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Duration of a remedies effect and antidoting 1

 

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Duration of a remedies effect and antidoting

I think I've read similar discussions, but can't seem to find them. I'm wondering how long a homeopathic remedy can exert its influence and possibly confuse a proper image of the case. I'm afraid that I may have given remedies without enough waiting in between many months ago or even a year ago and that these remedies may have complicated a case. I've heard of remedies acting for years. Could a remedy at 30C given 3 times over a couple of days continue to confuse a case months or years later?

I'm considering antidoting as well. Can something like Vick's vapour rub applied every day for a week or so antidote all previous remedies?

For anyone curious, the case relates to my dog's skin condition:
http://www.abchomeopathy.com/forum2.php/242395/
http://www.abchomeopathy.com/forum2.php/339228/
 
  rtc35 on 2014-06-01
This is just a forum. Assume posts are not from medical professionals.
I just wanted to expand on an answer I gave earlier regarding this.

Remedies only last a few hours, or a few days, at the most. After that, any response is being maintained by the vital energy of the patient with no external influence from a remedy. Remedies do not 'stay in the system' like a chemical might. There is no physical substance in the remedy at all, it is purely non-material.

We use our medicines precisely because they have very short durations.

What happens after a remedy is given (assuming it has done anything at all) is that the 'posture' of the vital force changes. If the patient is very sensitive, or if the remedy is given too often, this change of posture may remain. However, it is not maintained by the remedy, which has long since disappeared from the patient. You cannot antidote this, as it is the patient themselves that now supports the symptoms.

Very often patients mistakenly believe, or are lead to believe by people who do not understand homoeopathy very well, that their symptoms are being caused by a medicine taken weeks, months or even years ago. This is a fallacy and comes from a very poor knowledge of how our medicines work.

As an example, to better understand this, imagine that a patient gets sunstroke from being out in the sun too long. The will have sunstroke even when you remove the influence of the sun - but they remain sick. The patient themselves now creates the symptoms.

Another example would be someone being upset from being criticized. They can hold on to this for a long time, being hurt by it, but the person themselves is no longer present and may not even remember or care about it. It is the affected person's sensitivity that continues to create the hurt, not the person who made the criticism, and neutralizing that person in some way does not remove the hurt.

This means that if someone seems to have become worse after being given one or more remedies, the only way to deal with it is to cure the person. Use the symptoms, both old and new, to form a complete picture, and treat it homoeopathically with a medicine that is most similar to this picture.
[message edited by Evocationer on Fri, 06 Jun 2014 01:15:44 BST]
[message edited by Evocationer on Fri, 06 Jun 2014 01:27:11 BST]
 
Evocationer 9 years ago
Thank you so much for this thoughtful reply. I try to be careful in my understanding of homeopathic practice, but sometimes it's easy to get lost. I was reading The Science of Homeopathy by George Vithoulkas and in looking back at it again, it merely says 'When a patient has received numerous homeopathic remedies over the years, the defense mechanism's actions are altered, at first subtly and then profoundly' but in my mind, I remembered it incorrectly and came to think he may have said the effect can last for years. I suspect I have composited a series of statements and created a Frankenstein of an idea in my head. I really should have known better, but ultimately, your explanation has provided a lot of clarity and I will definitely process your words carefully.

Unfortunately, the book has not given much encouragement. In the appendix Vitoulkas describes more than 20 scenarios to consider when trying to interpret a patient's response to treatment and the one that seems to most closely match my dog's response is that of an incurable patient - no aggravation, but immediate amelioration, soon followed by relapse. I know that he offers it only as a guideline, but I am becoming increasingly concerned that I'll never find a cure for her. I just recently gave her Ars Iod 30C and I was thrilled to see her skin improve so profoundly, her mental and emotional symptoms also improved greatly, she was gaining weight, eating well, and showed improved energy. After only a week of good health, she began a full relapse. This has happened before, when I thought I'd cured her and she spiralled into a worsening state.

I wonder if it's possible that a food that she has a sensitivity to could antidote the remedy. She's certainly sensitive to a lot of foods and it's hard to keep her from withering away. I know that foods generally do not act as an antidote, but some foods can, as well as medication. She is not on any medication, but if a patient is allergic to a food, can that food act as an antidote? Wishful thinking, I suspect. I tried repeating Ars Iod again at 30C, but it did nothing at all the second time. I'm wondering if I should graduate it. I suspect you'll say, retake the case and find another remedy.

I'd like to say thanks again for taking the time to respond. It really is inspiring to see people reaching out and helping others in forums like this.
 
rtc35 9 years ago
Have you tried Cina yet?

Obstinate
Aversion to being carried
Averion/aggravation approached by others
Capricious, rejects things longed for when offered
Disobedient

Cina belongs to the same family as Arnica, and as such is useful for ailments from injury, bites and stings.
 
