Clinical Cases

Revisiting: No One Said Being A Homeopath Was Easy!

Revisiting: No One Said Being A Homeopath Was Easy!
Written by Elaine Lewis

A five-year-old is very sick with a virus. Did you guess the right remedy?

Don’t tell me you missed last month’s quiz?  Here it is again with the answer to follow:


Shana Lewis is in Blue ink, her mother, Elaine, is in Black.  Enjoy the Hpathy Quiz!

Shana, you are not going to believe this!  I was at Whole Foods today….

Shana at FSS reunion Shana (pronounced: Shay-nuh)

Mom, you better tell people what “Whole Foods” is.

OK.  It’s a health food store the size of a supermarket, and quite grand, I must say.  Shana, get me a picture of Whole Foods.

Check!

So, there I was, standing in the checkout line–Shana, get a picture of the check out line!

Check!

So I was standing in the checkout line, minding my own business, as usual, not paying attention to anything, when all of a sudden I hear the bagger derisively saying to the cashier, “What is this, ‘Happy Days’?” referring to the background music being played from Sirius XM Radio, no doubt.

Mom, you better tell people what “Happy Days” is.

Oh.  Happy Days is a TV sitcom from the ’70’s about the early rock ‘n’ roll days of the ’50’s!  Shana, get a picture of “Happy Days” for me.

Check!

Tanti auguri Happy Days, la serie compie quarant'anni

So that’s when I realized that Ricky Nelson’s watered-down version of “I’m Walkin'” was being piped into Whole Foods!

Isn’t that a Fats Domino song?

Yes it’s a Fats Domino song!  That’s the whole point!  (Shana, get me a picture of Ricky Nelson.)

Check!  By the way, wasn’t Ricky Nelson was one of those Elvis Presley wannabes?

Yes.  You see, Shana, Ricky’s parents had their own sitcom at the time called “The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet”.  Ricky was always freaking his parents out with his obsession with rock ‘n’ roll and when he learned to play the guitar, it was written into the show; so, in every episode, they would work Ricky in, singing somewhere, and from there his career as a teenage idol took off!  

Shana, see if you can find Ricky singing on his parents TV show.  

Check!

“The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet” turned out, in the end, to be just a vehicle to spotlight Ricky Nelson!  So, as Ricky is singing this song, the bagger at Whole Foods says, “Everybody knows that rock ‘n’ roll stinks before The Beatles!”

No!!  He did not!!!!

Yes, I’m serious!!!!!!

Do we need a picture of The Beatles?

No, Shana, even the 20-year-old bagger knew who The Beatles were!  So, I blurted out, “THAT’S A FATS DOMINO SONG!!!” I was met with blank stares and mild incredulity.  (Shana, get me a picture of Fats Domino)

 Fats Domino

Check!  Leave it to you, Mom, to create an incident at Whole Foods!  The important thing is, you struck a chord for Truth in Rock ‘n’ Roll!….Again!  To the extent that anyone cared. 

Well, you know, Shana, no one ever said being a homeopath was going to be easy.  

Huh?  

And speaking of homeopathy….

Actually, we were talking about ….

It doesn’t matter, Shana!  What matters is, we are oddly enough back to Gabi again, only this time it’s her son, Santiago.  He’s only 5 years old and has some sort of virus.  And now, all the way from Canada, we give you the one and only… Gabriella Aguero!!!!!  Let’s really hear it!!!!

Good grief.

***

Hi again, Elaine.  I thought this would make a great quiz case for you!  Santiago had just come out of the bath and I had wrapped him up and put him in his PJ’s and robe and put him to bed under the duvet.  I know it was a bit much but the house was cold and with wet hair I was afraid he would get sick.  He had been a bit complain-y all day but I had not paid much attention to it; this was at night.

So, I went to look in on him after I finished putting things away.  He was asleep.  His face was bright red!  I touched him and he was really hot; so, I proceeded to undress him a bit and uncover him and I gave him Belladonna without even thinking about it.  (Between you and me Elaine, I am running out of potencies so you will be surprised here at what I have been using.)  I gave him a 200c and there was no real improvement.  I figured that with such a high potency he should be calmer and less agitated right away (he kept moving and going up and down and in and out of the covers) so next I gave Sulphur for the redness…dumb me.  No reaction.  I waited about 20 minutes to give it some thought.

He happened to be sleeping with his mouth open so I decided to smell his breath and it was very strong; so, I finally put two and two together, also recalling that I had noticed his tongue was white and gave one dose of ____________ 1M, (yes, I know, a little high but that was all I had).  He calmed down instantly and fell asleep.  That’s it!!!!  He woke up the next day as if nothing had happened.

******************

Well, Gabi may have THOUGHT she gave an excessively high potency but it turned out to be spot-on!  So….what is the remedy?  Do you know?  And do you have your high potencies there for acutes like this?  Do you think a 30C would have worked?  It might not have.  You know, we not only have to get the right remedy but the right potency too.  

Write to me at [email protected] and let me know what remedy you came up with; it will be revealed in next month’s ezine.  Shana, get me that video of Fats Domino with Ricky Nelson joining him on “I’m Walkin'”!

Here it is!  (Eat your heart out, Beatles!)

