What’s New with Roll? White Line Massage

Roll hasn’t had a massage in quite some time, so we thought he was definitely overdue. I think he thought so, too! Roll is still happy and not showing any pain. This is encouraging.

He has had quite a struggle with White Line disease and we are being very pro-active in his treatment. Today we checked his foot and he has more new growth which is encouraging, but we have had severe and very wet weather lately which is causing the new growth to get a little soft.

We checked with the vet and short of keeping him penned in his stall (not an option), we are limited in what we can do. We opted to have the vet come down and take a look for himself and not just look at the pictures.

We agreed that it might be beneficial to clean his foot twice a day and then dry it off before putting it back into the boot. This could help some. The switch from Styrofoam to neoprene inside the boot is working much better.

Joanne, our equine masseuse, started by working on both of Roll’s hips since that is where he is having the most trouble with weight-bearing, but so far, he is staying balanced even with his severely damaged foot. The pressure remains centered on his damaged foot and is not listing one way or the other. This is a good thing!

Then she worked over the croup area where muscles can easily get strained in his back. Roll seemed to really enjoy his massage.

Joanne massaged the insides of his legs to relieve the gaskin muscles…and into the flank area. Since we do regular “imprint” touching with him all over his body, he was less touchy in these areas than he might have been otherwise and actually enjoyed the relief she provided for him in these areas.

Then it was on to the withers, shoulder and neck…

…but when she began massaging his face, he was in pure ecstasy!!! Roll continues to improve and we are hopeful for a reasonable recovery. Thank you all for your prayers and support!