Posting to help out a friend.

The mare is Peppy bred. 15 Hands. Built like a tank. Alternating months of chiro and massage done on her.
Diet: Morning - 2.5 cups beet pulp, 2 cups alfalfa pellets, and magnesium pellets
Night - 2.5 cups beet pulp, 2 cups alfalfa pellets, acti-flex and aloe juice, 

First problem was...She started blowing up when the saddle was put on her back. Full on bronc mode tied to the trailer at a rodeo, or in her stall. Never when she was actually being ridden.

Assumption was the girth being older, uncleaned, and uncomfortable. She ordered a new fleece girth (a little shorter because it was maybe four inches from the saddle ring), blow ups happened less frequently but you could tell she was a time bomb. Then she REALLY blew up at the trailer, was fine lunging, fine when I got on, fine warming up for her, then she broke in two headed to first and rider took a serious spill. We assumed ovary problems with spring starting to come in and showing some heat signs, normal vet (a track vet) agreed and gave her regumate. He also watched her trot and gave her upper and lower hocks injected. He said there's been a lot of mares with issues this year. Her rankness decreased dramatically but was still hyper sensitive to the girth some days. Still super reactive down her croup or if touching her while walking behind her.

I talked her into hauling to a reputable lameness vet, lamness exam done, and had hocks, SI, TMJ injected, and chiro'd.

 Mostly fixed the issue, EXCEPT, on her right side she still had a reactive point that as soon as the girth touched, she"d flinch. Nothing on the left, nothing else on other ulcer points. This is also the spot where the ring sits on the cinch.

No blow ups for four months This Monday (07/22/19) she did a bunny hop when tightened, then nothing. She puts the saddle on, makes the cinch snug to walk out of the barn, hand walks her to her working area, and tightens a little snugger (her routine every time). This is where she absolutely came unglued yesterday, broke the lunge line and fence. She caught her, lunged her, tightened her again - nothing happened. Got on her - nothing again.

What could we be missing? She's fed up to the point where she doesn't want to put any more money into her. So hauling her back down for two hours for a scope is not happening. She's scared to run her tomorrow, which I get. 

Could a half breed off billet help with the pressure from the ring? Are we not looking outside of the box enough? Would her SI be sore again after four months? Buy one of them ring covers for the cinch?

I really don't want her to give up on this mare, they've done some crazy improvements in a year and I know the mare is just telling her she hurts. Just where or how or why.

That is a very unfortunate story. I have never been through something like this before but I will attempt to give my two cents. My friend had a horse that would always randomly break in two, after years of working the horse and many vet checks, it took some extreme digging to find out the horse had an old back/rib breakage that has healed wrong. They assumed maybe it got kicked/fell in the pasture while out for the winter, they later retired the gelding because there was no fixing it. My mare will get cinchy if she has ulcers. I always give her Healthy Gut and some time off for them to heal up. My personal opinion is there are too many nice horses in this world to sit on a bad one! I pray no one gets hurt and your friends horse feels better!

Random thoughts, but saddle fit or pad? kissing spine? stifles? That really is weird it's only sometimes but it does sound like something is hurting her or pinching somewhere. Maybe suggest a shoulder relief cinch? I know all too well how expensive it can get trying to pinpoint a random problem with no visible issues. I hope your friend figures out what is wrong with her mare so they can get back on the road. Good luck! 

A cinch issue would have to be so severe to even come close to that . My gut says kissing spine but totally respect not putting more money into one . At this point they have done all they can do and it's time to send them down the road. To many good ones out there than dealing with that  

So...I had that thought, the boyfriend didn't think it was possible because there's no significant lump there. That's where she's at, but to sell her to recoup some of the costs would be hard with the current issues. A lot of cards in the deck to figure out and sift through.

Thank you on that though, very insightful.

Stifles checked out okay. Nice thing is after tomorrow it can be tested without going on so we'll try different pads Shoulder relief has been talked about, saving pennies for it at the moment. She did have the shoulder dips and they're filling out so we'll try transitioning to a thinner pad as well. Thank you!

Education purposes - do kissing spine symptoms vary that much? It seems the first response to most problem cases is kissing spine, but I legit don't know enough to have even suggested that. Not bashing either, genuinely curious as to why you say that besides gut. Which most of the time are right anyways.

Maybe I missed it but are you treating for ulcers? That would be the first thing.. Then I'd go to saddle fit and actually have the mare fitted or try different saddles... Also kissing spine like others on here have said. 

My first thought with her blowing while being girthed is ulcers.

How old is the mare?  Did she have her testosterone levels checked by any chance?

She's 12. Did not, didn't even think of having that on the radar for her...

Haven't gone the ulcer route because she shows no symptoms besides the reaction on the right side only.

That sounds rough... and scary because there is nothing worse than riding an unpredictable horse. I always look for pain/ulcers first but I will say I have had several Peppy San Badger horses and two of them learned to buck and once they learned they did it whenever they felt like it. One did it for years - he is now 18 and trustworthy but he bucked a lot of guys off and it was always random and the timing never had a rhyme or reason. The other was only a 4 year old and kid gentle....until one day his owner fell forward on him and spooked him and he bucked him off - hard. That colt bucked from then on until I cut my losses. I never would trust him enough to lean out and rope. He could go several months or he could buck 12 times in one riding. They were just unpredictable. I own several Peppy San Badger horses and I am cautious of them all LOL. 

