The clues mount

Thankyou all for your support. The more I think about it, the more almost total sight loss explains everything that has been going on with Smartie.

His eyes on both sides seem the same, but he is very anxious for me not to go to his near side in the stable without touching him and speaking to him first. I think that is because the light sources are both on the off side and he does not want me around the dark side where he can't see at all. He always kicks his food bucket around the stable. I used to think he did it for fun and now I realise that it was probably accidental - he couldn't see it. Two days ago he tried to walk straight out of the barn and there was an inch thick metal bar in the way that he bounced off, looking surprised that it was there.

He is better outside than he is in dim light. He is not getting moon madness this time, it seems (though he might get it tomorrow). I put that down to having learned to turn on the barn lights so that he doesn't spend all night getting wound up about not being able to see. They have been on every morning without fail for the last 3 weeks or more.

If I move my finger slowly, I can practically touch his eyeball before he realises that I am doing it, both sides. I think he can see only movement, and particularly if it is something red. Do you remember him having a total freak at a red lead rope? And when he jumped last week when I came out of the tack room carrying some nippers - the nippers have 14 inch bright red handles.

I have totally changed how I am handling him, speaking very gently, approaching very slowly, touching him a lot but very slowly, and he seems rather , well, grateful is the only word that really fits. Very quiet, very gentle.

I've done some research and we have two options - "congenital stationary night blindness" or a brain tumour. Both would fit. The first one is supposed to be non-progressive, but progressive cases are found. It starts with inability to see at night and progresses to daylight. There is no doubt that he is worse in the stable, in dim light, than anywhere else.

It is amazing to contemplate how he learnt his surroundings and fooled us all that he can see when he can't. He even jumped the gate! He obviously mapped where he was and can cope if it isn't changed. When I changed his stable when Casper went, he became unsettled and has never truly been as calm in that stable as he was in the original one.

I tried testing his pupil reflex with a torch this morning, and couldn't find one. After I had finished crying I went and tested Tetley and I couldn't get one on him either! So it's the wrong torch, because Tetley can certainly see :-)

And on a more cheerful note, Tetley can half pass too. He was perfectly sound again this morning and did some lovely shoulder in and half pass in walk, and a couple of circuits of a fantastic punchy trot. When he gets it as right as he did today, I can drop the reins completely and he stays in self carriage, bent around your inside leg, doing the half pass. Enough to put a grin on your face all day :-)

And I took Tia up the road leading her to see what she would do. She was interested but completely unspooky, just ambling along happily. She was totally unconcerned when we got to the main road and a huge lorry rattled past. She just gets better and better :-)

I don't suppose I will have much more news of Smartie, but this diary is called what it's called and there's no point changing it now. Unless he has some sort of miraculous recovery, that's the end of any work he will do. For the meanwhile, I own a paddock ornament :-)

Thanks again for your support.

C