Notes from Maine - 2026/06/21

This has been a busy, tumultuous week here for my family. Everything is moving in the right direction now, but we had some late nights, early mornings, and a surgery to get here. 

I’m not the kind of person who enjoys ascribing emotional states to other species, but I think it’s safe to say that Earl (big, goofy, sweet Shire horse) was as concerned and distraught as I was. For more than five years, he has never spent a night alone. He’s not cut out for it. Horses are very social animals. When his brother died in 2020, I was right on the cusp of a few other crises. My father was going into the hospital for surgery on his back, and then he ended up eventually doing a couple months of rehab here. Finn (RIP Finn, a wonderful English Mastiff friend) was suffering with recurrent ear infections that would eventually lead to surgery, and the world was shut down.

Earl was alone for months before we found Maybelle (lovely Spotted Draft), and he found peace again. It was tough trying to keep him sane and grounded during that time. He was young and didn’t do well isolated from company. I feared (and still fear) any circumstances that might lead to him being alone again in the future.

So when I learned that little Lilly (Earl & Maybelle’s daughter) would need surgery, I put it off. She had an umbilical hernia. It’s not uncommon. Her hernia was examined and they said to give it a chance to resolve on its own and then consider surgery if it didn’t. I watched, hoped, and waited. Eventually I resolved that surgery was necessary. I could have had it done six months ago, but I didn’t. Then, a couple of weeks ago, I had the worst dream. In it, her hernia had turned into an emergency. Warning: this is graphic. If intestines push through the abdominal wall, they can twist or pinch and that’s a death sentence if not discovered and remedied quickly. I’m here most of the time, but imagine she had an accident right after bed and I didn’t discover her until the morning. 

When I woke, I rushed out to the barn and checked on her. She was alert, happy, and her sweet self. I said hello and then immediately went back inside to talk to the surgeon that my vet recommended. They happened to have an opening last Friday. With a few text messages, I found someone able to transport both Lilly and Maybelle down for the surgery the day before so Lilly could be monitored and prepped. At fourteen months, it would have been very stressful to transport her alone, so her mom needed to go too.

I went as well after I attempted to get Earl settled down. The sight of his family loading onto a trailer made him frantic in his stall. The hospital is ninety minutes away. Locked in a stall down there, Maybelle yelled so loud I thought that Earl might actually hear her back at home. The surgeon examined Lilly and then looked at me with an unreadable expression. 

“It’s a good thing you brought her. This is a dangerous size of hernia. Small is not an issue. The big ones aren’t that dangerous either, but this size…”

“Will she be okay?”

“Yes. We do lots of these,” he said.

She had surgery on Friday. Back at home, Albert (dog) and I spent most of our time out in the barn with Earl. We found chores to do and tasks for Earl to participate in. Whenever we left him, he yelled and called for us to come back. Aside for sleeping and meals, we always did. 

It all went well. Then, yesterday, they came home. In retrospect, it seems like a very manageable deal. What’s a few days and a couple of nights? The problem is that horses are very delicate, despite their size. Earl is 2,000 pounds (900kg) and regularly bends steel just by leaning too hard against it. But an upset in his routine can cause injury, ulcers, or colic and it takes immediate response to get him back on track. Honestly, he did better than I thought he would. The first day, if I turned him out to the pasture he spent all of his time running from one end to the other, looking for his family and screaming into the wind. By Saturday morning, he was calm enough to graze a little. Still jumpy, he had found a little composure. 

The ladies did wonderfully. They trailered well and had good manners in the hospital. Maybelle was given a little light sedation to calm her down when her daughter was taken into surgery, but she did fine. Now that they’re back, everyone is breathing easier. Lilly requires 14 pills twice a day for a couple of weeks. It’s not as bad as it sounds. With some applesauce and a dosing syringe, she doesn’t mind it. Our normal vet comes on Wednesday to take out the stent that’s holding gauze against the incision for now. They’ll be inside for three weeks, and then have access to a very small turnout for two more. Some horses, it pains me to note, spend a lot of their lives with less. 

It’s so relieving to have that sweet little filly back.