Symptoms CAN vary with it tjat mich ! Depends on where in the spine the problem is , how bad it is etc. would not surprise me if some days it was ok and others it hurt really bad. I have a bad back! Essentially kissing spine ( compressed disk) most days fine but when it hurts it HURTS. Other than that I’m healthy. Here is the deal in my opinion...........to me this is never going away. You will have to do some type of maintenance long term. Is this something the horse owner is willing to put up with ? Also , some horses just turn into A.... holes. For whatever reason they don’t want to do what you want them to and they are not shy about showing it. 

I know ulcers are painful BUT......... lots and lots of horses have ulcers and do not behave like this. As far as saddle fit goes, yes it matters. Some saddles fit better than others for a horse but even an ill fitting saddle should not cause this severe of a reaction. My mom went to NFR on several horses and always rode every horse she owned with the same saddle. All different types of horses. I’m sure her saddle fit some of those horses better than others BUT it wasn’t a matter of being completely normal vs getting nicked off simply from saddle fit. 

Years ago a friend had a smokin barrel horse that would "on occassion"  buck hard, at random times.  Not sure what type of saddle you have, but hers was a sports saddle.  She finally found that there was a small thread (think fishing line or clothing tag type) and when it would poke him ... he would buck.  Buyt it wasn't a consistent deal only when poked.  Might check your saddle.

We’ll go over her saddle and pad tomorrow before saddling up. She WAS in pain with her SI, but she use to stand parked out. She is standing like a normal horse since her injection and isn’t showing any pain since then. She poked around on her today and the mare just looked at her and stood like a rock, even the usual reactive spot. Other days I can put my hand on her hip to walk around her and she bunches up like a spring. 

I’ve had difficult horses who had shown favorites, but I’ve never dealt with an unpredictable one. Knew they were out there, guess I never really thought about what they did or how they acted. 

Here is my list to check off

teeth

ulcers

kissing spine

tack

oops forgot to throw EPM in there

If that doesn’t do it cut your losses and move on. 

I have a 16 yo QH M that I have loaned to a friend that owns a Wounded Warriors, Special Needs Horse Facility. This mare is very stoic, They have had her for 4 years now and during the last three weeks she had a light switch change when ridden in the pasture by one of her teen riders that's a pretty good rider. She got so on the muscle that she stepped off and walked back to the barn. I went out and checked on her noticing that she had a Hunter's bump on the left and some bad back and buttocks soreness. I worked on those areas and thought that should be good after two treatments. She didn't ride real good in the arena so they called me to come back out. I took her saddle and rode her myself. She was ON THE MUSCLE. I thought I was taking her to the starting gates. I told them that I wanted her to see my vet and away we went. I dosed her with Zesterra before loading. 45 min later I unload her and step back on her. She rode like a princess, the last time she was in that arena was a pro rodeo in deep ground that sucked the life out of both of us. This horse is loved by my vet's tech as she paved the way for her college rodeo and scholorship. Morgan noticed that she had the same stance "camped out" as she did when she would have a bad weekend away on the road. We had her scoped in Wisconsin after being on the road for a week and a half and she had ulcers it took her 5 weeks to clear the ulcers at that time. Morgan scoped her and found ulcers at the pyloric outlet and a few up at the glandular margin. Poor mare! (She takes her work seriously and I have no doubt that the young lady with some deep emotional problems she picked as "her person" has this mare internalizing those issues. I really believe our horses become an extension of us.) My granddaughter just started riding the mare the same time this young teenager came to the program. Stickers has been fine for my granddaughter and grandson but gotten worse for the young lady. 

This mare had a hx of pyloric ulcers in the past. They were difficult to heal. This time we put her on antibiotics and ulcergard with sucralfrate to really coat the stomach. I noticed she was standing better by time we got her back to her barn after a dose of each of the above and Zesterra. 

I have noticed horses that get pyloric and hindgut ulcers camp out and have a hard time wrapping up a barrel they also will get tight over the loin on the right side.  

I have had lots of horses with ulcers treat them as best you can and then try to figure out what set them off. Ulcers are a huge concern for me as when those are left open its a direct route for EPM to take hold as the immune system has a shield lost. 

I hope that you can get your horse scoped and rule out ulcers. 

I vote kissing spines.

the good news is it’s diagnosed via x-rays and in the grand scheme of diagnostic tools those are cheap.

Then ulcers and perhaps both as stressing over KS pain could cause ulcers.

I'd have her checked for Kissing Spine. To rule it out. My trainers horse had it, he had the surgery done and the random bucking fits stopped. I owned that horse for a year and he would randomly break out into bucking fits ... I never once back then thought it was health related, I didnt know any better. I tried to hang in with that horse for a year, thinking it was just him, since he was young and oh PSB on his papers yada yada... turns out the poor thing was in pain. I wish I knew back then, what I know now, hes a jam up heading horse and 1 bad cat in the barrel pen.