Androctonus amoreuxii hebraeus
Case
J.A. A 59-year-old male.
This case was taken in October 1998, in front of a group of
students; J.A. was referred by one of the members of this class. His
immediate appearance was of a person with considerable scarring on
one side of his face and forehead-obviously from some sort of injury
or accident. He walked with a slight limp and described himself as a
retired "operations supervisor." He was wearing an army camouflage
outfit and a baseball hat decorated on the front with a plastic
moose, American flag, and an orange crystal. He was also wearing
American-Indian-style jewelry. He had a florid complexion and a large
abdomen. He spoke in a confident, somewhat arrogant manner, obviously
not at all intimated by speaking in front of a class of students. We
observed his apparent pleasure at listening to himself talk
throughout the consultation.
J.A. was coming for treatment for a number of physical complaints:
allergies, an enlarged prostate, high blood pressure, and low-grade
diabetes.
"I don't like taking pills and never took medicine when I was young
as I figured it wouldn't work. They stuck me with all sorts of
needles and really screwed me up. I got a flu shot and then got the
flu. I am taking medicine for blood pressure and diabetes but would
like to get off."
J.A. reports that he has had allergies for as long as he can
remember, but that they have been getting worse over the last couple
of years. "I was hooked on nose spray but I was a professional driver
and the medicine made me drowsy." His allergy symptoms include a
cough with a lot of salivation, sneezing, post-nasal drip, stuffiness
and pressure in sinuses.
"I am outside in the woods all year round, hunting and fishing. They
are worst outside, in the Fall when the leaves start to decay. It's
the revenge of the deer. The only time they are better is at the
ocean."
When asked about how this affects his life he says:
"Nothing stops me from doing what I want to do. I spent a lot of my
early years alone. I entertained myself. You can change anything you
want to. At age twenty I was in the army doing small arms training.
Got shot in the head and hurt a hell of a lot. I spent a year and a
half undergoing plastic surgery. Took a big chunk out of my nose and
lip. I know what pain really is. Excruciating pain when they skin you-
that is really cool. I don't like morphine. At first they gave me a
lot and I learned to do without and go somewhere where there was no
pain. I had so many shots you could squeeze my arm and the medicine
would squirt out. In the army they had me see a psychiatrist a couple
of times before the surgery-they were concerned about my mind,
worried about the disfigurement. I said the first thing I'm going to
do is get some beer and go hunting with friends. Being disfigured
doesn't bother me-life's too short. Once I hit my hand with a hammer
and said 'Boy are you stupid'-I put it under cold water and sutured
it myself."
When asked about his childhood he said:
"As a child, my father was away at war. We used to play soldiers and
I was better at it than the other kids. I was the only kid on the
block with a bow and arrow and a tomahawk. Two brothers-I kicked
their butts. As a child I spent a lot of time with my grandmother.
She was part American Indian. There were stuffed animal heads all
around the room. I learned about being in tune with nature, about
animals. I learned how to manipulate situations. I like being able to
get away, to soar. The most peaceful times I ever had weres when I
was learning to fly. In a life/death experience when you re-run your
tapes, you are looking down, you fly."
When asked about his work (J.A. was a truck driver) he said:
"Work was challenging. I learned to read people pretty well-how to
work with a bunch of idiots without turning them into a hostile group
against you. I read people pretty well. My brother says I'm a
manipulator. Some people call it a snow-job. I take a situation and
turn it around and no one knows you're doing it. I'm intuitive. I
feel vibrations from people. I can look at people and see colors over
their heads. I can project thoughts to animals. The animal has no
idea I am there. Whatever you think of you can be, if you want to
enough."
He spoke at length about his love of hunting:
"Weather doesn't bother me because I have no control over it.
Yesterday was a perfect day because I got within sixty yards of a
buck. It was a good day for a hunter...when humans stalk an animal it
can smell them and moisture keeps the smell down. Killing is not a
sport. I'm dead serious about it. I know I can catch them if I want
to. I knew where to go and I stayed there patiently until the buck
came near. I can communicate psychically with the animals. I said to
it, 'I'm going to kill you' and it turned its head because it knew I
had it. I had my bow and arrow aimed. I decided not to kill the deer,
but I could have. The Indians could go up to an animal and touch it
and let it go on."
He said he slept well unless the allergies interfere and he has to
sleep propped up. He also wakes up at night to urinate (due to his
enlarged prostate):
"I dream about whatever I decide I want to dream about. I make up my
own story. I plan things in my dreams and then carry them out."
"I collect knives, guns, and spurs. I also keep feathers and fur
from the animals I have killed. I don't throw anything away-you name
it and I've probably got it."
"That idiot in Iraq-how many people are prepared for Armageddon?
It's coming and I have plenty of guns for everyone."
"Money rules the world and our president. I'm a Roman Catholic and I
believe in morality-right is right and wrong is wrong. Clinton
disgusts me-I'm surprised at how pissed I am at him. He's sticking it
to the American people. I'll just wait until the election."
When asked about fears he says, "I've never feared anything. I've
been there, done that. I kick butt." "I'm 59 years old and I haven't
slowed down."
J.A. smashed his right heel fifteen years ago and it is still
painful. He has arthritis in the right leg and knee, and some
cramping in the leg-hence the limp.
For food, J.A. desires spicy food, garlic, fish, pizza, and prime
ribs. "Prime rib end-cut is the ultimate-I worked as a butcher once
too."
Now he has to watch his diet for blood sugar. He checks his blood
sugar daily and takes medication when his levels indicate the need.
He drinks a lot of water and "a fair amount of Jack Daniels." He
says he is warm-blooded.
Evaluation
The most striking thing about this case was that, as a group, we
were all fascinated and horrified listening to J.A. 's description of
stalking animals. He obviously felt an enormous power in his ability
to be the one who decided whether an animal would live or die, and
letting them go was his way of expressing "compassion" and feeling
powerful. We could picture him with bow and arrow poised, ready to
shoot his prey, and sending the animal a psychic message that it was
in his power. We were struck by the fact that his allergies were
keeping him from hunting-the symptoms were protecting the organism.
J.A. 's obsession with hunting seems to have been there from
childhood, with his love of playing soldiers and "kicking butt," but
what affected his life the most was having to endure the excruciating
pain from his gunshot wound. He was able to survive in conditions
that most others would have not been able to withstand, and even
seemed to derive pleasure from his ability to do so. This is one of
the unique qualities of the scorpion in the desert, that can survive
when anything else would perish. J.A. 's mention of Saddam Hussein
and his own readiness to fight when Armageddon came indicate his
feeling of being ready for an attack. In terms of his language and
how it relates to Androctonus (scorpion) pathology, he used phrases
like "stuck with needles" and Clinton "sticking it to the American
people." He also likes to hunt with a bow and arrow, which resembles
the one-pointed sting of the scorpion tail. Without knowing about
Androctonus, we would have considered giving Sulphur-because of
J.A. 's theorizing about life (much more than is included in this
article), his love of collecting unusual objects, his eccentric
clothing ("his rags are his riches"), and his arrogant self-
confidence. His food desires and generals fit Sulphur as well.
However, what is characteristically most unusual about this case is
J.A. 's extraordinary ability to survive and his relationship to
attacking and being attacked. These are not covered by Sulphur. We
discussed the possibility of a snake or some other animal remedy, but
the prescription of Scorpion seemed to fit his state perfectly.
Rx: Androctonus, LM1 daily. [Note: J.A. did not follow this regimen
and only took the remedy sporadically.]
Followups
December, after 2 months
J.A. comes in wearing street clothes. His allergies are 50% better-
no phlegm, nose is clear, and he can breathe well. He used to have
terrible tearing of the eyes; that has stopped. He doesn't have to
sleep propped up at an angle any more. He's been out in the woods
most of the time for the last couple of months and it has been good.
Blood pressure is normal, stable; he's still taking BP medication.
When asked about himself in general, J.A. reports:
"It's been phenomenal. I feel an inner feeling change. Life is not
so much of a hassle. I have an inner feeling of peace and joy.
Attitudes have changed. Clinton has not bothered me. I'm more in tune
with what I am doing. Not tired or listless. I used to fall asleep at
8pm. Now I'm active until 11pm. [We did not know this before.]
Sleeping through the night now. Not having to get up in the middle of
the night to pee."
J.A. speaks about being in the woods and seeing the young plants
sprouting and changes in nature. The pain in his leg has increased
recently. He says it is due to physical exertion.
April, after 6 months J.A. looks less disfigured. The whole class
comments on this; or are we just getting used to his appearance? He
reports:
"Allergies are 90% better. No problem with leaf mold this year.
I am more tolerant of people and ideas. I've mellowed out.
Hunting-I let most of them go now. This year I would have taken
fifteen but I've only taken two. It's like wildflowers. I don't pick
them but leave them for others to enjoy."
His legs are much better. He is still taking blood sugar medication,
but only about half the amount he was taking before. "My doctor said
to me 'What happened?'"
Rx: Androctonus, LM2. He has taken this intermittently since then.
After 9 months
J.A. reports that he now has no allergies at all. He is still on
the same meds for high blood pressure. Although his condition is
completely stable, he won't stop these meds until his doctor suggests
it. The same goes for the diabetes. He only takes the meds
occasionally, if he has eaten sugar. His arthritis is much better. He
is not walking with a limp and can use his leg fairly normally. He
does not have the headaches or neck pain that he used to have. J.A.
told me he was bored with his collection of knives and guns and was
thinking of getting rid of it. In general, he is much calmer and
happier in himself.
