How a Ranch Kid Saved a Life
My daughter, Abby, has heard Robert Burns’ adage “the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”
She lived that adage last Sunday.
Saturday night, she went to her senior prom, exuding glamour in a beautiful dress. When she came home, she described her entire evening as surreal.
Her Sunday plan was to sleep in, do laundry and homework and revel in the afterglow of the prom.
Mice and men didn’t change her plans, but a milk cow and her mother did.
Instead of reliving the glamour, she found herself slogging through the muck of a corral, covered in the fluids of life.
My first meeting on the Montana Board of Public Education, 180 miles away, would start early the next day. I planned to do chores, double feed the cows and sheep and leave by noon, delivering meat on my way.
My trip to the barn for morning chores revealed an extra set of feet in the corral.
Maija the milk cow had calved again.
This was calf number 16 or 17.
Maija has surpassed all of the averages for a milk cow, both in lifespan and likelihood to breed every year.
The calf stood near the manger.
Maija lay across the corral, ignoring her calf.
Maija needed to be milked morning and night while I would be gone so I called my brother, Roger, for reinforcement.
We planned to milk Maija and be sure the baby nursed, too, but Maija would not stand. Her ears drooped and her eyes were glazed. When she finally stood up, Roger and I milked out some colostrum before Maija staggered and fell.
She exhibited the classic symptoms of milk fever that comes on when a cow pours all of her calcium into her milk without reserving some for other bodily functions.
Maija was about to die.
She needed calcium and she needed it fast.
I don’t keep 500 ml of calcium and magnesium on hand.
The vet clinic is closed on Sundays.
In a panic, I grabbed my bottles of Tums.
While Abby bottle-fed colostrum to Queenie the calf – named for Abby’ prom – I dumped Tums down Maija’s throat.
Maija didn’t resist.
Clearly, she needed more help than Tums could offer.
I considered canceling my meeting. Roger said I should go. Maija would either live or die.
I really, really hate calling the vet.
Maija would die if I didn’t call.
The vet had the right meds.
Abby has given vaccinations, fed cold lambs, driven manual transmission pickups, sorted cattle, and carried frozen calves across icy creeks. Abby could inject calcium into Maija.
I told Abby that if Maija died, it wasn’t her fault, but if she lived, it was because Abby saved her.
Either this treatment would work or it wouldn’t.
Fear and uncertainty streamed down Abby’s face as she drove to town to pick up the medicine.
She was feeling exactly what ranchers feel every time an animal is in crisis – am I doing enough? What else can I do? What am I missing?
Maija didn’t even flinch at the needle Abby poked through her skin – a bad sign. Two hours later, she still wouldn’t stand.
So Abby drove to town for another bottle of medicine.
This time, Maija resisted Abby’s injections.
Roger came back that evening to help Abby milk.
By then, Maija was standing and Queenie was nursing.
Abby wasn’t ready to admit she is a hero, but she started to feel the relief we all feel when we have done enough.
Abby walked through the fire and came out the other side.
By the time I got home, Maija gulped down the grain in her bucket.
Abby hugged me and went straight to bed.