Several years ago I was called to see a patient suffering from violent pains over the left eye and the left side of the head. For seven weeks previous to the time I saw her she had had severe pains in that part of the head which drove her frantic, finally clusters of watery – like blisters appeared upon the forehead over the left eye, where there was a large scar when I called and so it is to this day. From this history had nightly aggravation and much restlessness, I gave her Rhus tox., which helped, but I was a long time overcoming the distressing condition, and gave several remedies during the following six weeks.
Now last Fall the same lady was taken with similar violent pains on the right side of the head, accompanied with vomiting of sour food, and she acted as though crazy, jumping out of bed and running from room to room like a young cat that has had too much meat. I had become more or less acquainted with this patients desire for rich food. Her cellar was a storehouse of choice preserves, canned foods and delicacies, all home products, and there is not a fine restaurant in Philadelphia that she has not visited.
When I called at her home, things were going at a merry rate; she had rushed from room to and her husband after her till both were getting their wind for the next rush, meantime she would vomit sour food. Everybody was terrified. Oh! do something to quiet her. She vomited like Nux, ran like Stramonium and complained like Belladonna.
None of these remedies helped, and after several hours I gave her Morphia. I was satisfied the cause of all her trouble was in the stomach. We made little progress through selecting remedies carefully. Finally a good dose of castor oil was given to help unload her system. Next day she was better. Two days later she was not so well, crazy wild. Too her to the hospital to X-ray the stomach and bowels. During the night she tried to jump out of the window. She had months previous to this tried to destroy herself.
The pictures taken showed almost no peristalsis. The lightest food was not digested, and was vomited after several hours. Finally, we fell back on the good old castor oil, a tablespoonful each morning, and some Ignatia 3x, and Hydrastis 2x. Immediately she made a rapid recovery.
I endeavored to impress upon her husband the necessity for her diet being light, but when Christmas dinner came she could not resist taking just a little of each course and pound cake and tea at 4 p.m. She had a very pleasant holiday, but when 4 p.m. came next day she got busy again with her headache and vomiting, raging around like a regular toper. But we were wise now, so lots of castor oil, Ignatia 3x, and finally a little Hydras. 2x cured her.
I call such treatment pain doctoring, where you are compelled to puddle your road through to health. The following two cases will show the great value of Hahnemanns discoveries and that Similia Similibus Curantur is a definite science:
CASE 2.
Aug. 29, 1919.
Mrs. M., aged 46.
Nervous and itches.
Stomach bloats in p.m.
Menses has sensation of a lump in it.
Leucorrhoea yellow.
Hot flushes.
A rash comes and goes on the limbs, smarts, burns and itches.
Weak, hungry between meals.
Headache occasionally.
Sleep nervous and has dreams.
Tongue all hacks and cuts but no bleeding.
At night legs so nervous, cant keep quiet I gave Sulphur 30 which helped very much.
She has headache for about two years in spells. It has been steady now for one month.
Headache generally over the left eyebrow, now over the right eye.
Headache comes on at 9 or 10 a.m., and severe between 1 and 4 p.m.
Headache after 4 p.m. disappears.
Sleep comes later and wakeful. Sleepy in the evening.
Hot flushes, weak, hunger between meals.
Itchy skin and on the scalp.
Can not sit still, her feet are restless.
The headache was the most distressing symptom so I gave Cedron cm.
Next day reported the headache came at 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., and not so severe. There days later her head was all better.
Her next most distressing symptom was much nervousness and very figidity feet. Zinc 200 cleared this all up. Eight days later I gave Sulphur, which removed the remaining symptoms.
The succession of remedies, Cedron, Zinc and Sulphur, were the steps to a cure, though Sulphur had removed a certain group of symptoms previously. It came in good at the end of a case, when commonly we give it at the beginning to stir up symptoms.
CASE 3.
April 28, 1920.
Neuralgia over the left eye and around it. The pain would shoot violently and would come at exactly 9 a.m. and lasts until noon when it would stop suddenly, only to reappear at the same time the next day. Cedron cm cut this suffering right off the next day, and it has not returned since.
In the first case reported gormandizing was the cause of all her attacks, and the potentized remedies were of no use. Free unloading of the alimentary canal and little or no food cured promptly.
In her first attack the condition over the left eye was called herpes of the 4th nerve by five physicians who preceded me, and none thought of the stomach at the cause. How necessary to keep to the totality of symptoms in prescribing and not to lose ourselves in endeavoring to control a few violent – local symptoms.
CASE 2.
This case shows the great benefit of keeping a record of a patients symptom for future prescribing, and so getting a line on the remedies, as well upon the succession of symptoms.
CASE 3.
With a paucity of symptoms is readily brought into the light through our knowledge of the preceding cases, and the marvelous power and accuracy of the homoeopathic remedy is shown.
Cedron has but few symptoms known to us, but its clock – like regularity in neuralgia pains especially over the left eye, lifts it into a clear cut position, so that even a high potency renders an unmistakable account of itself. Convincing all that Hahnemanns discovery of the latent power in medicines when liberated is a study worth our time, and that the best way to fasten such information upon the mind is to tell but little about a remedy, find its characteristics, and show its action upon the sick.