The hidden colors of light : a case of iridium metallicum
By gina inez, rshom (na)
The following is a case of Iridium Metallicum. With careful
listening, intuition, the use of a rubric in the Complete Repertory,
and Jan Scholten's Homeopathy and the Elements, I was able to
prescribe this remedy successfully. My client is one of three adult
sisters, two of whom I had already treated. One received Magnetis
Polis Arcticus, and the other Kali Phosphoricum. The third sister, my
new client Iris (not her real name), came to see me mid-June 1998.
Iridium metallicum
Case
Female, sales manager, age 39, single: she is of medium height,
slender and willowy, with short brunette hair, wearing some make-up
which accents her strong and attractive features. Her eyes are
bright, big and almond-shaped, inquisitive and knowing. She blinks
them frequently. Her pants and shirt are both casual and carefully
chosen.
Iris, first of all, presented with a list of physical complaints.
1) Frequent urination: and occasional incontinence with cough,
concern for "control of my bladder." She drinks fluids frequently and
wakes at least once nightly to urinate.
2) Hypoglycemia: lightheaded and foggy when hungry or when eating
carbohydrates. Snappy, irritable, amel. with eating, amel. with wine,
amel. eating protein for breakfast and lunch. These symptoms
disappear on vacation.
3) Ailments from jet travel: client frequently travels for business;
sore throats, swollen glands, sneezing, nasal obstruction, coughing
ensue.
4) Skin rashes since childhood: eczema on arms; as an adult, genital
herpes also on left nate.
5) Headaches: dull pain in forehead, average once weekly, agg.
before herpes outbreaks, or with neck pain. Cervical vertebrae tend
to dislocate, also triggering lower back pain.
6) Sore chest: from holding her breath, she believes.
Iris suffers chronic tiredness. She wishes to have sustained energy
and an easier relationship with food. "Spiritually," she said, "I
want to merge and ground and be in present time." She is fearful she
will "sabotage" her own joy. "Although I'm joyful now; if it's too
good, I will leave."
Iris' story
"My whole life I have wondered why I am here. Who am I? My issues
revolve around self worth. I was a sensitive child. I was
told, 'Overly sensitive.' I would transform myself to get love and
approval by noticing what others needed. Even as a child, I was
either self-conscious and shy or very directly focused."
"I have two selves:
7) a successful corporate business person in a corporate
environment;
8) a spiritual self that seeks and desires a spiritual environment."
Iris is considering changing her job: "There is no foundation, no
anchor, a nothingness." Although she is financially successful, she
wants to be "more assertive, more powerful, present and comfortable."
Iris gets paid on performance: in fact, she has been the top
salesperson in one company for four years, and the first woman in the
company ever to achieve this. "I used to feel guilty [regarding this
high performance]. I felt I couldn't be corporate and spiritual." In
any case, Iris says she tends to push herself to the breaking point
of exhaustion.
"I'm very changeable. I feel people intensely. I manage people and
do sales [for a commercial office furniture company]. I 'become' the
other people I work with." Psychic/spiritual classes have helped
her "to ground." These classes give her skills to embody her
talents. "I'm all air and water astrologically." ("A rainbow is a
mixture of light and water," Sherr). 1 "When I'm busy, I fly out of
my body."
Iris has a fear of heights and of falling. She fears a "lack of
discernment in relations with men and of repeating these old
patterns...Years ago, I was married to an emotionally and physically
abusive man. I lose myself. I disappear emotionally."
Iris has "podium anxiety," with heart palpitations. "I feel too
visible. I have a fear of being judged, yet I want so much to be
seen." Loss of breath; she loses the train of thought.
Dreams
• Prophetic: (since childhood) "I shut down that side of myself for
fear I had no one to talk to about these dreams. With the exception
of a grandfather on one side, and a grandmother on the other, no one
else was outwardly clairvoyant."
• Of being chased: "These occur when I feel anxious about being
behind in work...I am chased after I have killed someone."
• Doing more and more: "As a waitress: having to seat more and more
tables.... I have to do more and more."
• Travel dreams: transportation.
• Architecture: when visiting her boyfriend in another state, who is
a builder, she had dreams of architecture, details even of the
joinery of houses; "rubrics cubes condos."
• A gray quartz spiral swirling in her room through her heart.
("Sensation as if an iron rod is standing straight in the heart
region," Scholten.)2
Medical history
Born: weak, fragile, jaundiced. Right hip not formed.
Pneumonia and mononucleosis at age 4.
Nosebleeds since childhood, agg. at high altitudes.
Acne during adolescence, treated with antibiotics for two years.
Broken wrist, and broken right clavicle for which she had surgery
one year ago.
Whiplash.
Family history
Maternal side-cancer
Paternal side-heart problems
Sleep-difficult, wakes at 3:00 AM
Energy-agg. 3:00 PM, high at 11:00 AM
Food-desires spicy, salty, fish, robust and warm foods, chocolate
averse-ice, ice-cream
aggravates-coffee
Generals-anxious in wind
agg. cold air
Two and one-half years before, Iris had received Phosphorous LM 1-15
over a forty-five day period from another homeopath. Some physical
symptoms improved for one to two years. The mental/emotional picture
had not changed. This practitioner, however, did point out to Iris
that her antagonism of will (between her work and spiritual life) was
her core problem. And I agreed.
I prescribed Iridium 1M for Iris. Iridium is in the "Gold Series,"
according to Jan Scholten's schema. It is in between Osmium to its
left and Platina to its right. Iridium, along with Baryta Carb and
Aurum (from the Gold Series) are listed in the rubric "will,
contradiction of " (Complete Repertory). Iris' case seemed most
suited to the issues of the "Gold Series": of work, responsibility,
performance, isolation, religion, etc.; and Iridium seemed to fit the
case best.
First follow-up-at one month-late July 1998:
Iris said, "Nothing has happened." New client, new remedy (for me),
nothing's happened! Reflecting on the wise words of Jeremy
Sherr, "nothing" may indicate the gentlest of all healings. I
exhorted my client to tell me about her month.
"I cannot say things are better or worse. I had an anxiety attack
for two hours, three or four days after taking the remedy." Almost
two weeks into the remedy, Iris had an anxiety attack in a hotel
room: "I didn't know what to wear for a party. I couldn't leave the
hotel room to go to the party. I was afraid I wasn't enough...Anxiety
is still an issue." (Iris had not actually spoken of anxiety during
the first interview.) "I have been depressed, but not badly...I am
also coming to tears where I didn't before." This practitioner
noticed a softening in her demeanor.
"My sensitivity, when mixed with anxiety and insecurity, is not
pretty. It takes on a different color. It blends together to create
depression and anger, and outwardly, frustration and anger."
Iris' sense of personal/psychic boundaries is definitely better, not
taking things too seriously or personally. "I get busy and forget to
feel for others and myself, but I feel more of an opening. I see a
need to be compassionate and to do management simultaneously! I am
feeling less socially awkward in business." Iris again noted how
seeking approval from her father (i.e. , outside herself ) as a child
set up a pattern of anxiety she still faced. When I asked her about
the conflict she had spoken of between her spirituality and doing
business, Iris replied: "I haven't thought about that this month. I
guess that means I am a spiritual woman of business!"
Neutral focus-amel. in general, amel. in the afternoons.
Frequent urination-amel., does not wake at night.
Nosebleeds-amel. (none even at high altitude).
Hypoglycemic symptoms-amel., able to eat well more easily; desires
fewer sweets and chocolate, but craves coffee.
Herpes-at onset of an outbreak, Iris took a suppressive medication.
Menses-three days early and she wept with them.
PMS symptoms, which she had denied to herself in the past, became
more obvious and unavoidable to her.
Dreams-no architecture dreams. Other dreams unremembered.
Sleep-still erratic, somewhat improved. Trouble quieting the mind
over the day's business.
Iris' "nothing," it seemed, was something quite special. She and I
both mused about this and agreed Iridium 1M was working for her. No
remedy was given at the first follow-up.
Over the course of the next twelve months, Iris received Iridium 1M
twice and 10M once. (Iris was sensitive to jet travel, and on at
least one occasion she needed a repeat due to the deleterious effects
it had on the remedy's action.) She continued to improve in all the
ways she showed on the first follow-up.
Over time she dropped the relationship she had with her boyfriend
when she found "sexuality with him was suffocating and he could not
support my sensitivity even though he said he could." No other type
of closeness could be found with him. Then she began to date two new
men. (Delusion; wants two of everything, Scholten). She enjoyed
learning about herself in this way, but felt self-conscious at the
perceived societal norms (of dating only one man at a time). In a few
months, she chose one of the two partners to whom she felt best
suited, and has continued to enjoy and flourish in the relationship.
During treatment, Iris quit her job and became a consultant for the
same company. I noticed her tendency to be hurried and to arrive late
for appointments diminished. So did her desire to see many other
alternative health practitioners. She seemed more relaxed and less
perfectionistic as time went on.
Iris' case is uncannily reflected in Jeremy Sherr's published
proving of Iridium (and I have only just read this proving in order
to research this article). In his introduction, Sherr
writes, "Iridium was named from the Latin/Greek work Iris, meaning
rainbow. While in it's solid form, Iridium is a silver- white
precious metal, however in marine acid, it becomes astonishingly
multicolored and iridescent, 'emitting a light of extraordinary
splendor.'
