19/01/2026
It is with unimaginable sadness and heartbreak that we have to write to you all about Spirit.
After being admitted to the Equine Hospital in Lisbon and undergoing an MRI, the results have now come back. From the very beginning, we knew that the aggressive cancer in Spirit’s eye carried the gravest of prognoses, and that even surgery and treatment would offer only the faintest hope, with a long and painful road to recovery.
Still, we hoped. We hoped beyond reason, beyond fear, because Spirit was extraordinary.
Throughout his ordeal, Spirit endured excruciating, relentless pain with a quiet courage that humbled everyone who cared for him. He never complained, never gave up. He simply trusted us, and carried on with a strength that was nothing short of heroic. We so desperately wished that the results would bring even the smallest glimmer of relief or possibility.
Instead, they were devastating. Far, far worse than we could ever have imagined.
The cancer was not only aggressive but deeply and extensively invasive. While this type of cancer rarely spreads to distant parts of the body, Spirit’s disease had already advanced far beyond what surgery or treatment could overcome. Its location and severity meant that it could not be fully removed, and even the most radical intervention would not have stopped its progression. There was no treatment that could have saved him. There was no path to recovery. Spirit would not have survived this cancer.
Despite unimaginable and unrelenting pain, Spirit endured with extraordinary courage and dignity. His strength, his gentleness, and his quiet trust in those who loved him were nothing short of heroic. We so desperately wished for a different outcome, for even the smallest chance, but the reality we were faced with was heartbreaking and final.
The results have left us devastated, knowing that love alone could not spare him, and that all we could do was protect him from further suffering.
We shall always remember Spirit as such a beautiful kind soul and we hope that he can now run and gallop freely over the rainbow with no more pain.