Annie's Story: The Facebook Foal

In April 2010 we were anxiously waiting for our miniature horse/Shetland pony mare named Tease to have her first foal. As the days passed and she went weeks over her due date, our anxiety rose even higher. As usual we had our live foaling cam on and people across the world were anxiously watching and waiting for our new arrival with us.

Finally, Tease went into labor. I hurriedly posted on Facebook, Twitter and several horse forums to alert our cam watchers that Tease was finally going to foal.

I was watching the cam when I saw Tease finally lay down to push. I ran to the barn and unfortunately saw that the head was stuck. I called hubby in and together we worked to get the foal out. After finally pulling out a beautiful bald faced pinto filly, I thought the hard part was over.

After about 30 minutes we noticed that the Annie was having seizures and was having trouble getting up. My heart sank. I immediately called my neighbor Sally who is an expert in horse reproduction. My phone was exploding with cam watchers wanting to know what was wrong.

I explained to Sally about the foal being overdue and stuck during delivery. She said the foal was probably septic and would need aggressive treatment with antibiotic shots around the clock. I was stunned. In all my years of breeding horses I had never read or been told that a foal that is overdue and/or stuck during delivery can cause the foal to develop septicemia.

After a week of round the clock care at home I knew we were fighting a losing battle. Annie was not turning the corner and was getting sicker. I called several veterinarians and they all basically said the same thing. Unless Annie got treatment at Ohio State University; she probably wasn't going to make it. I was devastated and heartbroken. We had already spent hundreds of dollars treating her at home and the estimate for OSU was upwards of $2000. with no guarantee that they could save her. Reluctantly I posted on the internet to "Annie's Aunties" that Annie was probably not going to make it.

That was the start of one of the most amazing things I have ever been witness to. I only wish I had the words to accurately describe the outpouring of love that we experienced from virtual strangers. Within hours several people had started collections on Facebook and several horse forums to get the money to save Annie. I couldn't believe what I was reading. The majority of the donators had never even owned horses. I had to search my soul as I felt it wasn't right to accept this gift from strangers. I felt that I had failed. After many phone calls and emails I agreed to accept their generous gift to save Annie, but only if the money was sent straight to OSU.

I still vividly remember reading emails on my phone on the hour long drive to take Annie to OSU. Many of them were from people suffering from their own illnesses that had been watching Annie. They told us how watching Annie struggle to live everyday gave them hope to beat their own illness. They told us how Annie gave them strength to move past their own pain when they watched us giving her painful shots every two hours. Others told us how they had to put a pet down in the past due to a large unexpected vet bill and they wanted to help. Both hubby and I had tears streaming down our faces reading all the touching stories that Annie's Aunties shared with us.

Thankfully after a week at OSU, Annie came home and went on to fully recover. My goal is to write a book detailing Annie's story and recovery, and use the book proceeds to start a charity to help others with large unexpected veterinarian bills. It's a big dream but after living through Annie's story I know that all things really are possible.