Holly Barr – Severe Leg Injury – Severed Tendon – Fully Recovered

John Dowdy:

Hello, and welcome to this week's Equinety Podcast. And this is number 132 of the Team Equinety Podcast. We're in for an exciting one this week. It's a major, major injury, possible career ending injury for this horse. But before we get into those details, I want to welcome on the owner of this horse, Holly [Barr 00:00:25], out of Ohio. Welcome to the Team Equinety Podcast.

Holly Barr:

All right, well, thank you for having me. I'm excited to share Bo's story with you.

John Dowdy:

Well, I tell you, it is an amazing one. When you had emailed us and sent these pictures, I'm just like, Holy cow. It's horrifying seeing these images. But before we get into what happened, give us a little background on Bojangles, and maybe a little bit of your background as well. And kind of the progression of what happened and how you found the product and everything else.

Holly Barr:

Okay. Sounds good. Yeah, I'm a nurse [inaudible 00:01:03], so I work in the medical field. And I barrel race my horses, just for fun. And we've had Bojangles, he was actually born [inaudible 00:01:11] farm. And so we did all the training with him. And we had some family health problems when he was a six year old. So he actually didn't really start barrel racing competitively up until he was seven. And that was the summer that he actually got injured. So he was only running for about three months.

He was pretty competitive. He was placing in the 1D for barrel racing, hit or miss. But he had this injury in August and we had gone out to feed our horses in the evening, and we saw that Bojangles wasn't coming in. And he was standing by the fence. And then we went out closer to look and we had the high tensile, but it's the plastic coated tensile.

Somehow he had got his leg caught in the fence and the wire around his leg, like a tourniquet, and just cut into his leg. So I ran and I got our cutters and cut him free of the fence. And then noticed that, it looked to me like his leg was broken. Because he couldn't put any weight on it. And every time he did, it buckled forward. And it was just, it was a very horrific scene.

So after I got my composure, I called a friend, she's a vet. She told me, she's like, You need to get that horse on the trailer. Nobody's going to be able to do anything for him out there. The only possible thing they could do is euthanasia.

So we got him onto the trailer. I got him up to Cleveland Equine, which is a local vet in the area. And got him off the trailer, they did their assessments. And he said he didn't sever his extensor tendon, his leg wasn't broken. And then he told me that we could try to suture it back together. The tendon was non-repairable, but we could try to suture the skin back together. And he was willing to give it a shot if I was.

He couldn't guarantee that the horse was going to be even sound enough as a pasture pet. But like I said, if I was willing to give it a try, he was. So we decided, let's go ahead and do this.

And he sutured him up. He did great. We had to cut an actual PVC pipe, the place on the front of his leg, as like a brace to keep his leg from buckling forward. Without that extensor tendon, their leg wants to buckle forward. So we kind of did a handyman thing and got that going.

And so we [inaudible 00:03:48] the next week for the bandage change, the incision that he sutured looked great. Everything looked good, we were excited. But then the next bandage change the following, it would've been 10 days after the initial injury, we were doing bandage changes every five days. His skin had started to slough off. So being stuck in the fence, just caused a bunch of trauma to that entire leg. And the skin just started slough off.

And every week we took him up. And it just kept getting worse and worse. And for almost three months straight, the wound just looked worse every day, just every bandage change, it just looked worse.

So I was starting to get very frustrated. And I knew I needed something to help him with the healing. Because we weren't going down a very good road. And your product, actually, the Equinety, popped up on my Facebook, like on my news feed. And I clicked on it because I was interested in it. And I believe it was a wound healing thing that caught my attention.

And so I looked into it, dove into it and was reading a little bit more about the product. Because I'd never actually heard of it before. And I was interested in the amino acids, the essential amino acids, as far as having those for healing muscles, just generalized healing. And so I thought I'd give it a shot. With the medical background, I was kind of treating his wound as like a non-healing diabetic ulcer. And I know with people it's extremely important, nutrition is the biggest thing with any kind of wound healing. So yeah, so I went ahead and I tried Equinety. And then, it was in a few weeks, I started using that, that I started noticing that we did have some improvement with Bojangles' wounds. Instead of every day they're changed and getting worse, we were getting slightly better. So, but we had a long road to go. Long road to go.

John Dowdy:

So just to recap a little bit. So doing your evening feeding, like you always do. And Bojangles didn't come up. You go out and find out he's caught on the fence, he's got a severed tendon. And the vet's willing to work with you if you are. And so everything went well as far as suturing him up and everything. And you're doing the bandage changes.

And over the two to three month period, things weren't really progressing, as far as the healing process goes. And then you've-

Holly Barr:

That's correct.

John Dowdy:

Okay. And then you came across the Equinety product, the Equinety Horse XL, specifically. And then you start within a couple weeks, you were noticing big changes from the repairing and the healing process.

Holly Barr:

Correct.