"The Greek goddess Iris is the daughter of Elektra. She is
considered to be the personification of the rainbow...the goddess
Iris has her own highway. This female courier transports messages
between earth to heaven via the iridescent highway of a rainbow. She
can travel through air, water and the underworld-from the very
fundaments of the earth to the zenith of the heavens. Her task is to
be a joiner, uniter and conciliator..." 3
Consider iris' case:
"I am all air and water" (the rainbow).
"I need to be grounded. I lose myself; I get busy and fly out of my
body."
Dreams of "architecture, joinery."
Dreams of transportation.
And most exquisitely, Iris' "solid form" (her business persona) is
better elucidated through the vibrancy of her "colors" as a
psychically gifted person when the potentized remedy itself is given.
From Jan Scholten's brilliant description of Iridium,4 a few themes
for this case stand out:
• "A blunder during the conducting of business"-Iris' anxiety before
a party: she didn't know what to wear.
Anxiety, disturbing sleep: thoughts of business of the day.
• "Not quite arrogant"-Iris: "Since childhood I have been either shy
and awkward or incredibly focused." Scholten: "They [Iridium] tend to
be quite singleminded. They are always preoccupied with what is yet
to be done...They may seem irresponsible but this is only because
they see everything from the point of unexplored possibilities. They
do feel very responsible, much more than others might expect."
• "Robbed of their own power at the last minute"-Iris suffered
chronic fatigue, anxiety and foggy-headedness related to food intake.
When she first came to me, Iris' food, sleep and energy level were
disturbed or underfunctioning. She was robbed of her ability to be
fully in her body and to be present in her spirituality.
In this day, religiosity, which runs through the "Gold Series" (or
the 6th period of the Elemental Table), might be interpreted as
psychic openness or a willingness to do "God's work" through a
variety of channels not represented in our classic texts. Iris'
openness and struggle with her spirituality and psychic abilities may
be translated into the appropriate religious rubrics.
Iris' work in the commercial furniture industry is a revealing
metaphor for her expression at stage 9 of the Gold Series. She is not
yet sitting in the "big chair" herself (i.e. , the throne) like
Platina or Aurum, but she is traveling to and visiting the businesses
where she sells and sets up the office (the throne room).
Iris' dreams of having to do more and more (in her waitress dream)
reflect a stage of development directly before the summit. She has
acceded Sisyphus' tragic push to the top which always fails (Osmium)
but she has not yet succeeded to the glitter and assuredness of
Platina. Her dreams of having killed someone and of being chased
(corroborated in Sherr's 'Dream Section') reminds us of the well-
known violence of Platina, only Iridium is not so sure of itself;
hence is being pursued as well.
Physical symptoms in Iris' case corroborated by Sherr's proving of
Iridium:
Head-forehead, pain, dull
Respiration-spells of breathlessness
Bladder-frequent urination
Extremities-pain, right clavicle, right hip
Skin-itching on arms (and legs)
Symptoms found in Scholten's description of Iridium:
Mind-hurried
Fear-heights, of falling
Generals-( eating
sleeplessness
right-sided
Causes-hurt, humiliation
In the Materia Media of the Mind by Heli O. Retzek, only six common
rubrics are listed for Iridium:
• Antagonism, herself with
• Concentration, difficult
• Dullness, sluggishness, difficulty of thinking and comprehending
• Thoughts, two trains of thought
• Will, contradiction of
• Will, weakness of
The classic texts (Boericke, Clarke, Choudhury, Hering) remind us
that in nature Iridium is found only in combination with Osmium and
Platina as Osmiridium. It has a high specific gravity and is one of
the heaviest substances known. Clarke compares it to China and
Laurocerasus for "the aged and persons exhausted by disease," and for
children "who are puny, weak-limbed and grow too fast." It is said in
Clarke that Iridium may be superior to Aurum, Aurum Mur and Osmium in
uterine tumors. All the texts refer to a vacant feeling in the head-
and "painful weakness of the lower limbs and renal region alternating
with self-confidence and facilitated mental labor."
Iridium was introduced by Hering in 1853 and proved by A. J. Tafel
in the 19th century. It is compared to Platina for its numbness and
cramp-like sensations; and also to Ferrum Met., Palladium, Causticum,
Kali Ferrocyanatum.
The psychic sensitivity of Iridium may place it in the Phosphorous
family of remedies which would also include Iris' sisters' remedies
Magnetis Polis Arcticus and Kali Phosphoricum, among others.
Iris is dancing and performing in experimental theater, and ready to
find consulting work more suited to her talents, possibly creating
healing environments in the workplace. However, nineteen months after
her first dose of Iridium, her issues of insecurity and some skin
symptoms led me to recently prescribe Phosphorous 200C for Iris. If
over time it appears that Phosphorous is a curative remedy for her,
it will be interesting to explore the relationship of Iridium to
Phosphorous.
1 Jeremy Sherr and Dynamic School, Dynamis Provings, Volume I, by
Dynamis Books, England, 1997, p. 341.
2 Jan Scholten, Homeopathy and the Elements, by Stichting
Alonnissos, Netherlands, 1996, p. 727.
3 Sherr, op. cit., p. 341.
4 Scholten, op. cit., p. 725.
My special thanks to Jeremy Sherr and Jan Scholten for their
contribution to our understanding of Iridium Metallicum.
Gina Inez, RSHom (NA), has been practicing Classical Homeopathy
since 1985 in Marin County, California. She served as the Registrar
for NASH from 1997-1999.
Sus : a proving of pig
By karen allen, rshom (na), cch
"Would the results of a proving be different based on the specific
part of the subject which was used? Would perhaps a proving of a leaf
be different than the proving of a fruit, or a milk be different than
saliva?"
Sus scrofa
This was the question, raised in a discussion at the 1996
International Foundation for Homeopathy case conference, that led to
the proving presented here. There were those present who argued that
beneath all substance of an organism was the same vital force, and
when potentised, that same vital force would present itself
regardless of the specific component of the organism used. It was
mentioned that there would be likely differences if bone was used
rather than blood due to the highly specific mineral makeup of bones.
Questions were raised about using a male versus a female subject for
an animal proving, and how the mental symptoms of the proving might
be affected. All in all, it was an interesting question, with much
speculation, but little evidence to support any particular point of
view. There are some examples in the materia medica such as Agaricus
and Muscarin, Belladonna and Atropia, Nux Vomica and Strychnia, all
of which are pairs of plants and a derived alkaloid. These show
distinct similarities, but different remedy pictures. However, the
reduction from plant to alkaloid may be more extreme than the
difference between leaf and root or blood and saliva might be, and
the question remains.
Having just read The Dynamics and Methodology of Homeopathic
Provings by Jeremy Sherr, this case conference discussion heightened
my interest in conducting a proving. I resolved to use the approach
outlined in the book to prove multiple components of the same
organism as a trial to see if a difference in the proving results was
identifiable. While casting about for a likely subject for the
proving, I happened to have lunch with an acquaintance I did not know
very well at the time. In our conversation, he mentioned that his
family had a farm that raised pigs. As we chatted more, I learned
that these were not just any pigs-on this farm the pigs were a
specially bred and screened group of animals used as donor animals
for xenotransplant (organ transplant between members of different
species) and xenograft (tissue graft between members of different
species) medical procedures.
Over the next few days, I thought and read and researched about
pigs, hogs, and swine. My investigation showed that recent medical
literature was sprinkled with articles involving pigs, and many more
have appeared in the last few years. Increases in demands for donated
transplant organs were noted: more than 50,000 people die every year
waiting for a transplant organ, compared to the approximately 2,000
who receive one. This has prompted research into the use of donor
animals, and pigs have been considered good candidates because they
have many similarities to human physiology and anatomy. In March of
1997, the journal Nature reported that fetal pig neuronal tissue has
been implanted into the brains of patients with advanced Parkinson's
disease, demonstrating that animal tissues can grow within the human
body. Heart valves, skin grafts, and liver tissue from pigs have been
used in various medical procedures. Porcine pancreatic transplants
have been done in Europe for a number of years. Porcine heart and
liver transplants were unsuccessfully attempted with extremely ill
patients in 1992. In the 1996 January issue of Emerging Infectious
Disease, xenotransplants of organs from pigs were discussed as being
3-5 years from clinical trials. An April 1997 issue of Biomedical
News reported that there are now herds of genetically modified pigs
which have had DNA segments relating to the pig's immune system
function altered so that humans won't reject the tissue. In addition
to organs, bone marrow transplant is being researched. Limiting
factors continue to be immune system rejection of the foreign tissue
and fears of viral transmission through xenotransplant. An ethics
advisory group for xenotransplantation had directed a moratorium on
xenotransplants in Britain and New Zealand. The Centers for Disease
Control is currently drafting guidelines to prevent transmission of
infectious agents, monitor xenotransplant and xenograft recipients
with a national registry, and screen candidate animals and tissues.
While reading all this, I became curious about what the possible
impacts could be to a human population if organ transplants were
possible, and became commonplace. What influence could that bring to
children born to a parent who had a xenographic organ? Could a state
of 'pig' be recognizable in people who have received grafts or valves
or other pig tissues? It seemed very worthwhile to conduct a proving
of something foreign which has actually been incorporated into human
bodies and is now living and growing there. Additionally, pigs
offered an easy source for multiple components to prove. I contacted
my acquaintance, explained my project, and he obtained the source
substances for my proving from the pigs raised for xeno-transplant.
