Hi, I’m Stephanie and I have a horse named Mustard. You may have already known that as I tend to post a lot of photos on Facebook. Mustard is 25 years old and I have been grateful to have him in my life for the past 14 years. He has taught me so much over the years and he is my best friend. We have shared countless adventures together. As you may be aware Mustard had an emergency on Monday August 22, 2022. He was suffering from colic which is every horse owners worst fear. His veterinarian came out right away and gave him pain medication and IV fluids; however, he was still in terrible pain. I immediately hauled him up to Purdue and he was diagnosed with a strangulating lipoma; meaning, a slow growing non cancerous fatty tumor had wrapped around his small intestine and his small intestine was being strangled. The only chance at trying to save Mustard was to have major abdominal surgery to remove the affected area of intestine. Mustard’s first surgery took 5 hours and he had a four foot section of his small intestine removed. He initially did well post operatively but less than 12 hours later he started showing signs of colic again and required a second emergency surgery. Mustard’s second surgery lasted close to another 5 hours and he lost another 6 feet of small intestine due to a stricture near the previous surgical site. On Wednesday he had to have a plasma transfusion because he had low protein levels. Mustard is still hospitalized at Purdue and he is still receiving IV fluids and several other IV medications. As of Thursday he is stable and showing signs of improvement. He was started on small amounts of food but later in the evening he started to have reflux and has had to have a tube placed through his nose and into his stomach to remove excess fluid from his stomach. Mustard’s veterinarian has estimated that he will be hospitalized for at least a week at Purdue depending on how he is doing each day. He is still not fully out of the woods just yet, but he is a strong guy and and he has a lot of people sending prayers and good thoughts his way.

His two surgeries, hospitalization, medications, and plasma transfusion are estimated to be between a total of $10,000 and $15,000. I have had several friends ask if I had a go fund me set up to make donations to help with some of the cost. I was hesitant to create one but if you are willing to support Mustard, he and I would definitely appreciate it. If you are not in a place to help financially I understand. Please continue to keep him in your thoughts and prayers!

Thank you,

Stephanie