Evocationer 9 years ago
I find Cina a really interesting suggestion. I never would have considered it because it doesn't appear to address her main issue, the skin condition. I read through 3 materia medicas - Kent, Hahnemann and Phatak and they hardly discuss itching skin at all. I do see some very interesting features, so just as much for my own personal documentation, I'll clarify what I've come to observe about her condition more recently:

Related to Cina:

Touchiness esp. about the head. I wasn't as acutely aware of that earlier on, but now I see her touchiness is focused on the head. She will jump if you touch her anywhere, but she likes her lower back petted when she isn't taken by surprise. Sometimes she paces about my feet as if she wants something and scurries away when I kneel down to approach, but she hesitantly returns because I've learned that she likes gentle scratching to get some of the excess skin off where it's hard to reach - behind her neck and shoulders. As soon as I touch the head, she moves away and if I persist (to get a large flake of skin off her head) she will leave and not return. By the way, her head has recently cleared up and hair is returning to her head.

By far, the most obvious aggravation to her itching is from eating. She immediately begins a lengthy scratching session after every meal, the only other thing getting in the way is often having to pee or poo immediately after eating as well. Then it's back to scratching. I wondered if this would be a black letter symptom for Cina. It's not black letter, but it is listed under Eating, after, agg. Kent: 'everything is worse after eating even a moderate meal'.

I think I used to consider her to simply have a low appetite, however, when she eats, she often devours her food like a vacuum. If our other Chihuahua comes close, she may growl and might even nip at him in extreme cases and he obediently cowers off to the side until she eats it all for herself. If I put more out, she chases him away and eats it too. And yet, in the morning, she may have little or no appetite at all. She sleeps all day and then comes whimpering for food when she is ravenous. So I like Cina because it mentions voracious hunger alternating with loss of appetite and it's also found in the repertory under emaciation with ravenous appetite in BOLD.

Two summers ago, I went away with the kids, but my wife stayed home with the dogs. They both developed diarrhoea while we were gone, but coincidentally, it was very hot while we were away. It's hard to know if it was the heat or separation anxiety or both, but either way, Kent mentions diarrhoea 'from slight disturbances of the mind' ... 'aggravated in summer'.


A few more notes, but not related to Cina as far as I can tell:

It's hard to judge how true 'worse for heat' still is because it's been such a long cold winter and spring. It's been 10 months since our house was not cold. She likes to sit in the sun. I haven't noticed this triggering any more scratching than usual lately, so maybe worse for heat stands up better than worse for sun.

She whimpers during an itchy spell as if crying out for help.

A cold damp cloth soothes her itching when she exudes a clear, sticky fluid. Wiping it off alleviates the itching.

The excesses of peeling skin seem to be reduced when we cut animal protein, but she loses weight quickly. I believe eggs and dairy aggravate and as I've said before, red meat is the worst. Poor dog - all her favourites. When it comes to vegetarian, she prefers sweet potatoes, carrots, bread and grains - looking good for Cina as well, I think.

She smells bad after eating fish - metallic, but I'm not sure how much it aggravates her skin.

Ultimately, I'm very curious to try Cina, but I wonder how it can be right if it says so little about her chief symptom. Very interesting. Thank you so much for this suggestion.
 
rtc35 9 years ago
If you look through Kent's various lectures on homoeopathy, you will see that he says the main complaint does not need to be covered by the remedy if the mentals and generals fit. You will see this same idea reiterated by various other homoeopaths including some of the modern masters (Vithoulkas, Sankaran, Scholten etc). A remedy that fits the mentals and generals, the core of the case (the totality at its highest level discerned through the hierarchy of symptoms) will often cure local complaints for which they are not known or have not been used before. Skin particularly has little importance for prescribing purposes, if the higher aspects of the case are clearly covered.

I have often been able to essentially ignore the main complaint, and still have it respond to the remedy, as long as the rest of the case clearly points to the remedy. When you do this and when you should not does vary a lot on the particular case in front of you though.

If you always attempt to have the remedy cover the main complaint, you may miss the correct remedy. Many times the remedy itself may have clear symptoms and themes on the general level, but not have been used for the complaint in the past and so is not known for it.

On the other hand, attempting to treat the general state will improve their overall health and allow them to cure the local complaints themselves (Direction of Cure).

Cina is found in the repertory under the following rubrics (although none of these would be important for prescribing purposes):

Eruptions
Eruptions, itching
Eruptions, pimples
Eruptions, pimples, itching
Eruptions, pustules
Eruptions, red
Eruptions, scarlatina
Eruptions, urticaria
Formication
Inflammation (dermatitis)
Itching
Itching at night
Itching, crawling
Itching, better scratching
Itching unchanged by scratching
Swelling of skin
Ulcers
Warts

So there is SOME relationship to the skin (as every remedy can have).
 
Evocationer 9 years ago
I think there was a time when I knew these things better, but that was long ago. I should really read the Organon again. You'd hardly know I read it once. I've fallen into a crude understanding of things - or maybe that's as far as I ever got. That's why I'm the layman and you're the homeopath. I'll administer Cina tomorrow. Many thanks.
 
rtc35 9 years ago
It's ok, honestly it seems a lot of practicing homoeopaths forget this stuff as well (if some of them were ever taught it).

Keep me updated. Animals are a bit of a difficult situation for homoeopathy since they cannot report exactly what is going on for them. I will be interested to see how this goes.
 