John Dowdy:

Yeah. So now you are, what, about three to... Well, about three, three and a half months in, at this point?

Holly Barr:

About three, three and a half months in, yes. Where we started actually noticing a turnaround. Where everything was getting a little bit better. But I just say a little bit better because the wounds had been three months of getting worse. We had a long road ahead of us. So the wounds were big. We were just looking for the granulation tissue. And so every bandage change every week, the granulation [inaudible 00:07:18] shoots out a little bit more, a little bit more. The healthy issue was starting to come back.

So for the first five months, the vet did every bandage change until it got to a point where he thought it was stable. And we started doing the dressing changes at home. So my sister helped me, and we just did weekly bandage changes for the first year of that injury. And it finally did close up and then we started the rehab of the horse, after that. So it was just, the pictures kind of say everything, but...

John Dowdy:

Yes they do. And for those that are tuning in and listening to this at our website at teamequinety.com, there's a podcast link. And so this podcast will be transcribed. We're going to post these pictures. And boy, I tell you, the first one and first several are pretty horrific. Not for the weak stomach people. But...

Holly Barr:

That is true. I do believe... Yeah.

John Dowdy:

Yeah. But I tell you, it really is amazing as it goes along, how quickly the repairing and everything, and the healing process seems to be going pretty fast. Even though we are talking over a two year period, but for all intents and purposes, the injury was quite significant.

And you know, I always tell people, the Equinety Horse XL isn't a miracle supplement. But when you add it to things that you're doing, it seems to always help get you back quicker than maybe what you wanted to. So, but every horse is different. Every situation's different. This is probably one of the most extreme cases that we've come across in eight years, where the product has really helped.

Holly Barr:

Yeah. And I would say it definitely helped Bojangles with the turnaround. Because like I said, I was desperate, I was looking for anything to help him. Three months of everything getting worse, was very frustrating. And then once we started feeding the Equinety, it was a turnaround. It was a small turnaround, but it was at least a turnaround. We were getting more granulation, and he's made a complete recovery now. He is strong and he's doing great.

John Dowdy:

Yeah, now-

Holly Barr:

And actually, I think he made a stronger comeback. I think he came back stronger than he was before the injury happened.

John Dowdy:

Wow. That's pretty incredible. Now, before we give the update on what he is doing now, for those of you who are tuning in, maybe you're looking for something to help your horse. Whether it be from an injury, joints, hooves, top line, as a preventative. I mean, it's really everything encompassing in the horse's body. What makes the Equinety Horse XL so unique, first of all, it's 100% pure amino acids. There's no fillers, no sugars, no starches. And there's no loading dose. So the $100 tub of Equinety has 100 servings in it. And you just give one scoop a day.

And so how the science works in this is, when you give a scoop in the morning, as an example, the amino acids are rapidly absorbed. And they're specifically designed to give the body what it needs to stimulate the pituitary gland, which is a gland in the body that releases hormones. And when this happens, we're actually allowing the body to send its own hormones to its own problem areas. And so that's why it helps in so many ways.

And when you go through all the podcasts that we have, there's just stories upon stories upon stories. And from one end of the spectrum to the other, of how this product has helped. And the great thing about it is, the majority of people, and I'm talking upper 90 percentile, do see changes happening within days to a couple weeks and definitely by 30 days. Very slim chance that you go beyond 30 days and not notice something going on.

And so we're blessed in the fact that we've got a product that helps in so many ways. And as you were mentioning, Holly, for the first two and a half, three months, you weren't really seeing that big of a change. And then when you added the Equinety Horse XL is when you really started seeing that healing and repairing process really kick in.

Holly Barr:

Oh yeah, yeah. And it was pretty amazing. It was very uplifting, you know. And for the product, for the money that I spent on the product, compared to the money I spent on rehabbing this horse, was a very small percentage for the Equinety. So it was totally worth it, 100%.

John Dowdy:

Absolutely. So now we jump ahead two years. What is Bojangles up to these days?

Holly Barr:

So we made his first run back in December of 2020. So he's been at this about a year now, since his injury. And he just keeps getting stronger and stronger. So he, recently in the past three months, back in November, he won a big barrel race. I think there was almost 300 people in the class. He took first in that, won the class.

And recently with the winter time and stuff, we've been doing some indoor rodeos. And he's been doing great. He's very consistent. He places almost every rodeo that he goes to. And he's just, he's a fun horse to have. He's got a lot of heart. I always say, he has a new appreciation for life now.

But he's a great horse and he's come back strong. And we hope that we can keep continuing with him. But you know, the only thing keeping that leg from buckling forward right now is his muscle strength. And with that leg, the compensation of the accessory muscles there, in that leg. And so it's important that we keep him strong and keep his muscle going and keep him in shape, and we'll keep going as long as he lets us keep going.