 

Ricky and Fats 2

——————————————–

How did we do?  Here are our vote totals:

Mercury-7

Arsenicum-5

Ant-c.-3

Nux vomica-2

Aconite-2

Gelsemium

Chamomilla

Kali mur.

Pulsatilla

Rhus tox

It looks like the majority of you knew!  But only one of you sent in a list of rubrics and it was none other than Anonymous himself!  Here’s what he said:

Dear Elaine,

According to the following rubrics the remedy can be Mercurius.  I used Boenninghausen’ Repertory:

[Boenninghausen] [Face] Red:Bright:

OK, I looked in Boenninghausen’s repertory and there were only two remedies under Face, red, bright–Belladonna and Stramonium.  Under Face, red, there are 130 remedies, many of them in bold, making this a useless rubric.  Meanwhile, Anonymous, stop using Boenninghausen’s Repertory, OK?  To say that it’s out-dated would be an understatement!  The best and easiest-to-use Repertory to use nowadays is Murphy’s.

[Boenninghausen] [Fever] Pathological types: Inflammatory

How do we know this?  Don’t make assumptions.  In fact, the presence of bad odors in a case usually suggests that the pathology is not inflammatory but probably septic.

[Boenninghausen] [Mouth and throat] Tongue: Coated: White:

There are 80 remedies in this rubric and even more in Murphy’s, many of them in bold, making this a useless rubric as well.  We’re supposed to be looking for what’s characteristic in a case, not common.  If there are hundreds of remedies in a rubric, it means the rubric is not identifying at all.

[Boenninghausen] [Mouth and throat] Mouth (buccal cavity), in general: Odour from, bad breath

Yes, finally; this is an important rubric.  The patient really does have bad breath, and this does narrow down our choices.  We need a bad breath remedy!  For example, we wouldn’t give Belladonna to a patient who had bad breath (as a concomitant to the acute case).  We’re not talking about people who always have bad breath, which is common, unfortunately.

[Boenninghausen] [Sensation and complaints in general] Infants: Fever:

Santiago is not an infant, per se, he’s a child.  But again, fevers in children?  Too large a rubric.  Too general.  Not useful.

[Boenninghausen] [Sleep] Sleep:Restless:

Restless sleep?  Mercury’s only a 1 for that in Murphy’s Repertory; I couldn’t find it in Boenninghausen’s at all, it’s too large a rubric anyway.

[Boenninghausen] [Sleep] During sleep: Mouth: Open:

I didn’t see a sleep chapter in Boenninghausen’s repertory.  I checked the mouth chapter and under mouth, open, there was no sub-rubric “during sleep”.  In Murphy’s Repertory, I did find, “Mouth: open, sleep, during” and Mercurius was there only as a 1.  (FYI, a 1 in homeopathy means the remedy is listed under a symptom in plain type, like what you see me typing in right now.  The highest you can get is a 4, which means the remedy is in Bold AND underlined!  Meaning it is a REALLY good choice for the symptom it’s listed under, practically a sure thing!)

[Boenninghausen] [Time] Time: Night:

Night time aggravation is too big a rubric—and most of the remedies are in bold.  How is that going to help us?

[Boenninghausen] [Sensation and complaints in general] Burning: Of external parts

With 122 remedies, most of them in bold, this is another useless rubric.

[Boenninghausen] [Sensation and complaints in general] Ill, sense of being (sick feeling, etc.):

Really?  “I feel sick” is not a very helpful symptom for homeopaths as pretty much all sick people feel sick.

[Boenninghausen] [Sensation and complaints in general] Restlessness: Corporal

Restlessness, too large a rubric.  92 remedies, half of them in bold and if I look in Murphy’s…well, let me look…. Over 400 remedies!  A meaningless, useless rubric; it means practically every remedy is restless!

Despite picking a long list of mostly useless rubrics, Anonymous found his way to the right remedy nonetheless!  Yes, it is Merc-viv.  And by the way, the remedy Merc-sol. is interchangeable with that.  

Look, this case does not have to be repertorized at all!  Why?  Because we should know our remedy keynotes by heart!  What do we have here?  Bad breath!  What remedy has bad breath?  That’s right, Mercury!  What else?  Who throws the covers off and then puts them right back on again?  That’s right, Mercury!  (Some of you mistook that for “restlessness” and voted for Arsenicum, but, Arsenicum would never throw the covers off, as they are freezing!)

So, who are our winners this month, aside from Anonymous?

  • Caralyn
  • Abby Beale
  • Chris Gregory
  • Lowanna
  • Maria Georgas
  • Sinead

What do our winners get for being super-stars of the Hpathy Quiz, Dr. B?   I know it’s short notice, but…. how about a ticker-tape parade????

The balloons are a nice touch.  Thanks Dr. B!  See you back here next time!

______________________________

Elaine Lewis, DHom, CHom

Elaine takes online cases.  Write to her at [email protected]

Visit her website: https://ElaineLewis.hpathy.com

 

About the author

Elaine Lewis

Elaine Lewis, D.Hom., C.Hom.
Elaine is a passionate homeopath, helping people offline as well as online. Contact her at [email protected]
Elaine is a graduate of Robin Murphy's Hahnemann Academy of North America and author of many articles on homeopathy including her monthly feature in the Hpathy ezine, "The Quiz". Visit her website at:
https://elainelewis.hpathy.com/ and TheSilhouettes.org

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