Freshly obtained semen, saliva, milk and blood were added to
individual bottles of alcohol and left for 24 hours. Each of these
was potentized and potencies of 6C, 12C, 15C, and 30C were made in
alcohol. Packets of remedies on pellets were made up, each identified
with a number only. A cross reference was created to index the packet
numbers to the source remedy/potency. Four additional packets of sac
lac were added. No one knew what was in any of the packets until the
proving was completed. The name of the remedy is Sus, the Latin word
for swine which is the genus name used in biological classification.
"Twelve voices were shouting in anger, and they were all alike. No
question, now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The
creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and
from pig to man again; but it was already impossible to say which was
which." -George Orwell, Animal Farm
"It may be remarked that man is the only animal which can live and
multiply in every country from the equator to the poles. The hog
seems to approach the nearest to our species in that privilege." -
Gibbon
Pigs are widely distributed throughout the Earth in both wild and
domesticated form. Hog, pig, and swine are interchangeable terms for
domesticated mammals of the swine family of the order artiodactyla
(hoofed animals with an even number of toes on each foot), suborder
bunodontia, families suidae and tayassuidae. They are believed to
have descended from two wild species (Asian and European), and first
domesticated in China about 9000 years ago. Explorers, traders and
immigrants eventually spread them around the earth. Pigs are well
adapted to meat production because they grow and mature rapidly, have
a short gestation period and produce a large number of young. As
omnivorous scavengers, they can adapt to many environments and diets.
In addition to meat, leather and bristles are produced. With the
exception of Muslim and Jewish cultures, which regard them as unclean
and therefore inedible, pigs are raised and eaten throughout the
world.
Pigs have played a role in history as well. In his book Guns, Germs,
and Steel, author Jared Diamond partially attributes to pigs the
dominance of European cultures over many others around the globe. He
discusses the evolution of epidemic disease as sourced by the close
proximity of humans and domesticated animals in Eurasia, where it was
not uncommon for peasants to live under the same roof with their
animals. Then as today, the relationship between humans and pigs
could be very close; in some places in the world today, human mothers
nurse piglets from their own breasts. His book documents the gradual
viral and bacteriological migration from animal diseases to human
diseases and attributes influenza and pertussis to domesticated
swine. In the first stage of evolution, a disease is found in animals
but a transfer to humans is uncommon, and there is no human to human
transmission. This is seen today with leptospirosis in dogs and pigs,
brucellosis in cattle, psittacosis in birds, and swine erysipelas in
pigs. In the second stage, a former animal pathogen evolves to a
point where there is direct transmission between people, causing
epidemics. In the third stage, a disease which was exclusively an
animal disease has become an exclusively human disease. The impact of
these diseases (measles, rubella, mumps, pertussis, smallpox,
influenza) on indigenous cultures throughout the world was
devastating, becoming one of the factors in the spread of European
influence.
Pigs also feature in the culture and mythology of many countries. In
his books, The Prydain Chronicles, Lloyd Alexander retells Welsh
legends involving an oracle pig named HenWen who used sticks to tell
the future. Pigs have been revered as weather forecasters, symbols of
fertility or bravery in battle, creatures enraptured by music and
much else as detailed in George Druce's "The Sow and Pig: A Study in
Metaphor" from the Archealogia Cantiana. They have contributed to our
maps with hills called hogbacks; the city of St. Paul, Minnesota, was
originally called Pig's Eye. They have also been reviled, and
connotations of the words pig, hog and swine are seldom
complimentary. Pig iron is a crude casting of metal from a blast
furnace. Hoggish and piggish are adjectives meaning dirty, greedy or
stubborn. Pig-headed refers to a stubborn person, and a swine refers
to a contemptible person.
There are some interesting oddities about pigs as well. They have no
sweat glands and require other means to cool off, explaining the
tendency of wild pigs to live in marshy places where they can wallow
in water or mud. Newborn pigs are extremely sensitive to cold and die
easily if left in a drafty place. Pigs are vulnerable to anthrax, but
it is not uncommon for young pigs to become only mildly ill and
recover completely from this disease which can be fatal to many other
animals and humans. In a 1925 issue of the British Journal of
Experimental Biology, Baker wrote about the inherited tendency to
sexual abnormality producing both hermaphrodite and sex-intergrade
pigs. In strains of pigs where this tendency was prevalent, over 10%
of the pigs showed abnormality. He concluded that these were
masculinized genetic females though they generally demonstrated male
sexual instincts. In the true hermaphrodites, an ovary was
consistently found on the left side and a testicle on the right side,
the clitoris was enlarged and developed similar to a penis, and there
was also a uterus and vagina.
A list of diseases that affect pigs reads much like a list of human
diagnoses: meningitis, encephalitis, polio (Talfan disease),
tuberculosis, pneumonia, rheumatism, tetanus, osteoporosis, cirrhosis
of the liver, hepatitis, gall stones. Urinary and kidney diseases are
commonly found in pigs, and nephritis has been associated with
exposure to cold, direct drafts on pigs' backs. Like many other
illnesses found post-mortem, diabetes mellitus is not diagnosed in
pigs because they are generally slaughtered at six months of age, but
pancreatic degeneration found in some slaughtered animals is
consistent with glycosuria. Swine erysipelas is a disease of pigs,
caused by Erysipelothrix rhusiopathiae, which raises characteristic
diamond shaped red patches on the skin, and sometimes appears as a
diffuse red coloring all over the skin. The condition can be fatal to
pigs, causing hemorrhage of the kidneys and other complications. This
disease can affect people who come in contact with a diseased pig,
has been fatal to humans, and may last for years in some people, with
diamond shaped blotches on the hands and face that are aggravated by
heat of a fire or stove. This same E. rhusiopathiae agent has been
identified as a cause of arthritis in pigs in the U.S. , and in one
study as many as 75% of pigs affected with arthritis were shown to
have this organism.
"Even when I felt my stomach was full, I wanted to go on eating. I
would have eaten anything. I would have eaten garbage if you had put
it in front of me." Sus prover
The proving was conducted gradually from the fall of 1996 through
the summer of 1997 in the U.S. and Canada. The methodology laid out
in Jeremy Sherr's book was used, and instructions copied from the
book were handed out to provers. Supervision was done by myself and
Joan Raddysh, a Canadian homeopath now in Toronto whose contribution
was invaluable. Finding suitable candidates who were interested in
participating, relatively self-observant and articulate, and
conscientious about avoiding interferences such as coffee, medical or
recreational drugs, herbs, supplements, etc, proved to be a
challenge, and so the proving was done with a few individuals at a
time in several very small groups as people agreed to participate,
for a total of 27 provers for the four remedy components. In addition
to the supervision before and after the remedy was taken, follow-up
was done with the majority of provers at 3 months, 6 months and 1
year. Three of the provers observed no symptoms of any kind; one of
these had been given sac lac. The notable results are given below in
the words of the provers, followed by two successful acute cases. I
have not found a constitutional case for Sus yet, but hope that the
publication of this material will make homeopaths aware of what is
known about the remedy so far and create the opportunity for further
clinical use.
While knowledge of the remedy is incomplete and additions to the
repertory seem premature at this stage, rubrics consistent with
Kent's Repertory have been noted here using plain type for lowest
grade, italic for middle and bold for highest grade. Whenever
possible, existing rubrics have been used. Following Jeremy Sherr's
lead, I make no attempt to offer an essence or summary picture for
the remedy, letting the symptoms of the proving speak for themselves.
However, in response to the questions raised at the 1996 IFH case
conference, the results of the proving were so similar from each of
the four components of pig (saliva, semen, blood and milk) that I was
unable to differentiate them in any way.
Mind
There were many symptoms related to work including positive
anticipation of work, desire to work, increased sense of satisfaction
and accomplishment at work, anxiety about having forgotten how to do
one's job. It was interesting to find that almost 50% of the provers
noted that they worked overtime, double shifts, increased
responsibility, or increased hours at some point within the first 3
days after taking the remedy.
• "I had to work tonight and was actually looking forward to it
which was unusual."
• "I had a wonderful feeling that I had a task, a purpose and I had
finished it. I feel at peace now."
• "I felt like I could accomplish everything at work today and I
did. I feel great and have lots of energy."
• "I was at work twice as long today, funny how that happens."
• "I was at work from 9 am to 11 pm; I had not one chance to leave
or take a break."
• "Someone else wasn't coming in to work so I had to do her job on
top of mine. I lasted the entire day without feeling drained once."
• "I thought I couldn't do my job. In a sense I believed that I had
forgotten how to work. That's why my hands started to shake, because
I was actually scared. It still bothers me now, much later."
Two provers noted a difficulty in answering questions.
• "I have a time delayed response when answering questions. There is
a brief period of blankness and then I can respond."
No provers reported their own violent behavior, but in the few days
prior to taking the remedy (while keeping records in the proving
notebooks) or the first week after taking the remedy, several events
involving conflict were noted, and the following are representative.
• "I have never before been punched in a street confrontation. Three
guys came up to me as I got off work, made various comments that I am
a nerd and have no friends. It is, in effect, playground bullying.
One of the guys punched me on the right cheek just above the mouth,
chipped a tooth. I did not see the blow coming."
• "I struck a blow against a mouse that sent it limping off for
cover last night. I had already received the remedy proving kit so I
thought to include it in my notes."
