Clinical Cases

Musings on Mental Illnesses

Written by K. V. Natarajan

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I do not have any knowledge in the intricacies of the complicated inner parts of the brain nor am I educated in psychiatry. Yet the following will prove how perfectly homeopathic remedies work when the expression of vital force in a patient is taken into consideration for treatment.
1971: Mental Retardation (Homeopathy Treatment for Mental Retardation)
While working at Thiruvannamalai, as Station Master, a friend came to ask me for help with a child of impaired mental development. Enquiries revealed that the child, at two and a half years of age, was treated for croup with convulsions. The anticonvulsive treatment was continued for a prolonged period of six months. There was normal growth, both mentally and physically, prior to this treatment. I derived that continued medication had impaired her mental development. Homeopathically, the disease expression had shifted and settled in her brain.

Her mother explained that the girl, now 15 years of age, was not shy but behaved as a child with newcomers. Her talk and mannerisms were childish. She could not wash vessels, swab and clean the floor or draw a line of kolam (rangoli/colour) on the floor as required daily. Even while walking she would jump and dance.

Some references I made were:

Kent: Mind, Memory impaired
Kent: Childish behaviour
Boericke: Comprehension difficult

The initial respiratory trouble took place in November which is a cold and damp weather period in Tamil Nadu. Nux Moschata was selected on that acount.

Burt’s Materia Medica on Nux Moschata says:

It is at all times a great remedy with us. Although it suits all kinds and classes of people, it is particularly adaptable to children, old people and women during pregnancy. Its has a particular action over the nervous system and hence we find it applicable in such nervous ailments, as hysteria, locomotor ataxia, chorea, epilepsy, catalepsy, faintings and serious forms of convulsions. Jactitation of muscles, trembling, fatigue, lassitude and restlessness are prominent characteristics of Nux moschata. He suffers from great restlessness and must constantly move about. He staggers while walking; often we find him falling.

The mental aspect of the patient also betrays the same tendency. Frequent vanishing of thoughts while talking reading or waiting, great weakness or loss of memory, listlessness and indifference also speak of real depletion of the nerve force. He has no will power of his own and is the playing of whims and fancies. He accomplishes nothing; he undertakes no enterprise. He stands in one place for hours together and he does not know what to do and where to go. He does not know where he is and betrays great incoherence attempting to express his idea. This shows total imbecility and Nux moschata frequently meets with, cures and rectifies all such mental disorders. Stupor, unconsciousness and insensibility are merely stages of his downward journey.

Nux Moschata in its 200th potency, one single dose of five globules, did the wonder. Next morning they reported shyness in the girl. In a month she menstruated. Three months later she could read and write Tamil elementary books! No medicines were given following this one dose of 200C.

After three months she relapsed. Nux Moschata had tallied for the respiratory trouble, the damp weather and also childish and foolish behaviour. The one dose rectified the suppressed ill effects, making her behave normally. Also she began to use her brain in learning household duties and studies which is was not able to earlier. Now this relapse was not helped by Nux Moschata in repetition or 1M potency. Therefore I understood the present state to be the continuation of a mentally ill condition that was her natural innate/chronic illness.

Therefore I selected Hyoscyamus, which happens to be first grade in foolish behaviour and gestures in Kent’s repertory. Thus I decided that the chronic medicine of Nux Moschata may be Hyoscyamus – at least it appears so in this case.

Kent: Gestures, ridiculous and foolish

In its 1M potency, within 10 months, the girl’s development was enhanced, to the amazement of all, to a similar bright figure comparable with the other ladies in the family.

A perfect restoration is possible, as claimed by Homoeopathy with a carefully selected remedy, allowed to work undisturbed by any other remedy. No vitamins, no substitutes etc. In a short while she was able to learn tailoring and began to work in that profession.

1992 : Delusions
A man of 35 could not complete M.B.B.S studies due to mental illness. He imagined that two people were talking together and what they said was an indignation against him. He would behave very violently against them inside or outside the house, based on these suspicions. Hence he was kept under captivity with regular sedation.

Why this unusual behavior? I talked to him personally. He did not show anything amiss while in personal conversation. He told in a very confident tone that others were criticizing about his shrunken thighs. He was very sure about the thinning of his thighs. Actually he was of well-built body and his thighs were appropriately well developed. That meant he has the delusion of shrunken thighs. Yes, the homeopathic Repertory has these peculiar symptoms!

