Horse sound when working properly, lame when not ...

[tonitot]

I've posted a few times about Ethel being lame and having a bad back, back has been sorted and for a few days she was sound when I was lunging her. Yesterday she seemed to go lame again. I spoke to the back lady who said to put some draw reins on her (attached to the bit down between her front legs and over back) to get her to bring her head down and allow her to put her nose on the floor. I did this and noticed that when she had her head stuck up and was just trotting round not really working that she looked a bit lame, when she brought her head down and worked over her back and used her back end a bit more, she looked sound again. Is this normal with some horses? I'm thinking that maybe she needs to work correctly all the time to strengthen her muscles in her back and hindquarters and maybe this will stop her looking unsound, does this sound right? The vet is looking at her tomorrow to see if she is actually lame or not, but it was bugging me so thought I'd ask on here. Thanks in advance

 

[StormyMoments]

i used to own a grey like that, if you didnt hold him in an outline he would be hopping lame on the inside leg on either rein, we sent him to have a full body bone scan and x-ray, nothing. so he had physio and still no change, so we never did figure out what was wrong, or what wasnt for that matter, but this might not be the same for your horse, because the vets suspicions was kissing spine hence the bone scans and x-rays sorry not to be of much use :/ good luck!