• "I was woken up at 3 am by a couple of wailing cats that were
fighting right outside my window."
This last is a strange, rare and peculiar type of symptom which was
experienced by the one person who seemed to experience most of the
proving symptoms.
• "I had the idea that my foot was split between my big toe and my
other toes, going up into my foot part way, like a snake's tongue is
split."
Mind, Occupation ameliorates
Mind, Industrious
Mind, Answers slowly
Mind, Fear, work, feared he had forgotten how to (new subrubric)
Mind, Delusion, foot split in two (new rubric)
Head
Almost 90% of the provers who reported any symptoms at all had
headaches. In several provers, there were daily headaches for weeks,
with intense headaches on a weekly frequency for up to 2 months.
Invariably the same words were used: dull ache, vague ache, pressure
pushing outwards, but too dull to be a bursting sort of pain. In
fact, dull ache was the most common description used for every kind
of pain experienced by the provers in any symptom.
• "Vague headache, centered behind the eyes"
• "Ache in the head with much dull pressure inside the head, pushing
outwards"
• "Mild headache from 3 to 5 pm which slowly went away"
• "Dull ache which strengthens, then recedes every few hours through
the day"
• "An ache in the forehead at and above my eyebrows"
• "Aching pain in my head which was better after eating hot soup"
Provers also noted increased itching of the scalp which was improved
by scratching and followed by the formation of small scabs which
flaked off with more scratching.
Head, Pain, headache in general
Head, Pain, dull pain
Head, Itching of scalp
Stomach
Approximately 75% of the provers reported increased hunger and
increased satisfaction with food. In particular, many provers
mentioned seeking out a desired food and finding it extremely
satisfying when they had eaten it, although there was a very wide
range of the things desired with no two the same. For a few provers
this lasted for weeks, but for most it lasted only the first few
days. Approximately 30% of the provers reported nausea.
• "I was very hungry as soon as I woke up."
• "I was unusually hungry at times through the day."
• "I was ravenous, eating and eating, even when I knew I was full I
wanted to eat more."
• "Even when I felt my stomach was full, I wanted to go on eating. I
would have eaten anything. I would have eaten garbage if you had put
it in front of me."
• "By 10 am I was starved."
• "When I ate it, it was the best thing I had ever tasted."
• "After I ate, it seemed like the end result of a craving, when one
feels accomplished that they have fulfilled the desire."
• "I had a craving today for a blueberry bagel with cream cheese and
I wasn't let down-it was excellent."
• "I felt nauseated after taking the remedy."
• "From 3 to 3:30 pm I felt mild nausea."
• "There was a lot of cigar smoke and this made me feel nauseated.
It felt like I would have vomited if I had not gotten fresh air."
Stomach, Appetite, increased
Stomach, Appetite, ravenous, canine, excessive
Stomach, Nausea
Abdomen
• "Within 15 minutes of taking the first dose of the remedy, I felt
a colicky feeling in the abdomen."
• "After the remedy I had stomach cramps followed by diarrhea."
Abdomen, Pain, cramping
Rectum / Stool
• "I had diarrhea several times a day, after starting the remedy."
• "After having stomach cramps, I had very soft stools."
• "I had diarrhea which was very forceful, like an explosion into
the toilet."
Rectum, Diarrhea
Stool, Forcible
Urinary organs
Kidney pain was both produced as a proving symptom and resolved
during the proving for a prover who had chronic pain in the kidneys.
Several provers reported waking at night to urinate, something very
out of the ordinary for them.
• "My back began to ache in the area of my kidneys, more on the
right side. This lasted for an hour and a half then faded away."
• "I awoke again without the pain I usually feel in my kidneys every
morning. This was very different for me-I have had this pain every
day for years." (Pain was remitted for 3 months.)
• "Waking at 4:20 am with a strong need to urinate."
• "Frequent need to urinate."
Kidneys, Pain
Kidneys, Pain, morning
Bladder, Urination, frequent
Bladder, Urination, night
Extremities
Several of the provers reported symptoms of trembling or joint pain,
and most of these were on the left side of the body. Provers who
already had joint pain noted that it became worse after taking the
remedy, but none of those provers reported that it improved
afterwards-the discomfort gradually returned to its previous level.
• Trembling in the hands and forearms, with fear of having forgotten
how to work, lasting 30 minutes.
• Cramping in the left hand lasting 3 minutes
• "While driving, my hand and foot on the left side started to cramp
up. Better after stretching."
• "My left shoulder seems to have been wrenched somehow. It is a
dull ache."
• "Dull ache in both knees."
• "Dull aching feeling in the left hip and knee."
• "There was a feeling of wasting away in my arms. It was mid-
afternoon. It felt as if the fluids and strength of my arms was
ebbing. Sapping of strength."
Extremities, Trembling, anxious
Extremities, Pain, joints
Extremities, Cramps, hand
Extremities, Cramps, hand, left
Extremities, Cramps, foot
Extremities, Weakness, upper limbs
Sleep/dreams
There were many dreams reported involving the need to urinate, and
the provers, upon waking, actually did need to urinate. This was one
of the most commonly reported symptoms in the proving.
• "I dreamed that I was at a rally where we were forced to hear a
talk about the end of technology. In my dream I had to get up and go
to the bathroom. When I did wake up, I realized my bladder was full
and I did need to go to the bathroom."
• "In my dream I was going to see a film in a big old movie hall. On
my way into the hall I had to line up to pee-I actually did need to
when I woke up."
• "In my dream I was with my brother and we were traveling in a
green countryside near the coast. My brother and I were peeing on the
grass near an old house, and we were told off by a young guy who said
we should have used the toilet. I woke up really needing to pee."
There were also quite a few dreams about eating.
• "I dreamed that I was sitting at a dinner table having a meal with
others. Everyone was friendly."
• "In my dream I was gathered around a bowl of food with other
greedy followers."
• "There were people wandering around in a farmyard eating food from
a huge cabinet-fruit and veggies and bacon."
• "People are around cooking fires in the orchard."
There were dreams from which people awoke frightened, as from a
nightmare, and some of these were dreamt multiple times in the same
night.
• "In my dream I looked towards the window and saw a reflection. I
thought it was me. As I got closer, it became clear that it was
someone else. At that point I woke up, terrified that somebody was
outside my window."
• "There was a long stemmed red rose with a note saying 'I don't
want you to ever do that again.' And signed by my friend, but I did
not know what she was referring to. I awoke frightened because I
thought I had done something to jeopardize our friendship." (Dreamt 3
times in one night)
• "I had a nightmare about a friend-a guy and his wife who were
threatening to kill me with a gun. I tried to pretend I was already
dead, but he was not fooled. Then I had to empty out my pockets and
was surrounded by many coins. When I awoke I was anxious and the
feeling stayed with me for a long time."
• "I was in a bar but it was all light and sunny outside. Whenever I
touched someone, their skin would flake off. It was creepy."
Sleep, Dreams, urinating, of
Sleep, Dreams, nightmare
Sleep, Dreams, eating
Sleep, Dreams, frightful
Sleep, Dreams, repeating
Skin
Dry, itching and red skin on the waist, sides, back, shoulders,
arms, scalp and face were reported. Scratching relieved the itching,
as did water, lotion, and in one case, a mud bath.
• "I had red patches of dry, itchy skin around my waist. I put
lotion on them and it felt better."
• "My skin felt dry and very itchy. Scratching felt good, but the
only thing that really made it go away was a mud bath at a local
spa."
• "My scalp has been very itchy. I have been scratching it and now
there are little scabs flaking off when I scratch."
• "I have a terrible itch between my shoulder blades. If I scratch
long enough it stops itching."
Skin, Itching
Skin, Itching, scratching amel.
Homeopathy on the internet
Provings sites
Proving information is relatively scarce on the internet, but the
following sites provide a start.
www. gn. apc. org/ecch. icch/provings. html
The ECCH and ICCH (European and International Councils on Classical
Homeopathy) Recommended Guidelines for Good Provings are available in
full on their website. This is an excellent document-essential
reading for anyone considering conducting or taking part in a
proving.
www. hominf. org. uk/proving. htm
This is the excellent website of The School of Homoeopathy in Devon,
England. It provides comprehensive information on the following
provings: AIDS; Arizona Lava; Dreaming (obtained from South African
Sangomas); Falcon; Kauri Agathis Australis (giant tree); Knopper Oak
Galls; Positronium; Salix Fragilis (crack willow); and LSD.
www. dynamis. edu
This is the site of the Dynamis School in the UK and it provides a
database of information on many provings, new and old, including who
conducted the proving and when. It does not, however, provide any
proving content currently, but hopes to do so in the future.
www. homeopathycourses. com
This is the site of Lou Klein's Homeopathic Master Clinician
Courses. It provides information on the following provings:
Helodrilis caliginosis (earthworm); Loxosceles reclusa (brown recluse
spider); Carbon dioxide and Coriandrum.
www. planete-homeo. org/english/materia/
In many ways, this proving report of Hydrocyanic acid (conducted by
the Society Gaucha of Homeopathy in Brazil) should be a model to
anyone writing up a proving. It provides all the data of a first-
class scientific report. Planete Homeo is an excellent French
homeopathy web site, which includes an English-language subsection.
