Colic

He has to go for surgery. Maybe I shouldn’t have been selfish and should have just let him go. But I couldn’t I wanted to try one last thing. I am heartbroken. They said they will ring me if there are complications like they need to bypass the caecum- then what I have no idea. My heart is breaking ??
 
He has had colic surgery before but it was 12 years ago. It was sand impaction. He hasn’t coliced since. He is 19 though now. I am so emotionally exhausted
 
The vet just called they said the caecum had cleared but there was a problem with the small intestine that needed a foot coming out as before ( similar thing happened last surgery 12 years ago). They still recommended going ahead so I said do it. Honestly I don’t care if it took all my savings if it meant he had a chance. Why do horses break our hearts so , I don’t think I’ve felt this way about another human!
 
The surgery is done (turned out a dead piece of small intestine was causing the problem as the caecum had then cleared) but there is a high risk of postoperative ileus (lack of gut motility) and risk of gastroreflux. At which point they'd have to do more surgery - not sure I could do that tbh. This is his second colic surgery and I guess the prognosis is low even if he recovers. The vets were astonished he'd gone 12 years without a repeat after the other.
 
My 18 year old Irish cob had 6 ft of intestine removed in the middle of April. That was just over 10 years after his first colic surgery. Back then, he spent a week in the hospital with the vets telling me surgery was not in his best interest. After a week they changed their minds and operated that afternoon. Found nothing wrong but it did the trick and he recovered, vet described it as "letting the demons out". This time he showed signs of colic in the evening, vet came, injection did nothing for him, we decided to take him straight to hospital. After 90 minutes of tests it was either call it a day or surgery, I felt I had to give him a chance so surgery through the night it was. Wasn't plain sailing for the recovery and he spent 12 days in hospital, I couldn't even go and see him because of lockdown. But he did recover and we are now back out riding.
Miracles do happen and I hope your horse recovers, whatever, you know you've tried your best for him. Sending best wishes.
 
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