Nutrition-stress repertory - was English language question

[DCR]

As part of my PhD dissertation in nutrition I developed a repertory (Signs and Symptoms Related to Stress Induced Depletion of Nutrients). Building on the concepts and format of our homeopathic repertories as resources to aid in making appropriate choices in evaluating and treating individuals - I did the basic research into the nutritional aspects of stress. The idea that stress is responsible for nutrients being used up at an abnormal rate - and actually prevents certain nutrient absorption was the underlying precept. It is interesting to see that everything from anemia to kidney stones, from amnesia to psychosis all have nutritional components that are directly traceable to the biochemical results of stress. Just as with our homeopathic repertories - it is not a direct "if - then" and should never be used in that way. Just as with our repertories it is only a resource and in no way replaces the study of nutrition or the understanding of nutritional aspects of health and healing. However, it has already proven to be a wonderful tool to use when designing a program for recovery for an individual - even if it just makes the practitioner ask more questions and think about nutrition as a 'maintaining cause' to be considered.
Some of the information is readily available - buried in a variety of resources - and some was surprising. For example, individuals having experienced extreme stress may experience burning sensation in the mouth which may correlate to a Vitamin D deficiency - and burning of the feet, which may indicate a vitamin B5 deficiency.
The idea for this project came from my frustration as a practitioner. Stress seems to be a major component in the lives of so many of my clients. You can see the results of stress on the face of the individual as they walk in. You know it is having a very real biochemical effect - and yet the typical advice given to these individuals is "you have to relax". Well, they are already in a nutritional hole at that point. Giving them instructions about something else they have to do is like giving them a bigger shovel. The other typical advice is to give a multi-vitamin. Again, due to the stress situation, they are unable to process the input - so that doesn't help and they become more frustrated and more stressed.
Sorry - I did not intend to 'run on' about this - but as you might imagine, it is a subject near to my heart. While I appreciate Soroush's permission to post about this topic, I do not intend to misuse the forum.

[Teresa Kramer]

I am very glad you did. Most interesting, even to the lay person. t
Sorry - I did not intend to 'run on' about this - but as you might imagine, it is a subject near to my heart. While I appreciate Soroush's permission to post about this topic, I do not intend to misuse the forum.

[Shannon Nelson]

Hi Donna,
What a neat thing!!!
Many years ago, as a chronically-unwell teen raised by a
health-oriented mom, I did a similar thing to try to figure out (a) how
I could help pull myself together (this was way pre-homeopathy for me)
and (b) why, whenever our wonderful naprapathic doctor gave me (she
said hugely needed) B complex vitamins, I would feel better for a
couple of days, then rapidly way, way worse. I used the pretty amazing
index in Adele Davis's wonderful "Let's Eat Right to Keep Fit" to do my
own "repertorizing", and eventually found that for me, the key to the
vitamin thing was vit. B-5, which is grotesquely underrepresented in
almost every commercial B-complex formula. (Taking excess of certain
Bs can cause "artificial deficiency" of other Bs, e.g. in particular
B5... I really recommend that book!!) That plus related insights
(mostly from that book, and trial-and-error and etc. as the years went
on) were in a sense literally life-saving for me. I now share that
information with all of my "adrenally challenged" folks--including both
those I am not treating, and also those I treat homeopathically
(because the info is valuable during "between remedy" times, and also
will be when they do not have access to homeopathy). My experience
with this has covered only a limited range of symptom correspondences;
I would love to have easy access to more!

And a few other specific deficiency symptoms which have been really
useful over the years. So--if you publish that, I'll buy a copy! And
I'd encourage adding to it (as Davis' book does) what the best food
sources of the nutrients are.

Anyway--if you publish this, I would love to get a copy!
Shannon

[DCR]

Thank you Shannon,

I too loved Adele Davis's works - she was certainly a pioneer in publishing
health information for the public. I understand your experiences with B
vitamins but would (based on my research) argue that it is definitely not
artificial 'deficiencies' but rather other mechanisms at work - largely
related to bowel and liver function (or rather lack of function). I often
hear of people having a boomerang effect from vitamins and minerals - and
find it most often has to do with poor bowel/liver function and/or poor
quality of vitamins - as well as the timing and quantity of dosing. Also -
my pet peeve - the 'more is better' philosophy of supplements seems to be a
major problem.

I also would respectfully argue with your suggestion that nutrition be
considered "between remedies" or "when they don't have access to
homeopathy" since I believe nutritional deficiencies are a maintaining
cause and must be addressed in the totality of the healing program.
language question

[Shannon Nelson]

Hi Donna,
I heartily agree about problems with the "more is better" approach!!!!
i find that with vitamins, similarly to with remedies, the best amount
is "the least amount it takes to do the job"--tho of course the details
are different.

Below:
Well, I'd be interested to understand that idea better.
My term and idea of "artificial deficiencies" is the one she used, and
I found it to be really useful. She said that with some nutrients,
including some of the Bs, *proportion* was even more important than
amounts per se. E.g., I found that taking supplements with too little
B5 were not merely unhelpful, but did dramatically increase my symptoms
which turned out to (in the main) be sxs of B5 (pantothenic acid)
deficiency. They weren't just not *helping* that deficiency, they were
making it lots, lots worse.

I found that by eating certain foods which are markedly high in B1, I
would cause in my self a symptom which turned out to be from a B2
deficiency--which I could in fact rectify by taking a bit of added B2.
(Or by just cutting back on the offending food. ) Sunflower
seeds is one I remember--but we're talking a LOT of sunflower seeds.
Also I think wheat germ--again, a LOT. Both of those gave me painful
cracks at sides of mouth, which (thanks, Adele and indexer!) were
listed as deficiency of, and responded to supplementation of, B2.
Well, perhaps the other explanation would have worked out too...
What do you mean?
I agree in part; but I have also found--and this is a very small sample
I've tracked this part with; basically myself and my kids, really--that
many times when I've been "on a good remedy", I simply don't *need* to
take the things that I had been before. At times I've gone... well,
maybe even a couple of years? really without needing anything other
than good food. (Tho even at those times I tend to like "special
foods" too, e.g. algaes.)

