MY Calm reasonable horse has panic attacks,

[twist and shout]

I have aquired, a bit of a duffer! he is a beautiful ex race horse who had a ligament injury ( was serious), he has come to keep my gelding company, he is lovely and calm most (99%) of the time, our dogs, chickens and pet pigs can go through his legs etc, good with farrier, flapping things,travel and dentist all a sinch.

HOWEVER in the 8 months he has been here he has had 4 panic attacks, the last one was a windy day took him back to the field with his field mate and something triggered him off....
He puts his head in the air, its as if he closes his nostrils and cant breath,trembles then doesn't see any sense. cantered round me on lead until I had to let go, he cantered down to our grooming area ( obviously he does breath) where he continued to shake with head up and tail tucked under like a terrified dog. I have been around horses most of my life and never seen anything like it. He is a TB, perhaps that has something to do with it, he's pretty laid back and not at all stressy. Its like an episode of something.

He is just on grass.

Anyone experienced anything like this???

Vet took bloods etc and couldn't find anything, have not done very much about it as all other episode were minor and have been so spead out, but realise now he could be potentially dangerous as is blind panic.
Previous owner has not seen this before he's 6

many thanks for any ideas

 

[cptrayes]

I had the same in a ten year old warmblood last year. I took him hunting and he completely lost the plot, leaving the other horses and plunging onto a wire fence after only five minutes. I put him back on the lorry and he went utterly berserk, turned himself upside down and needed a fire brigade call to get him out. In the few weeks after that, he had panic attacks in the field, running up and down, while two other highly strung horses looked on in amazement. I had been gifted him to do a foot rehab on and offered to give him back, but the owner chose for me to put him down. I think it was a wise decision.

Goldenstar has also has one, if she doesn't post you could PM her. She had it put down.

There was also an unbroken appaloosa on here a few months ago that bolted out of the field twice. That was put down as well.

Sorry, but for me panic attacks are not something I can tolerate, due to the danger.

 

[twist and shout]

Thank you, . I have to say I did think Chum at the time, certainly gave me the willies and now he is not to be handled unless the yard is clear of people and pigs! I've not seen him do anything funny in the field, which is visible from the house.I just hoped there might be something that I could do or give him before the final straw, but your right it is an accident waiting to happen, I occasionally handle young green horses for a TB breeder who might shy, look or whatever but they look and get over the initial shock pretty quickly, he just got faster and faster until I let go. At the time I thought, blind panic - canned meat. Looking out my window I see both him and my gelding as happy chappies and hope someone might have an other idea.

 

[fatpiggy]

Hmmm, I don't want to sound alarmist but my mare had what laughingly I thought were panic attacks - they were actually partial seizures. On one occasion (luckily) she broke free from me before I could untie her, ran straight through a post and rail fence and rejoined her field companions, fortunately with just a few scrapes, because the next fence had barbed wire. It was the only seizure she had when something startled her and set it off. Normally she would only run around in circles because the brain is compelled to do that during a seizure. Alot of your description matches what my horse would do during a seizure. Feel free to PM if you would like to discuss.

 

[shergar]

Changed character ,irrational fear some horses will run till they hit some thing that makes them stop and they can have a temporary blindness as far as I know this is called a psychomotor seizure which is a complex partial seizure in the part of the brain that controls behaviour .
Sadly my friends horse had one and smashed the front out of her stable,a minute after the seizure she was eating hay and looked normal except for a cut over her eye,on the advice of the vet the horse was put to sleep.
Please be very careful if think your horse may be having seizures.