Kent: Delusions: Organs shrunken
Kent: Rage
Kent: Mania, Madness

Based on these symptoms, Sabadilla was chosen as the remedy.

Phatak’s Materia Medica states:

Mind.
Miserable. Timid. Easily startled. Erroneous (fixed) ideas about himself; imagines he is very sick; that parts are sunken; limbs are crooked, chin is elongated; one side larger than the other; that she has a cancer or is pregnant. No response to questions, loss of consciousness, then he jumps up and runs recklessly through the room. Rage. Mania better washing head in cold water.

The correct remedy is Sabadilla and in its 200th potency it made him behave normally. He was able to move out freely without any delusion and he actually told me how normal he felt. However he could not be completely cured since his father did not believe in the possibility of his restoration. If a psychiatrist stated he was incurable, he was. So he continued to be kept in captivity!

The cause of failure in homeopathy can be due to the one who is treated too! If only Allopaths recognise the immense power of Homoeopathy many, many, cases of psychic conditions might be cured by oral homeopathic remedies.

1994: Depression
Depression today, is approached in its broadest sense without taking the cause of the depression. And as such there is very little medicine for it while voluminous psychological advise is given. Of course the mainstay in allopathic treatment is sedatives for most mental conditions.

A mechanical engineer placed in a high position in a manufacturing unit at Madras got fed up with the paltry remuneration he got in India and decided to go to Dubai. His parents were also partly responsible for this decision as they used to compare him with his elder brother in U.S. Already in a depressed frame of mind with indignation caused by his parents, he got further damaged by the bad treatment meted out to him at his job in Dubai. He had also not earned such a huge salary as he desired though he brought more than 5 hundred thousand rupees home as savings.

On his return to India he became totally useless, with total prostration and without any inclination to work and he was fretful with anything and everything. It was his wife who had to face the brunt of his state. Psychiatrists, counselors etc. could not do anything except give him sedatives, which only made his prostration more severe. Then entered Homeopathy. His main difficulty, I realized, was that he did not earn as much as he desired or in other words he felt the loss of money.

Based on this picture, I selected Arnica as the remedy for him.
Boericke’s Materia Medica states:

General.
Produces conditions upon the system quite similar to those resulting from injuries, falls, blows, contusions. Tinnitus aurium. PUTRID PHENOMENA. Septic conditions; prophylactic of pus infection. Apoplexy, red, full face.
It is especially suited to cases when any injury, however remote, seems to have caused the present trouble. AFTER TRAUMATIC INJURIES, overuse of any organ, strains. Arnica is disposed to cerebral congestion. Acts best in plethoric, feebly in debilitated with impoverished blood, cardiac dropsy with dyspnoea. A muscular tonic. Traumatism of grief, remorse or sudden realization of financial loss. Limbs and body ache as if beaten; joints as if sprained. Bed feels too hard. Marked effect on the blood. Affects the venous system inducing stasis. Ecchymosis and Hemorrhages. Relaxed blood vessels, black and blue spots. Tendency to hemorrhage and low-fever states. Tendency to tissue degeneration, septic conditions abscesses that do not mature. SORE, LAME, BRUISED FEELING. Neuralgias originating in disturbances of pneumogastric. Rheumatism of muscular and tendinous tissue, especially of back and shoulders. Aversion to tobacco. INFLUENZA. Thrombosis. Haematocele.

Mind.
Fears touch, or the approach of anyone. Unconscious; when spoken to answers correctly, but relapses. Indifference; inability to perform continuous active work; morose, delirious. Nervous; cannot bear pain; whole body oversensitive. Says there is nothing the matter with him. Wants to be let alone. Agoraphobia (fear of space). After mental strain or shock.

The right remedy is Arnica and in its one dose of 200th potency made him active . He could now go out to temple and park with children but only for short while daily. However he was not relieved of depression fully. He was not confident of working and interacting with people.

Boericke Materia Medica: Great lowness of spirits. Easily vexed
Boericke Materia Medica: Brain feels tired

As we can see for prostration of mind the remedy is Phosphorus. In its 1000th potency what a stunning change! Next morning he went to his friend’s factory and in a few days he applied for a senior level post in a big manufacturing company. Today he is in charge of production in a multinational company. It is Homoeopathy, and it alone, that can do such wonderful cures! His wife later told me that he was really more active mentally as well as physically like never before.