John Dowdy:

Absolutely. And you know, one other thing I was going to ask. Because, as with people, we're dealing with a significant injury. And of course with the animal, how was his demeanor, compared, in the first, those three months prior to Equinety versus when you started giving Equinety? Did he seem more relaxed, calm? Kind of just going with the flow, compared to before? Or did you see much of a change there, his overall demeanor? Because I know that's got to be stressful as well.

Holly Barr:

Oh, very stressful. And actually the vet actually made a comment about that, how good he looked. When horses have significant injuries like that and they're on stall rest, and he was on stall rest for a good six months, he never left his stall. And then after that it was hand walking.

But anyways the vet even made a comment about how good he looked. Because horses with those kind of severe injuries, you usually have a lot muscle wasting. You have a hard time keeping weight on them. They're anxious from being stalled. He was very calm. He was a good horse. He took the stall rest well.

But his body condition, he remained fairly muscular for how little activity he had. He didn't have a lot of muscle wasting. We were obviously, we were feeding him good hay. He was still getting good nutrition. But adding that Equinety to his diet, I think was a game changer as far as keeping him looking good and helping with that wound healing.

John Dowdy:

Yeah. That makes sense. And going back over eight years and just talking with thousands and thousands of customers that are sharing their stories, and we get them on a daily basis. And whether you're in a high performance barn or a rescue facility or anything in between, and whatever the diet is that they're giving, can be the best of the best of everything, and care and feed and everything. When they add this one little scoop, which by the way is only 5.2 grams. It's like a teaspoon. And it's...

Holly Barr:

Yeah, it's not very much. Yeah. I was like, Okay, well it's not very much, but it's what they suggest.

John Dowdy:

That's right. And the reason why it's so small is because we're targeting the pituitary gland, which is roughly the same size in horses. And so it's not targeting the size of the body. It's targeting the size of that gland. And so, what we found with these barns and horses all over the country and different countries, they're all benefiting. And it's simply put, that they're just not getting the right amount of amino acid. So that's why we're supplementing this.

And so it's really amazing how well it works, how fast it works. And I think I'll throw in too, for those that are tuning in, because on the tub itself it's one or two scoops. So the science behind that is, if you give a scoop in the morning, then the hormones are released from the pituitary and the hormones have about a 23 and a half hour life cycle. So by the time you give a scoop the following morning, the hormone levels are back to where they would normally be for that age of a horse. Which is perfectly fine and works well for pretty much all of them.

When you're dealing with an injured horse or a performance horse, and you're looking for repair and recovery and things like that, a lot of people are giving a scoop in the morning and a scoop in the evening. So that's just helping to keep the hormone levels elevated for faster repair and recovery. So it's something that people can test around with. There's not any negative side effects with it at all. So, people can test just giving one scoop versus two scoop, but that's kind of the science behind that.

Yeah. Well, awesome. We're going to have this transcribed. We're going to have these pictures on there. And so I know that this is going to be a huge benefit to a lot of folks out there that are looking for something to help get their horse back to where they need them to be in the recovery process. And of course we have to say, it's not a guaranteed thing. It's just, we have thousands and thousands of stories. That the odds of it working are in the high percentile.

Holly Barr:

Yeah. Well, I appreciate you letting us tell his story, and our goal, with Bojangles making a strong comeback, we just wanted to get the story out there and let everybody know what helped our horse. To try to hopefully give motivation to anybody else that may be going through this. Because an injury like that is, it's emotionally stressful for you and the horse. And so any motivation I can give to somebody to keep going with their horse, and definitely give Equinety a try. It's definitely, I do believe that was a turning point for Bojangles. And so, it's definitely worth a try.

John Dowdy:

Yeah. And as you were saying that, because we talked about the stress of the horse, but not to mention the stress on the owner. Because you're going through all that as well. So I'm sure that had a very large impact when you see Bojangles as kind of calm and easy and going through it. Then that helps you out as well on your side, which helps everybody, the whole team that's working on this situation.

Holly Barr:

Oh absolutely. If he would've... Him being calm was a major factor for me to keep going. Because being in the stall for that length of time, it would be stressful on any horse. So, he still had a good outlook on life. He still had the will to live. He still, all of that, I think, made me keep going. Because a lot of people look at those pictures and they're like, Oh my gosh. They're like, I would've given up a long time ago. Or, I can't believe you did that. You know? And as long as he had the attitude to get better and to keep going, then I was going to keep going as well.

John Dowdy:

Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. Can't give up on these critters.

Holly Barr:

Nope. You can't. Sometimes they surpass your expectations.

John Dowdy:

Yeah. That's absolutely right. Well, Holly Barr out of Ohio, thank you so much for taking the time to share this awesome story here on the Team Equinety Podcast.

Holly Barr:

Oh, well thank you for having us, or having me, and letting me share Bojangles' story with you.

John Dowdy:

Absolutely. Okay, thank you so much.

Holly Barr:

All right. Take care.

John Dowdy:

Bye bye.

Holly Barr:

Bye.