My gal has four horses, one of which will be euthanized this weekend.
Smokey (14:2, about 900 lbs), a Morgan-Arabian cross (both spirited breeds), had to be retired about five years ago when the arthritis in his knees made unsafe to carry a person, as they would buckle under the extra weight.
He never lost his get-up-and-go attitude. He just was no longer ridable. As his arthritis got progressively worse (his knees ultimately having softball-sized swellings on them), he started slowing down. Not out of lack of heart. The body was just failing under him.
But the reason he’s being euthanized is not the arthritis. He was noticed to have a “growth” this past week on his penis when he “dropped” to urinate. The vet came out last night and when he “dropped” after sedation, she confirmed what we had suspected and feared, that it was penile cancer–which is not uncommon in older horses.
The growth is tangerine- to orange-sized, but she said that she could feel even more cancer buried within the sheath. She could cut off the growth, but that would not really gain him any additional time, since it had already apparently spread significantly. (The one other horse that has had it at the barn, in the years I’ve been going there, had his penis removed, and the urethra redirected out the back–but ended up dying anyway within a year.)
My gal has had him for 11 years, so it’s being pretty rough on her, dreading that final walk with him. During his riding career, he did everything a person could ask of him, and ended up his “professional” career in a therapeutic horseback-riding program for handicapped kids, after which time, my gal picked him up and he gave other kids the chance to have fun for several more years.
So, he’s had a pretty good life. And as tough as it was to make this decision, the other option–to let him suffer until he eventually succumbed to the cancer–is obviously worse. And there was hardly a dry eye at the barn last night when the other folks found out, as he has been such a long-time fixture.
So, good-bye, Smokie. You don’t know how much pleasure you’ve given to so many people.