of illness or bursting with life and health. I’ve realized, thanks to Bravissima’s ordeal, that I have been looking at this world upside down and backwards. It isn’t a matter of how short a life, or our happiness, is cut; it’s a matter of how many unexpected days we’re given. God doesn’t take away what is ours; He gives us, however briefly, what we never would have had.

This is the verse Danny and I have engraved in our wedding bands: “He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” It’s from Colossians 1:17. And it’s the way I want to view everything in this life. There is so much hope.
~ Laura