I'm a really big believer in knowing *why* one is taking anything, and
don't take it if you don't need it. Personally, that tends to be well
taken care of by my good ol' short memory. I tend to just
*forget* to take anything that's not actually helping me! And even
now, during another extended period "between remedies", I am happiest
when I have just one (or a few) simple things, e.g. herbs, that will do
the job; when I'm taking a carefully crafted handful of vitamins and
etc. several times daily (as I often have), I feel like I am probably
really missing the point.

BUT if several carefully crafted handfuls daily is what it takes to
keep things balanced and working well, then I will most certainly do
that, with huge ongoing gratitude for the people and books and
experiences that have taught me how to do it!

Also, I keep seeing/reading cases where I'd have SWORN the person
needed to do this-or-that (cleansing, nutrient, whatever) to heal, but
danged if the remedy didn't just do the job... It's humbling and also
pretty exciting.

Still--as you may have gathered, I would never mean to undercut the
importance of nutrition...

Sorry if this is a bit of a babble--I'll be away for a couple of days,
but am really enjoying this thread!

Thanks again, Donna--more later!
Shannon

[DCR]

Ah but you've hit on the major problem with existing 'lists' of deficiency symptoms in the nutrition resources - they are typically presented as a 'this for that' instruction manual. As if you should go down the list with an adding machine. When you utilize a repertory approach - where you take a list of symptoms (fatigue, cracks in the corners of the mouth, hyperglycemia, brittle fingernails, muscle twitching, burning feet, etc.), see the list of nutrients each one brings up - then analyse as we would a set of potential homeopathic remedies that are indicated by rep analysis, you are more likely to see a more informative picture before you.
While I do enjoy this discussion - it is off topic to this list, and I would suggest any further discussion be private.

[Soroush Ebrahimi]

Why do you think it should be OFF TOPIC? I thin it is certainly ON TOPIC
(all those in favour say AYE)

Regards

Soroush

[Holly Fowles]

AYE
~Holly~

[Shannon Nelson]

LOL, since Soroush feels (and I happily agree) that it's not off-topic,
unless someone objects, I'll continue on the list?

Below:
It might *appear* that way also with our reps, right?
IMO, as with any "single symptom", whether physiological or
homeopathy-related, the single symptom is in itself only one clue;
other facts must--as you've said--be considered as well.
That's really what I did.
As I looked up (as best I could from what was available) each of my
symptoms, I found a number of possible causes (possible nutrient
connections)--and of course many of those are interconnected as well.
In my case, at that time, it was interested to me that pantothenic acid
/ B5 was the one that came up over and over, and "untied the knot" for
me. Of course I am not trying to generalize from that, except to note
that (a) adrenal weakness is more and more common, and (b) B5 is one of
the really major players in adrenal health, and (b) it is (I like this
word today ) grotesquely undersupplied in nearly every commercial
B-complex and multivitamin formula, and (d) at least for *some*
people--emphatically myself, but I have definitely found others
too--that shortfall makes the difference between helping and hurting.

And as with homeopathy, the process of following thru the broader range
of symptoms to their (possible) causes leads to a broader understanding
of where the weakness lies and how to rectify it--similar to the
difference between e.g. finding that Belladonna stops the headaches,
and the finding that ah, if I give calc-c, then we don't need the
belladonna because the headaches don't happen. Ih my case (just for an
example--my example pool here is very small!) a similar instance for my
nutritional "detective work" was to find that (a) I had an *extremely*
high, ongoing need for magnesium (and learned those specific sxs very
well); and (b) high need for magnesium is one possible effect of weak
adrenals (along with numerous others). And so, over time, I got to see
that (c) as I nurtured my inborn adrenal weakness (those vitamins and
later homeopathy, and also much more), it was kind of fascinating to
see that formerly huge need for magnesium drop over time, until finally
becoming pretty much "normal"--no more (as it were) belladonna
headaches!

And then, at the deeper level, as I said--with "a good remedy" those
other needs disappeared too--but then, I never did try living on junk
food... And, as time and circumstances change, who knows, I
suppose there are times and points--and constitutions!--where no amount
of "good remedy" will remove the need for attention to nutrition! (And
again, my diet was by most standards pretty excellent all along; just
that at my worst, "excellent" was not nearly good enough.)

Actually one reason I've come to prefer using foods and herbs where
possible, is that there is (logically to an extent, but very much in my
experience) less apt to be an issue of "undersupply", "oversupply",
"balance", etc.--herbs as a rule have a broader and more balanced
action than do single, isolated nutrients, and also there is, in the
case of many herbs, a far longer and broader base of knowledge and
experience as to their effects (and cautions) compared with single
nutrients. (Vitamin C might be an exception.)

Donna--if you, or anyone else, feel strongly that you *don't* want to
carry this on the list, I'll be happy to take it private, and ask for
those who want to be included, to let us know. But unless there are
specific objections, since Soroush is happy for it to continue here, I
also feel that it could be useful to leave it here.

Thanks!
Shannon

[Irene de Villiers]

Finrod wrote:
AYE!!!!
.IRene
--
Irene de Villiers, B.Sc AASCA MCSSA D.I.Hom/D.Vet.Hom.
P.O. Box 4703 Spokane WA 99220.
www.angelfire.com/fl/furryboots/clickhere.html (Veterinary Homeopath.)
"Man who say it cannot be done should not interrupt one doing it."