Back to Light Work

This last week has been busy. Along with physical therapy three times a week, I have been putting in some hours at work on an inventory project. We also had a couple of surgeries scheduled, so I was able to run a modified version of anesthesia to fit my restrictions. The anesthesia cases ran pretty similar to normal only I didn't perform the pre-surgery physical exam, blood draw, or place the i.v. catheter, somebody else did. I also delegated the task of knocking the horse down, as rarely they can have an adverse reaction to the sedation and things can get crazy, dangerous quickly. I'm not quite ready for that yet:). I was able to place the endotracheal tube and help place the horse on the surgery table after it was down. I stood for most of the first surgery like I usually do, but I was really sore the next day, so for Tuesdays surgery I sat off and on. I helped as usual to recover the horse, but only the first part, when the horse is still down and I am helping it breath with the demand valve, waiting for the horse to breath on its own, then waiting for the horse to begin to have the swallow reflex so that I can pull the e.t. tube. Once the tube is pulled and the horse is breathing well on it's own I step out of the room and we bar the doors and recover the horse with a head and tail rope. The rope recovery part can be strenuous, so I just watched this time. Both horses did very well. I was pleased with how I held up too. It will be another two weeks before I go back to the real horse handling duties of my job. I've been given an inventory project that will keep me busy in the mean time. Along with getting back all my household and barn duties, I am busy enough.