Clinical Cases

Apple Anaphylaxis – A Case of Borax

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Written by Wendy Howard

The case of an allergy to apples in a young child, which progressed to anaphylaxis, cured by Borax. The case shows that the remedy’s signatures were evident in pregnancy as well as infancy.

My third child, now 11 years old, was born in my third year at college studying homeopathy. (This case is published with her knowledge and permission.)

I experienced a lot of confusion, anxiety and insecurity at the time of her conception and often throughout my pregnancy with her. The pregnancy of itself was trouble-free, except I was unable to feel any sort of connection with her or get a sense of who she was. Her physical presence was vigorous enough, but unlike my previous two children, I had no sense of any separate person with me. I took this to my homeopath at the time, but the remedies I had made no great difference. She was born at home in the middle of a college weekend. My waters broke during a ceilidh and contractions became well established straight away. The labour lasted just over 4 hours and she was born bright red, wriggling and screaming. She was wriggling so much that she slipped clean out of the midwife’s hands and was only just caught by her father.

As a baby she was still hard to get a sense of. Who this little person was I really didn’t know (“I don’t have the ability to be an individual, independent and on my own.” Rosenthal & Azriel). She was a serious baby, clingy, very red and wriggly when upset, startled easily, and didn’t enjoy being thrown into the air like her brother and elder sister had (This anxiety or nervousness, this indescribable feeling that is within him, is aggravated from upward or downward motion. Kent). But she fed well, was very alert, watched everything going on around her with studious and intense concentration and seemed to be taking it all in. Her first word was “Look!”. She was very sensitive to wind and caught her breath, jerked backwards and cried if it blew in her face. She slept anywhere provided she was attached to an adult, but putting her down on her own, either during the day or at night, resulted in her instantly waking and crying. If she did sleep, she would waken and cry at the slightest noise.

Whenever she was upset, her face became red and blotchy, particularly round the eyes (Great redness around eyes when crying (in an infant.). Allen.). As she began to take solid foods, we noticed that this same blotchy reaction was occurring whenever she ate apples or drank apple juice. All other foods seemed fine. With time the reaction intensified, so we stopped giving her anything with apples in it.

By the time she was 18 months old, we decided to try her on apples again. Her reaction was dramatic. Not only did she go blotchy straight away, but within minutes became very distressed and was having increasing difficulty breathing. Both her father and I were in little doubt we were looking at a rapidly developing anaphylactic reaction. While preparing to head for A&E, I flashed on a single symptom which had jumped out at me when reading Borax materia medica not long before – apples aggravate – and immediately gave her a single dose of Borax 200C. The reaction was instantaneous. As fast as the symptoms started, they ceased. Her breathing eased, she relaxed, the blotchiness disappeared and she fell asleep. All thoughts of A&E evaporated. (This incident was enough to obliterate her father’s previous scepticism about homeopathy.)

A week later I tested her on some apple juice. No anaphylactic reaction, but still some blotchiness and slight distress. I repeated the remedy. Within a month, she was eating apples with impunity and has done ever since.

Postscript: Having written up this case for this issue of The Homeopath, I got to looking at Borax in the context of my daughter again. It’s still the case that she doesn’t have a very clear sense of who she is, so I decided to give her another dose of the remedy. In the following fortnight, she reversed her previous intention to go on to high school and decided she wanted to be home educated along with her older brother. When I asked her why, she said she felt she would never find out who she is if she continues in the state education system. She wants the freedom to discover herself.

Note: This article was originally published in The Homeopath, Summer 2008, 27:1 Journal of SOH.

References

Allen, T F. A Handbook of Materia Medica and Homeopathic Therapeutics. 1889. ReferenceWorks.
Kent, J T.  Lectures on Homeopathic Materia Medica. 1905 (reprinted 1990).  B Jain, New Delhi.
Rosenthal, Chaim & Azriel, Avi. I lost the place where I end and she begins. A case of Borax. Homeopathic Links; 2000; 13; 1; 47-49

© Wendy Howard, April 2008
reproduced from The Homeopath, Summer 2008, 27:1
smeddum.net – Homeopathic Articles: “APPLE ANAPHYLAXIS – A case of Borax”

About the author

Wendy Howard

Wendy Howard - has been practicing homeopathy since 1998, graduating after four years of study at the Edinburgh College of Homeopathy. She holds the licentiateship and diploma in homeopathy awarded by this college. She is also a Registered Member of the UK Society of Homeopaths (RSHom).
Wendy contributes to international homeopathic research projects, has published articles in professional journals in Europe and takes part in, and occasionally organizes provings.
Her interests include Jungian psychology, Eastern spiritual traditions, quantum mechanics, astrophysics, astrology, anthropology and mythology.
Visit Wendy Howard at her webiste : http://www.smeddum.net/index.html

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