wasn’t getting better, so that night he had surgery,” she continues. “It went very well and the vets were very optimistic about his recovery. He had a twisted
colon. While very painful for him, they didn’t have to cut into his intestines at all.” The twisted colon was only one
of his physical issues. Winzalot had been diagnosed the year before with a large number of food allergies including wheat, soy, oats, corn and many types of grass hay. To combat the allergies he was put on a special diet consisting of alfalfa hay, beet pulp,
Coolstance (a coconut meal based feed) and Platinum Performance Complete Joint supplement, Platinum Skin and Allergy supplement and Platinum Gas- tric Support supplement. Jamie remembers how miserable
Winny was before he was diagnosed. “He would constantly itch his nose and bite at his sides, especially when we got a new batch of hay in. When we would go to multiple day shows the first day he would be great. Then at night after the first day we’d reward him with a wheat bran mash. The next day he would be uncontrollable: rearing when I rode him, pawing in his stall, and acting like he had a urinary tract infection. This happened several times and we couldn’t figure out what was going on,” she says. “We had a blood panel done to determine what his allergies were. Once we received the results, we realized that he has his worst reaction to wheat. He gets internal hives, so it was difficult to diagnose, but since he has been on allergy shots he is doing much better! He has been on the shots for two years now, so recently he is being weaned back onto orchard grass hay and seems to be doing well on it.” The allergies caused major problems following the colic
surgery. “Everything was looking like he would be healed up and better very quickly. Unfortunately, we discovered Winny’s allergies are not just to food. He ended up being al- lergic to the internal stitches and his stomach rejected them, causing him to herniate,” Jamie recalls. A few months after his first surgery, he had a second surgery, where they replaced the stitches with metal staples. All seemed well again, until he started getting wounds on his stomach. They learned that he was also allergic to the metal and his stomach was push- ing the staples out through his skin! “We left the staples in as long as we could so that the
stomach lining would heal as much as possible, but even- tually he had to have a third surgery to remove them,” she recounts. “That was the hardest surgery on him because scar tissue had formed around many of the staples. After they were removed, he had to wear a belly band for several months to give added support while the stomach lining fin- ished healing.”
It was a difficult time for Jamie. “Everything was crazy with his illness and the surgeries. It was an emotional roller coast- er. The day he got sick, I had had the best ride of my life on him. Then, that night, we were hoping he wouldn’t have to have surgery and could still go to Young Riders in Kentucky. By the next morning we were just hop- ing he would live. Then, it seemed like he was going to be okay again…and then he had to have another surgery. And then another. One day, everything seemed on track for a speedy recov- ery and then next they were telling me they would monitor him through the night,” she says. “By the end of it all, I was just going to be happy if he lived and if I got to ride him again. But, after the third surgery, the vets were confident he would be able to go back to full work and get to top form with a proper rehab program. I could not have been more thrilled and thankful to the vets who saved him.” Jamie credits her mom, the veteri-
nary staff and her friends for helping her through the crisis. Her mother helped with his care and was always
a huge emotional support, she says. She found Jamie other horses to ride so she would be ready for show season again. The staff at Pioneer Equine Hospital let Jamie visit whenever she wished and always kept her in the loop with what was
Above: Winzalot and Jamie Pestana. Below: Jamie and Winzalot wearing his supportive belly band in December 2011 during his rehabilitation.
Warmbloods Today 19
Nadine Pestana
Brittany Hedin
Allen MacMillan/MacMillan Photography
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