General homeopathy sites
The number of homeopathy web sites has become huge and is growing
larger every day. Using a good search engine works well for most
things, but if you're looking for a one-stop entry point, try one of
the following:
www. homeopathyhome. com
This is probably the most comprehensive (US-based) homeopathy site
on the web. From this site, you can find almost all others.
www. simillibus. com
Will Taylor's site, which includes a Remedy Of The Week feature, the
text of several classical homeopathy books, including the Organon and
The Chronic Diseases, and much, much more.
www. simillimum. com
David Little's site, which includes many essays and articles on
classical prescribing, with a special focus on the LM posology.
www. lyghtforce. com/homeopathyonline/index. html
Check out the only homeopathic magazine on the internet: Homeopathy
Online. This site also links to the lyghtforce homeopathy mailing
list, a lively discussion forum for homeopathic enthusiasts.
www. homeopathy-cures. com
Steve Waldstein's invaluable referral list to recommended classical
homeopaths in the United States and Canada.
http://www. empiricaltherapies. com/
This is Harris Coulter's site and has some of his writings on AIDS,
cancer and vaccination.
www. morpho. nl
Roger Van Zandvoort's online version of The Complete Repertory.
www. hominf. org. uk
For referrals to homeopathic practitioners, schools, organizations
and other resources in the UK.
www. hom-inform. org
This is the site for the Glasgow Homeopathic Hospital Library which
has a huge selection of homeopathic books and articles. They charge a
small fee for database searches.
Physostigma-the discarded vine
By kirsta heron, nd, dhanp
I have been quite curious for some time about the remedies made from
vines, wondering if their winding and climbing tendency would say
much about the nature of the remedies made from them. I have been
charmed at how the beans and peas that grow in my garden wander and
seek support from other plants or structures; playfully wrapping
their tendrils around anything they can reach. They have flowers with
mandible like structures that seem to talk, receiving visitations
from bees who seem unaware that they look as if they could be
swallowed at any moment. These vines are members of the legume
(Fabaceae or Papilionaceae) family and include such familiar remedies
as Baptisia, Lathyrus, and Melilotus.
The remedies in this family present with many problems of fatigue,
motility, and paralysis. According to Jan Scholten, this may be due
to the possible poisoning by the amino acid glutamate that then
affects the neurotransmitter serotonin. We also see many delusion
symptoms. In particular, those who need these remedies often feel
that they have done something wrong. For example, Baptisia feels that
they cannot succeed, that they do everything wrong; Melilotus feels
they are pursued by their enemies or the police and that they are
about to be arrested; and Robinia feels they have been disgraced.
Physostigma, a member of this family, is a perennial woody climber
found in tropical West Africa. Its leaves are large and pinnate with
purple butterfly-like flowers. The fruit is a reddish brown bean with
two or three white oval seeds. These beans ripen year round but are
most abundant during Africa's rainy season. These beans contain
alkaloids that are poisonous.
Historically, the beans have been used to determine the guilt of
those accused of witchcraft. If the accused vomited within a half
hour they were considered innocent, but if they died from the poison
they were found guilty. In the same way that patients who respond to
the other legume remedies feel that they have done some wrong, those
who respond to Physostigma feel they are castaways. It is easy to
imagine how someone accused of a crime and then ostracized by the
community could have this feeling.
The alkaloids within Physostigma stimulate the parasympathetic
nerves and medically have been used as an antidote to atropine. They
cause contraction of the pupil and ciliary muscles, and have a
profound effect on the striated muscles as a whole. The limbs seem
weary and unresponsive. There is fatigue and weakness. The case I
will now present shows a wonderful response to this remedy in a
patient with multiple sclerosis. It is from her that I first began to
understand Physostigma and other members of this family.
Case
Multiple sclerosis
Physostigma venenosum
C ase
Diane first came to see me in February of 1998. She was a beautiful,
elegant sixty-year-old from Georgia who had moved to the Pacific
Northwest a few years before. She wanted some relief from her
worsening multiple sclerosis. I found her first words interesting:
"Generally you start at the beginning, but I'd like to start at the
end."
This was curious to me at the time, and now seems quite illustrative
of how a climbing vine might begin to tell its tale.
"I've had more symptoms these last four years, but I was diagnosed
twenty years ago. Now walking is difficult for me because of my
balance. Sometimes I have problems with my vision and I have a
macular hole in my left eye. Recently I have less feeling and
dexterity in my hands and I have a neurogenic bladder. It doesn't
empty well. My initial symptom was numbness in the left arm and then
eventually numbness in both legs. This was in my twenties, around the
birth of my children."
"I am essentially married though I haven't lived with my husband for
two years. Our separation was amicable and my life is better alone.
Both my parents are dead. I grew up in Georgia and lived there until
I was forty. My parents were seemingly successful, although my mother
was an alcoholic. We were raised by servants. My sister was six years
older and she saw my parents as cold and lacking in love. I just
thought they didn't want to be with me-that there was something wrong
with me."
Here we can see the often-observed delusion of the legumes-that
there is something wrong with them. Physostigma's feeling of being
discarded or thrown away is reflected in Diane's description of her
parents and how she experienced their attitude towards her. Because
she was placed in the care of servants rather than her parents, she
felt unwanted. Diane continues:
"My father was disapproving and controlling. The only way to survive
was to play the game. He was a very wealthy man, very charming and
dictatorial-someone I couldn't trust. He would say one thing and then
do another. He would give you something and then take it away. There
was no way out...You couldn't ask directly. You would try to make him
think it was his idea. So I couldn't ask for what I wanted nor could
I go against his authority."
Diane's feeling that there was no way out is interesting in light of
her simultaneous feeling of being cast away. Here she feels trapped.
The climbing vine seeks someplace to go and the only solution is to
twist and turn so that the obstacle she is trying to maneuver around
can be overcome. But she cannot move. She cannot exert her will and
successfully ask and receive what she needs. This seems
metaphorically linked to the disease of multiple sclerosis. And quite
analogous to Physostigma, who has the feeling that their muscles do
not respond to the will.
"My mother was just there, but not there. She didn't want to talk to
you. Mother was an alcoholic by the time I was eleven. I couldn't
count on her."
"I ran away from home and was married for sixteen years. I was
nineteen when I had my first child and twenty-one and twenty-five for
the other two. My husband was very gregarious and an alcoholic. I
supported him and our three children those last years of our
marriage."
"My second marriage lasted five years. Six months after the divorce
I met my third husband. He spent all his time working and fixing.
He'd bring coffee to you but he would never sit down. He wanted to
work, I wanted to rest. After a year I decided to move to Seattle.
[Now] I have a lot of support."
This woman is like the climbing vine seeking the strong support of
something. Yet it doesn't support her. She finds herself in marriages
where she is the primary provider, the one who maintains and sustains
the relationship.
We also see the theme of overwork and rest in Physostigma. All the
plants in the Fabaceae family have the ability to fix nitrogen in the
soil, the function of nitrogen being to increase growth of the leafy
parts of the plant. In essence, these legumes provide their own
fertilizer. They are plants that do everything: grow and create
fruits and flowers as well as build and replenish the soil they live
in. Just like these plants, Diane has overworked. She has longed for
support but has supported her husbands instead. Now she longs to
rest, to enjoy a simple life...
"I now find myself keeping a lovely home. I fill it with flowers and
then sit in a chair and read."
She fills her house with flowers and sits down to enjoy them.
Scholten speaks of this trait. He says the remedies in the Fabaceae
family long to enjoy life, a life without trouble or complication-one
that is beautiful, clean, and surrounded by the beauty of nature. He
believes this characteristic comes from the nitrogen element in the
plant.
"My life before the diagnosis was very free. I learned a lot. I was
with my second husband and we had no jobs, no money-we really didn't
know where the next dime was coming from."
This is the time when her first symptoms were expressed, a time when
she felt unsure of the kind of support she could count on.
"The first symptoms were in my eyes. It came after an abortion,
after the anesthesia. I couldn't focus my eyes and my peripheral
vision was less. At first I didn't pay attention to it. Later I
thought-this is like I don't want to open my eyes, I don't want to
look out. It was worse if I stood up and looked. I'd almost lose my
balance."
"When I was little I was afraid to go to bed, so I would leave the
door open. I had all these colors in my eyes and I thought they were
coming after me. I had nightmares for twenty years until I was forty.
I saw a dark figure in a corner who I thought was trying to get me. I
was terrorized. I'd wake my family up by screaming. Sometimes I'd get
up and run."
It is interesting that Physostigma has many symptoms centered in the
vision and eyes. Even at a young age we see Diane experiencing visual
distortions. Moreover, she interprets these distortions as menacing-
the colors were after her. Later, this symptom evolves to become a
dark figure. We see these symptoms in the repertory as "Vision;
colors before the eyes" and "Delusions; sees spectres, ghosts and
spirits." Later Diane, experiences a blurring of her vision. Again we
see this in the materia medica: "Vision as if there was a film over
the eye." Her nightmares of a menacing figure occur during the time
when her physical symptoms are in remission.
"My first symptoms came near my pregnancies in my twenties. I felt
caught, I didn't want to be pregnant. But then the symptoms went
away. Why did my symptoms come back at forty? It was the first time I
was really free. But I couldn't find my place. Suddenly I had all
this freedom at forty and what do I do but get MS. I thought, now I
have an excuse to say "no"...it's rude otherwise. I just want to
please people at the sacrifice of myself. I come last. I would bend
over backwards to be nice. Otherwise you would be shunned. No one
would want to be with you, and I want people to be with me."
