Words: Dr Edward SHALTS
Interestingly, homeopathic remedies may be helpful for literally thousands of symptoms. Natrum muriaticum, for example, is known to cure thousands of symptoms.
‘Provings’ done on healthy test subjects and the results of two hundred-plus years’ of experience of using this remedy to cure thousands of people revealed these symptoms, which are listed in the Materia Medica.
Frequently, matching a remedy to an individual patient requires laborious analysis, but in some lucky cases the majority of most characteristic symptoms of a remedy are plain to see. In homeopathic parlance, symptoms that appeared ‘very strongly’ in the majority of ‘provers’ are called keynote symptoms. When present, they lead to a clear choice of the remedy.
In Idis’s case, the combination of her having a depressed mood, being reserved, refusing consolation,
having headaches after trauma, and craving for salt were all keynote symptoms strongly pointing to Natrum muriaticum. Her history of developing depression after the separation from friends also strongly supported my choice of this particular remedy.
I advised Idis that her pimples would go away, but I said that they were going to be the last part of her ‘illness’ to disappear. I expected the following order of events:
- Depression gets better
- Then headaches may come back and pimples may get worse
- Headaches go away, but pimples are still not better, or are even worse
- Then pimples go away.
All the information that I gave to Idis and her family was so new and unusual to them that she and her parents just said ‘thank you’ and went home with a clear expression of doubt on their faces.
Things Get Better
I suspected we were in for trouble. Six weeks later, a new Idis came to my office. She wasn’t depressed. She wasn’t isolating as much. She wasn’t crying. Her school performance was better. She’d even made a new friend [One friend for such a reserved girl means a lot]. And, so far, I was wrong about everything else. Idis had no headaches. Her pimples weren’t better, or worse.
Cautiously, this young lady asked me whether I wanted to reconsider my previous statement about not touching the pimples. I didn’t change my mind. No, dear. We scheduled a second follow-up appointment in eight weeks, and I clearly reminded the family to call me if any serious problems arose. No new dose was given. Things were going well.
Just a few weeks before the next appointment, Idis’s mother phoned to tell me that Idis had one big headache a week before and a few small episodes a few days later.
They all went away pretty quickly. I was pleased to hear this information. It meant that Dr C Hering’s Law of Cure was working. To me, and I hope to you by now, it meant that Idis was going through the classic healing process. Her symptoms were appearing and disappearing chronologically backwards. The headaches were an indication of a brief healing crisis.
What about her pimples? Well, at the follow-up visit the pimples looked pretty ‘angry.’ Idis was desperate. She was fourteen. Being the happy father of two daughters myself, I can easily appreciate the issue. Still, Mother Nature has her own way. With all the understanding in the world, I informed Idis and her parents that I still had to advise them against antibiotics and hormone-containing creams.
Idis’s body was healing at the core level, and it wouldn’t be appropriate. They seemed to understand. But, the difference was that this advice was written in stone in my mind, and it was written in erasable ink in their minds.
Idis was persistent and in a few short weeks the happy family went to a dermatologist who had a few laughs with them about ‘this strange homeopath’ and prescribed an antibiotic and a cream.
The Turnaround
Two months later, the beautiful Idis was back in my office with excruciating long-lasting headaches. Her
mood wasn’t the best in the world, which could have been a result of the headaches. Fortunately, they came back to me as soon as they did. Her remedy picture hadn’t changed. Idis stopped taking conventional drugs; she took her homeopathic remedy again, and felt better in only a month.
Guess what? The pimples came back. But, this time, Idis promised to give me a year to deal with them,
and everything ultimately worked out to everyone’s satisfaction. This process of healing in reverse stages doesn’t have to be present all the time.
Most frequently, symptoms of ADHD, for example [or, whatever else the current emotional issue may be], are all the child has ever had. In this case, we don’t expect any significant problems to emerge at the physical level.
