Minutus

I would find it hard to confuse Aur and nat-m, as although they have
many rubrics in common, they present so differently ( to my mind)

I would agree with Joy that the cheerful of aur will have (must have!)
obvious strings..e.g an aur business man may seem cheerful but the
atmosphere won't feel it. Their way of avoiding the real issue is to
work work work. They are intense.

Also Think of those people who, when you speak to them in the street
'appear' cheerful (put it on ) but sometimes you just glimpse as they
go their demeanour plummets back to their own preoccupation internally
( that can be nat-m'ish too ). Thier cheerfulness is more likely to be
OTT. I think of one young man I saw who had taken various drugs , who
reminded me first of Dys -co, with his anxious smile, as his
cheerfullnes was so forced it seemed, he was intense, in your face, but
terribly over cheerful about it. His eyes weren't chereful though, they
were desperate. (quite Anac too) The *feeling* I had when he was in the
room though was that inside he was looking at me through prison bars
that he was gripping with white knuckles and was sweating with the
effort of it and a frantic desperate, emotional pain beyond his
endurance, expression on his face pressed against the bars. No mention
of depression or suicide, he was loquatious and also felt slightly
dangerous, but not threatening. he did really well on aur. Another
chap I saw was very pleasant, lots of decorum, very well educated,
cheerful but through gritted teeth as it were, you could tell from his
demeanour though, that he had reached the end. In fact he seemed to me
to have a slight overall tremor. No matter how much I pressed him he
never directly spoke of his own feelings, he was behaving perfectly but
you could feel the seething inner turmoil. It was only my feeling ( but
very useful in understanding the Px) that if this pain wasn't turned
inward as it was, but outward instead, he could almost kill; ( even
though he was a lovely, kind, gentle person) therefore knowing it was
turned inward you can see the suicidal potential without asking about
it. The way he referred to his inner state was to quote Churchill
referring to his 'Black dog' that followed him. I had the feeling that
for him to directly talk about ( therefore look directly at) his own
torment would have resulted in a complete breakdown. His 'desperate
holding on' was all that was between him and disaster. He did
brilliantly on aur.

That is the state that I see in 50% of the cases needing Aur, i.e. not
the classic presentation of Aur; invariably as far as I can remember,
in men. The females I see needing it are usually much more expressive
and clearly state that they feel suicidal.
Simon

Hi Simon & Robyn,

Thanks for sharing these excellent MM differentials and insights - can I just add
to one or two points made, including Joy's ?

Also Think of those people who, when you speak to them in the street

That was exactly what happened when the px left the consultation room - she
would have extreme difficulty in maintaining the 'mask' of cheerfulness as she
went out of the door and her face literally dropped as she walked away; that was
why I bore it in mind, as it was so characteristic.

room though was that inside he was looking at me through prison bars

That's exactly what I meant about the head ruling the heart - it was all *locked in*
and rationalised.

MIND; TEMPERAMENT; sanguine (20) *
MIND; THEORIZING (K87, SRI-997, G70) (28) **
MIND; THOUGHTS; clearness of (58) *

Joy asked for MM examples for Aurum:

Allens Handbook
"Disgust for life, inclination to suicide. Sadness; with frequent weeping; as if a
misfortune impended. Unreasonable contrariety. Excessive cheerfulness,
carelessness. "

Scholten Elements:
Mood: haughty, cheerful, bored, complaining, worried, gloomy, suicidal by
jumping from high building or driving car against a wall.

Gross:
Mood changing -- Cheerfulness or despondency

Homeopathic World:
Homeopathic World 1884, page 262
A CASE OF SUICIDAL MANIA CURED BY AURUM METALLICUM.
By BABU RAJENDRA NATH BANERJEA, L. M. S., Medical Practitioner,
Allahabad.
BABU R. PM, a religiously disposed middle - aged man, formerly a student of
the Calcutta Medical College, consulted me last year about his complaints. He said
that in the night he sobs aloud when asleep, gets frightful dreams, and feels a
sense of fatigue on walking in the morning. His most troublesome complaint was
that he desired to end his existence by hanging. This desire he used to get when
he would be left alone. He is a married man and father of several children, not at all
tired of life. He had no fearfulness, neither any palpitation of the heart or anguish,
but he was full of rash anger and vehemence - the least contradiction used to
excite his wrath. He is not at all hypochondriac; on the contrary, he is very
intelligent, dutiful, and cheerful. He himself, being a homoeopath, had tried
several medicines, such as Bell., Nux V., Sulph., etc., but to no effect.
I prescribed Aurum M. 3 trit., one grain thrice daily for a week. After a week he
reported to me that he had slept soundly, his temper was better, and above all he
had no tendency to hang himself. He insisted upon my continuing Aurum for a
few months.

Other examples are given by Boennighausen, Clarke, Jahr, Phatak, Knerr,
Vermeulen and Zandvoort. Hope that explains why I might register
the compensatory 'cheerfulness' !

best wishes, Barbara

--- In minutus@yahoogroups.com, Simon King wrote:

Remember being taught by someone that Many comedians were Aurum types. Makes
sense to me with Tony Hancock, Peter Sellers etc.
Jeremy
I find it difficult imagining Aurum as being cheerful enough to the
extent you would use it as a rubric, i.e. consider it as part of the
case, regardless of the stages that Aurum might present as. From the
little that Vera gave us for this case - responsibility, cheerful and
uncomplaining, constipation, hair loss, desire for sweets with an
apparent <<< 4pm - I would be leaning more towards a cancer diathesis
than a syphilitic one
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