Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Poultice Patrol, Part One: "Which Aisle Has the Horse Diapers?"

First let me start off by stating that I am quite proud of the fact that I have never changed a diaper on a baby-- or on any other creature for that matter-- in my entire life. So the fact that I decided to place a diaper on my horse turned out to be a far more momentous occasion than I had foreseen.No, I didn't put a diaper on Wally's butt. I put it on his sore hoof.
One of my friends heard about Wally's brewing hoof abscess, and she asked, "Oh, are you using a diaper for the poultice?"
My response was along the lines of, "Huh?"
Turns out that a Huggies or a Pampers works quite well to hold a poultice in place temporarily. Problem is, you see, is that the person handling the disposable diaper must comprehend the proper application of the aforementioned Huggies or Pampers. I knew I was in trouble when I went to Target and was confronted with an entire wall of disposable diapers, all in different sizes, according to the weight of the baby. I stood there thinking, "How much does Wally's hoof weigh? Is it preemie size? Toddler size?"
Next, I was flabbergasted that I was expected to purchase 40 or 80 of these things. I grabbed a Target employee and asked her, "Don't these things come in a six-pack?"
She looked at me like I was insane. She said slowly, "No..."
Then she got an even weirder look on her face when I began to explain that, "I want these for my horse..."
About the time I figured Target security was scoping out the crazy lady in muck boots on Aisle 15, I simply smiled and said, "Never mind" and grabbed a bag of 40 diapers sized to fit a 12-15 pound baby. (Of course, that weight correlated to nothing in my experience, as I know next to nothing about babies, so I just imagined a 12-15 pound turkey and figured that was approximately the correct size).
Thus I went back to my parents' place where Wally is recuperating in rather lush surroundings. He seems to like being part of a herd, and the softer ground and lots of green grass is much to his liking. I'd say he's about 50% better, but there isn't any drainage yet. However, I can see a definite area on his outside heel bulb that looks about ripe to pop, so maybe we'll have the long awaited eruption o' pus in a few days. Meanwhile, please continue reading the blog post below, where I present my photo essay on the entire diaper debacle.

3 comments:

Nancy said...

Oh my god, i've got tears from laughing so hard! Now, i never knew about the diaper thing - i always used sanitary napkins whenever our horses had absesses. And I also take great pride in the fact that i've never changed a diaper, either!

My farrier tells a similar story - big burly, cowboy type guy. Goes to the drug store and is facing a wall of sanitary napkins trying to decide which ones to buy - this little older lady comes up and says "Oh you look confused, can I help you?" Fred the farrier says "Oh, you don't understand, they are for a horse." Little older lady says - "Oh dear, it doesnt matter what size she is, any of these would fit".

Anonymous said...

That's such a funny story Cindy!!! Thanks for sharing it! Wally's lucky he has a such a dedicated mom who's willing to -gasp- risk complete and total humiliation and buy diapers for him! And then she even writes about it on her blog afterward to make her readers laugh and smile.

Hope Wally feels well soon!!!

Cindy Hale said...

Oh, I'd suffer pretty much any humiliation for my horse. I guess I'm prepared for it, after all the years of showing, where sometimes I ended up being REALLY humiliated! Nancy, your story is so funny! It's been shared numerous times already. Your farrier is now famous. :)