Diane felt caught again and couldn't directly create the life she
desired. When she finally comes to a time in her life when she can
create freedom and choose, she feels that she cannot find her place;
she is waving in the wind like a loose tendril. She can't find it in
herself to say "no." Instead, she finds it easier to bend over
backwards to find her support, to avoid being shunned or cast away.
Scholten has said that the legume family has a desire for help, but
that they feel that no one can, or will, help them.
I first chose the following two rubrics:
GENERALITIES; SCLEROSIS; multiple
EXTREMITIES; NUMBNESS, insensibility; upper limbs; left I then added
a combination of all rubrics that suggested a 'forsaken' feeling,
including: MIND; FORSAKEN; and DELUSIONS, imaginations; alone;
castaway, being
a; deserted etc.
I saw Physostigma and was curious so I read everything I could find
about it and did a search in MacRepertory and Reference Works and
found the following rubrics that supported my choice of this remedy:
VISION; BLURRED
VISION; COLORS before the eyes
FACE; ERUPTIONS; herpes; lips
FEMALE; MENSES; irregular
RECTUM; CONSTIPATION; general
BLADDER; CONVULSIONS, spasms
EXTREMITIES; AWKWARDNESS; lower limbs
GENERALITIES; FOOD and drinks; cold; drinks,
water; aversion
Diane had a variety of confirmatory symptoms as well. Her numbness
began in her left arm, as it does with Physostigma. She also dislikes
drinking cold water and has a history of constipation. I gave her
Physostigma 200C on February 23, 1998.
Follow up consulations
7 Weeks: Diane came back April 14 and reported, "I saw a great
change, even the first day. I felt more energetic and everything
seemed much easier. I didn't want to sit down. I have better bladder
control and my attitude is better. I have more energy to do things,
and better mental acuity. I feel happy."
3 Months: On May 27 she stated, "There is an overall wellness. I
forget I can't walk as well as I think I can. My vision is pretty
good, as is my balance. I have a little less dexterity in my left
hand. I used to not be able to go anywhere because of my bladder
problem. Now it is not a problem."
6 Months: On September 2, Diane was having more trouble so I gave
her Physostigma 1M. When she returned to the office on October 6, she
reported, "The remedy helped. I notice my bladder symptoms and energy
are much improved."
One year: On March 9, 1999, she started to lag so I repeated
Physostigma 1M again. She had had some dental work with novacaine and
it had fatigued her greatly.
15 Months: On June 1 she reported, "My bladder control is doing
great and my immune system is much improved. I haven't had any herpes
outbreaks and my energy is better. My spirits have been very good. My
daughter had surgery so I had to travel to Boston to help her. It was
a boost to know that I could get along by myself. It is amazing to
get past this fear."
20 Months: On October 25, 1999 I spoke with Diane again. "I feel so
much better since I first came to see you. I was about to have a
catheter inserted because my bladder problems had become so severe.
But since taking this remedy the quality of my life has vastly
improved. To have bladder control is wonderful." Diane reports that
she has not lost any dexterity or feeling in her limbs over the
course of her treatment.
"I feel in a very good space now, more at ease and joyous about
life. I am better at asking for what I want. I don't always get it
but that is true for everybody. If I just let go, everything works
out. Whatever is going to be, will be. I am less surprised when
people want to be with me now. I am able to take that truth in and
know I am a pleasure to be with. I feel more compassion for myself
and others now, and I live in that space of peace more and more."
Because multiple sclerosis is a progressively deteriorating disease,
I am pleased with the progress to date with Diane. I feel we have
brought some health back, though we still see some progression of her
disease.
Remark
I feel hopeful of further progress because of the healing she has
done in the emotional sphere.
I believe that the main ways in which Diane healed directly
correspond with the center of this remedy. For me, the essential
emotional symptoms of Physostigma include the feeling of being cast
away and the longing for support, yet feeling undeserving. This is
coupled with the tendency to overwork, all the while longing for rest
and simple beauty.
Diane felt cast aside by her parents and surprised when people would
want to spend time with her. Now she knows people enjoy her and she
embraces that truth. She used to feel undeserving of the help of
others. Now she feels more able to ask for what she wants. She
understands that at times she may receive this and at other times
not. But now when others choose not to help, she knows it is not
about her or some wrong she has done. She believed in the past that
she needed to overwork to get what she wanted. Now she accepts what
the universe provides.
Physostigma's main expression on the physical level is seen in
vision changes, palpitations, constipation, and muscular numbness,
weakness, and paralysis, especially of the left arm. This weakness is
common to the legume family as a whole. Lathyrus, Indigo, Baptisia
and others all experience muscular weakness. The limitations of
motility that are seen in this family of remedies are compelling
because these plants survive by climbing. They need to move and wind
their way to more light and greater space. These plants also have a
need for support, as do the people who need these remedies. They long
for someone to depend on, yet feel so undeserving. They are hopeless
of ever receiving help, often because they feel they have done some
wrong. And because they feel undeserving they must overfunction or
work harder to secure the support they need. In the plant we see this
in their ability to provide their own fertilizer. In the patient we
see this over functioning juxtaposed with a longing for a simple
life, a life that will restore a sense of beauty and nurturance.
Krista Heron has been practicing homeopathy in Seattle, Washington
since 1989. She has taught at Bastyr University since 1997, and was
the director of the IFH Second Year Post- Graduate Course, 1998-1999.
She can be reached at kjhdbug. org.
The essential emotional symptoms of Physostigma include the feeling
of being cast away and the longing for support, yet feeling
undeserving. This is coupled with the tendency to overwork, all the
while longing for rest and simple beauty.
Fools gold
By mike bridger, rshom
In recent years the tide has turned in favour of homoeopathy and I
wonder whether this success hasn't gone to our heads a little. It
seems to have stimulated some kind of sycotic drive for originality
within the profession which, if left unchecked, could end up
seriously weakening homoeopathy as a whole. I am concerned for
example, about meditative provings. Crudely put, this involves a
group of people literally meditating on the material substance and
the symptoms they experience during the meditation being collated to
give the proving picture. My concern is that such provings may filter
into mainstream homoeopathy without serious debate or critical
assessment. This experimentation with meditative provings has to be
considered in relation to these overall trends which are increasingly
pervading homeopathic thought.
Increasingly homoeopathy is being jumbled up with notions based on
religions and spiritualism, psychotherapy, mysticism, magic,
occultism, psychotherapy, karma, Aquarius and as the song goes "Uncle
Tom Cobbly and all". This isn't surprising. The resurgence of
homoeopathy in Britain sprang directly from new interest in Druidism,
alchemy and-putting it crudely-New Ageism. The problem is that this
trend is also a move away from the language of homoeopathy, which is
a language of simplicity.
The infiltration of 'New Age' notions is happening particularly in
case analysis. We've got circle methods, triangles, tables, verbs,
auras, planets and spiritual guides, and next week they'll be another
guru to tell us what homoeopathy really is, should be and never was,
as compared to what we thought it was, or what Hahnemann meant it to
be. We'll think it's very clever because we haven't a clue what he or
she is talking about. And so we all climb aboard The Starship
Enterprise, to go boldly where no homoeopath has gone before.
Meanwhile, there on the ground are our patients getting smaller and
smaller until we can't see them at all, and all we have left is the
realisation that the nearer you get to heaven, the colder and
lonelier it gets.
Never mind the patient as long as we find the 'right remedy'. It's
like setting off and searching for The Holy Grail! We're being told
that the 'right remedy' isn't the one that covers the symptoms of the
case, or the presenting complaint. It has to cover the whole life of
the patient, particularly the patient's life as foetus. It should
penetrate into the deepest waters of the patient i.e. their soul,
and if the remedy doesn't cover the last 1000 light years of the
patient's past lives, then the prescription is probably palliative,
certainly suppressive and there's a good chance that the patient will
die in unbearable agony at an early age, only to be re-incarnated as
a blue-bottle fly. Who needs allopathy to frighten us when we've got
that kind of agenda.
The 'right remedy' is a homoeopathic G spot where lots of people go
looking for something, but they don't know where to look because they
don't know what it is. Maybe I'm just English. If these notions were
true we would need to be so evolved to practice successfully, that we
probably wouldn't bother to be on earth at all, but would choose
instead to fly with the angels. Homoeopathy would be left for the
Sages and Seers and Gurus. I hate Gurus because I want to be one, but
know that I'm no good at it. I'm the type of person that even if I
was called Merlin, dressed in robes with a pointy hat and had a magic
wand that incinerated everything I pointed it at, people would still
think I was the assistant bank manager.
Some regard homoeopathy as a sort of spiritual quest. If that's the
case then the remedy for the patient will have to cover the spirit of
the patient. When Kent talked about deep acting remedies he meant
that they covered pathology. Now 'deep' means 'soul deep'. Of course
homoeopathy has spiritual significance, but we should be aware that
much of the world's population is less worried about their spiritual
development and more preoccupied with finding enough food for
themselves and their children to eat.
I have heard homoeopaths claim that they and their patients are more
spiritually evolved than anyone else because they have been attracted
to homoeopathy. Madness.
If homoeopathy is tainted with the notion that homoeopaths save
souls and set them on some spiritual path towards an idea of
enlightenment, then it becomes a religion. Like all religions, we
attract fundamentalists who like to think that anyone who does not
follow the righteous path as defined by them, will find themselves
skewered on the barbecues of hell with only a fried onion for a
friend. Actually Hell would be practising in such a way, because the
saving grace of homoeopathy, as well as being it's flaw, is that
homoeopathy is human. Because it is human, it can never be a perfect
system. Paradoxically the more we become aware of this imperfection,
in ourselves, in the way we practice and in our patients, the more we
see the perfection inherent in that imperfection.