2000 : Depression
This is the case of a lady neighbour of my brother in Bangalore. Normally a very active lady engaged in multifarious activities, she was one day completely prostrated without any apparent illness. Doctors decided it was depression and kept her under sedatives. On enquiring I found she had been dejected on a flimsy happening and a single dose of Phosphorus 200 made her totally able to become as active as she used to be. This case was done only by phone conversation and I have not met her so far.

Some rubrics to consider are:

Kent: Prostration of mind on flimsy grounds
Boericke: Aversion to physical work
Boericke: Hopeless, discouraged, loss of self-confidence

In the above two cases of depression the patients were left on sedatives by Allopathy and of course with lots of advise on how to behave. Both were cleared of their mental difficulties by single doses of Phosphorous because Homoeopathy treats the expression of the vital forces instead of causing physical changes in the brain.

1986: Nervous Disorder
A neighbour from Madras reported about the continual crying of his child. He had to carry the child all day and night. Father and mother, alternating the ‘carrying’ duties, were somehow managing. Doctors could not find anything wrong with the child. A blood boil on the child’s head was cured by penicillin 6 months earlier. No further inquiry was necessary.

I selected Nux vomica for him.

From Boericke’s Materia Medica:

General
[Nux vomica] is the greatest of polychrests, because the bulk of its symptoms correspond in similarity with those of the commonest and most frequent of diseases. It is frequently the first remedy, indicated after much dosing, establishing a sort of equilibrium of forces and counteracting chronic effects.

……These conditions produce an IRRITABLE, nervous system, hypersensitive and over impressionable, which Nux will do much to soothe and calm. Especially adapted to digestive disturbances, portal congestion, and hypochondriacal states depending thereon. Convulsions, with consciousness; worse, touch, moving. ZEALOUS FIERY TEMPERAMENT. Nux patients are easily chilled, avoid open air, etc. Nux always seems to be out of tune; inharmonious spasmodic action.

A dose of Nux vomica 200 in watery solution made the child sleep in 15 minutes. I did not have any report again of the return of symptoms. The inflammation had moved to the brain and made the child fretful.

1975: Retarded Development
This case is of a child of four years who could not sit or stand. To move she used to roll on her body (Angaprathakshinam). This is what her grand father told me. I am not a neurologist nor psychiatrist.

The information the grandfather gave me was that the girl was not getting up at all and forever lying down. In answer to my question of how Allopathic doctors explained the complaint, he told me that she had not developed enough mentally to imitate elders and she may learn to get up in the future. But now it had been years and she had only rolled.

The doctors’ opinion was that the child hadn’t mentally developed enough to imitate people around her. This meant that her brain was affected. A child could not have developed this due to any emotional upset since this condition existed from infancy.

I understood this to be some effect of cerebral shock. I asked him to come in the next day with the information about whether the child wept immediately after birth; if not, how long it took for her to cry. I told him if there was something significant in the birth history I could help. The next day he came in with a bright and happy face and confirmed that the child took 24 hrs to become conscious and to weep after birth. I confirmed my suspicion that it could have been a case of cerebral shock related to birth, maybe due to the coldness of the weather in the November season.

My assessment was that this sense of imitation was lost due to mental shock in cold weather, during birth. Being an infant we cannot identify any other symptom. Shock by any other cause but not emotion is Arnica.

Thus Arnica was given and he was told to wait. I also advised him not to get perturbed if she slept for a prolonged period, like a new born baby because she had been in shock and the brain was not behaving in the normal pattern. The next day he again confirmed that the child of 4 years was sleeping continuously except for toilet and she had to be woken up to give meals etc. He also was happy by her sleep because so far the girl did not sleep night and day. She had to be managed by both grandmothers over the last four years with these symptoms. I had not enquired about this aspect earlier!

Just one dose of the remedy and wait for 3 months, the child slowly recovered, walked and even ran. The pleasure and satisfaction of the parents have no words of explanation!
Dr. K V Natarajan

About the author

K. V. Natarajan

K. V. Natarajan
Homoeopath,TNHC B7789
Dear Homoeopathy Fraternity,
35, Chari Street, North Usman Road,
Tnagar, Chennai, 600017
Ph:044-42125712. 08025239396

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