I can prove that homoepathy is not perfect. How many of you
practitioners reading this can honestly say that you have never
experienced that moment, when the patient is sitting in front of you
saying that the last remedy worked brilliantly, and you look down at
your notes only to find that you forgot to write down what remedy you
gave. Point made!
Remember those early days as a student, when you've read this
amazing stuff and you believe nothing can go wrong for you once
you're a homoeopath or have taken a remedy. Your grandad is sitting,
dribbling and farting in the corner where he's sat for 150 years and
you're trying to force-feed him with bucket-loads of Carbo Veg. He's
choking and someone's trying to call for an ambulance, but you pull
the phone out, shouting, "Don't you understand, the allopaths will
kill him!
Then that first shock when someone who took a remedy still dies 10
years later. The shock of hearing that a homoeopath is having
marriage problems.
Homoepathy isn't perfect and if we act as if it is, then homoepathy
will lose its identity. If we worship ideas at the expense of the
patients, then we will worship something else. It may be that
meditative provings are part of a symptomatology which reflects
exactly such a trend. We already see this problem in case analysis,
where the analysis seems to be geared around the desire to be
original and insightful, rather than trying to get the patient
better. This is the equivalent of the allopath's love of diagnosis
and we can get caught up in similar thinking. The more clever,
profound, complicated and obscure the analysis the better, and never
mind the patient.
Some eminent homoeopaths fly all over the world doing this stuff.
They pop up at some seminar, take a case and give Candlewax 10M
because the patient says they feel burnt out, then very quickly fly
off again for someone else to clean up the mess.
The sycotic drive for innovation and originality we should leave to
the allopaths. They have succeeded in alienating themselves from
their own roots, the people, the patients and healing. We gained from
their not learning the lesson, but we gained and I'm not sure we
learnt the lesson either. I see ideas and notions which are
questionable and yet are embraced so readily, without question or
critical appraisal by the profession; this disturbs me. Art can stoop
to the level of pickling cows in formaldehyde without anyone, apart
from the cow, getting hurt. But we are responsible for the health
care of real people. If we worship innovation at the expense of the
foundations of homoeopathy then our house will fall down. There are
those, including the pharmaceutical companies that wolflike, will be
prepared to huff and puff to help it on it's way.
The point is that systems and religions don't sit well with
homoeopathy, at least in practice. Systems of thought and belief are
by their nature generalisations. Homoeopathy is specific. I become
wary when I see this specificity replaced with gross
generalisation. "Homoeopathy heals the planet." No it doesn't-it can
heal the individual. That individual, by being healthier, can choose
to do healthier things, and a larger group of healthier individuals
can choose to make moves to heal the planet.
These are two different propositions. The crux of it is this:
homoeopathy is powerful and powerless at the same time. All
homoeopathy can do is make choices available to people because they
become healthier; it cannot and should not dictate what they do,
however nice an intention we have for them.
Never mind how clever we are at understanding illness, if we're
truthful we're only like our patients. When we get toothache we want
the pain to stop and never mind the fact that it is symbolic of our
past life as a dental surgeon. If one of our loved ones is ill or in
pain, we suddenly stop worrying about their trip to Nirvana and are
more concerned about the potential trip to the local hospital. An
excellent homoeopath spent a year going to different homoeopaths
trying to sort out abdominal pain. She was told it would go when she
sorted out her relationship with her father. Eventually she was
rushed to hospital with peritonitis. She nearly died. Now I don't
deny that she may have had problems with her father, but we need to
be clear about what we need to treat. My advice is never forget your
patients. You are one!
Ironically, the tendency to ignore physical symptoms in preference
for apparent mental and spiritual causes is no more or less than
simply allopathic. It is no better or worse than the allopaths
predilection for specialising in various parts of the body. These
same practitioners who scream if they hear prescriptions based on
physicals because they regard them as partial, are quite happy to
partially prescribe on any mental or emotional symptom that they can
manage to torture out of the patient, while disregarding the more
serious physical symptoms of the case.
My heart bleeds for those poor students who are misled into ignoring
the obvious and are sent like Gargantua the giant on that near
impossible journey, to find the hidden pattern, the block, the
delusionary state etc. Even if you think you've found it, rather like
finding your third eye, it's a little disappointing, not least
because the remedy you give based on your discovery often doesn't do
anything. Why? Because the practitioner is encouraged to prescribe on
speculative causations rather than the expression of symptoms. In
homoeopathy the symptoms contain the cause. The symptoms are both
cause and effect. Let go of the symptoms and you may as well stop
breathing as a homoeopath.
Like it or not we operate from the perspective of Western culture.
Like it or not our model can be essentially allopathic, even if we
call it homoeopathic. Much of what we do is a reaction to allopathy
which for us, is the monster in the dark. But as we know, a reaction
is often worryingly close to the thing reacted against. Allopathy
thought it could cure everything with its wonder drugs and techno
medicine, but we are suffering from a sycotic craving for new
theories and short cuts to 'get fixed quick'. Instead of Prozac we
find cure-alls by meditating on Rainbow, or Tooth Fairy or some such,
but it is only the opposite side of the same coin. We can delude
ourselves into thinking that we're cleverer than allopaths because
not only do we claim to deal with physical sickness, but we can alter
everyone's Karma too.
I see a great film in this by the way. Something like Orwell's
Animal Farm but I'll call it Aquarius Farm. Instead of all the
animals turning into humans, I'll have the homoeopaths in white
coats, growing stethoscopes out of their necks, driving around in
sports cars and mumbling to themselves in Latin.
People are very wary now, after the broken promises and the pay off
of Thalidomide and Opren and the rest of that stuff. They're wary of
people giving false witness. They're clever enough, if they perceive
us to be wearing The Emperors New Clothes, to shout "Hyoscyamus" and
kick us off the streets. Instead of claiming we are changing the
world we would do better to remember, as I said earlier, that most of
the population don't even know what homoeopathy is.
Instead of throwing stones at allopaths, let us remember that we
live in glass houses too. Homoeopathy has a bright future but as they
say, "The brighter the sun shines, the longer the shadow." We need to
start looking at that shadow. We need to become self-critical.
These days we can voice any whimsical notion we have at any time, in
any place. We can agree that there's no criticism because that would
remind us of allopathy. All you have to do is say, "spiritual;
Atlantis; moon; alchemy; intuition; I feel; meditation" and anything
produced will be untouchable or unquestionable in it's holiness. No
matter how half-arsed the notion is, it cannot be criticised because
it's beyond the rational and it's obvious to anyone who's evolved. If
you don't get it then you may as well jump in the primal slime with
the frogs. The more logical you are the less you are, because it
means you're out of balance with your intuitive side.
Then we have the lovely literal translation of the doctrine of
signatures-"I feel the remedy is Sulphur because the patient's head
is a little pointy and reminds me of a volcano." Bring back the
leeches I say.
We are at this adolescent stage where there's a grandeur and a
terrible importance about everything we do. We have this idealised
view about healing the world. After the first remedy our elderly
patient returns, pushed by his mum in a pram. After the second remedy
you take him back to the womb. After the third remedy, he's back
being treated for the burns he received in 1642 where inevitably he
was burnt as a martyr. Another prescription and he'll be back in the
garden of Eden munching apples, and so on.
It's easy to delude yourself about the grand work you're doing and
sometimes on a bad day, it's even desirable. But whenever I start to
get ideas above myself about how I'm saving the world and turning
Mrs. Morris into a nicer and more spiritually sound person, Mrs.
Morris comes in and complains that she's had six months treatment,
her hayfever is no better and what am I going to do about it?
We need as teachers to be careful not to feed students crazy notions
on what practice is all about. Let me tell those of you still
studying that homoeopathy would be a perfect philosophy, and a
perfect spiritual journey, it would be Nirvana itself, if it wasn't
for the patients!
Some days things go so well you go for a stroll in the churchyard
sprinkling Carbo Veg, certain that the earth will rumble and all the
graveyard inhabitants pop up to sniff the spring air as if they'd
just had an afternoon nap. But, other days you feel bad. 72 year-old
Mrs. X who last month was bed-ridden, blind and deaf has been in
today. She's just got a job as the lead dancer for Ballet Rambert but
she says she doesn't feel any better after the remedy. It's the sort
of bad day where the patient has just burst into tears, you're
already running late and her time is up. She catches you looking at
your watch.
Outside the sun may shine and the daffs on the lawn sway but in your
head the world is a trough full of syphilitic, gonnorhoeic and
various other noxious effluvia. You scratch your head psorically,
swig the last of the Jamesons whiskey syphilitically and wish night
would come sycotically. Days like these are really there to
experience humility.
Whichever spiritual path or religion we may choose to follow, almost
all place particular emphasis on that word, humility. We would be
well advised to evaluate the meaning of that word in relation to
ourselves as homoeopaths and the profession. It would be detrimental
to us if we were simply to poach notions, concepts and beliefs from
other systems and create a kind of soup made from lots of
ingredients, but with no flavour. However grandiose sounding the
recipes I would hate the patients to die of malnutrition.
The question of meditative provings may illustrate my point. I
understand meditation to be a dif
In
minutus@yahoogroups.com, "daniela" wrote:
lot
couldn't