Evocationer 9 years ago
I had high hopes for Cina, but unfortunately, it didn't seem to have much effect and I've certainly given it a long time. She has continued to slide back to full relapse after the temporary improvement from Ars Iod. She's scratched the fur back off her head and lost the weight she was gaining.

One new trend is towards more whimpering than before. She's quicker to cry and cries more persistently when she needs something - a blanket over her or just to express the misery of her itching.

Now that the heat has hit us, I would say she's looking more red and she often seems wet, exuding large sticky patches. I've always struggled to describe this odour, but after handling her, my hand smells similar to metal, like rubbing coins together, but that's not quite it - it's a bit more rank and organic. I imagine if one had surgery, and the wound got red and infected in the heat of summer, it might have this kind of odour. She gets this even in winter, but it's expanding, probably from the heat.

Now I have a question about technique. For Cina, I only had globules, so for the dog, I dissolve them in alcohol (vodka) and/or distilled water in a jar and pound the jar on a counter top. From this jar, I pour out a few tablespoons into a clean bowl and top up with more distilled water. The bowl, I tap a few times on the counter top before giving it out. I put the jar in the fridge until the next dose, at which time, I repeat the process of adding it to water and tapping the bowl. This saves me from dissolving globules each time. It could very well just be a coincidence, especially since I have many more failures than successes, but I don't think I can recall a single time when I prepared a remedy this way and got a result. Is there a flaw in my technique?

Also, I try to dose her twice a day - is that a good frequency? When do I stop if I don't see an effect, 3 days or do I keep giving her more?

Many thanks as always.
[message edited by rtc35 on Thu, 03 Jul 2014 15:32:46 BST]
 
rtc35 9 years ago
That is a lot of dilution - probably more than I would ever do for an animal. Most of them are not that sensitive. You are doing dilution into the second cup, a method used only for hypersensitive or low vitality patients. It is possible it is too dilute. That could be one issue.

How do you measure how much she then has though - she has the whole bowl full of water - that actually would be a lot of remedy. One or two drops is often enough, or perhaps at most 1-2 teaspoons. When you dose that way, the entire bowl of water becomes a remedy.

Obviously, if the remedy is wrong there will be no effect regardless as long as the dose is not given too frequently, as does seem to be the case here. But I would be more cautious with whatever ends up being the right remedy - you could overdose with the way you are doing it now. Overdosing is only a problem generally with a remedy that is suitable to the case, not so much with a remedy that has little similarity.

What potency did you give? How many doses?

I will look over the symptoms again anyway, to see what else might be indicated. Any other changes to her behaviour?
 
Evocationer 9 years ago
With respect to the dilution, I guess I figured if I start with 30C, dissolving into water or vodka and succussing it, at that point I'm not sure if I should still consider it 30C (I'm merely dissolving rather than diluting) or now 31C or something else since I'm not measuring out the ratio 1/100 precisely. Once I pour a few tablespoons into a bowl, in my mind, it's approximately 31 or 32C. I see that this isn't very precise. I hadn't thought of it as something for hypersensitive patients and I'm not sure I understand that.

In regard to how much she drinks, I recall hearing about picketers protesting the regulation of homoeopathy in Ontario under a new bill. They were foolishly taking entire vials of a remedy to prove how homoeopathy is nothing but snake oil, as if a whole bottle taken at once might constitute 200 doses and therefore an overdose should ensue. My impression has been, for a long time, that they're really just taking one dose. I guess it was then that I asked myself, wouldn't a whole bowl of potentized water, taken all at once, still be a single remedy, by the same logic? Is this a misunderstanding?

I generally give her 2 doses a day for 3 or 4 days before stopping, figuring that after 6-8 doses, if I don't see much change, it's not resonating with her.

The only other change in behaviour is that she's maybe more inclined to come downstairs where I work and beg for a cushion on the floor or pace at my feet, looking up expectantly. It's cooler down here and only in the last week has it risen to 22 Celsius in the room, up from the usual 18 or 19. I'm not sure if she's being more sociable or attached to me on some level or if there's another explanation, but I found it especially surprising 2 weeks ago, that she chose the colder room, only to shiver and beg for a blanket. It could be that nobody else in the household really attends to her the way I do, so she prefers a room where someone can put the blanket back on her regularly, even when upstairs, she shouldn't need one as much. Chihuahuas just love to burrow into blankets though.

I'm going to look back over all the remedies that I only had globules for and take a look at the results I had. Maybe I should revisit some using a better technique.

Thanks.
 
rtc35 9 years ago
'In regard to how much she drinks, I recall hearing about picketers protesting the regulation of homoeopathy in Ontario under a new bill. They were foolishly taking entire vials of a remedy to prove how homoeopathy is nothing but snake oil, as if a whole bottle taken at once might constitute 200 doses and therefore an overdose should ensue. My impression has been, for a long time, that they're really just taking one dose.'


Yes if taken all at once it is one dose, but it is a very large dose which can provoke a larger aggravation (if the remedy is the correct one). The medicine must have a high degree of similarity to produce a marked response from one dose however, which is why these protesters probably experienced nothing.

However, a dog drinking from a bowl usually doesn't drink the whole lot, but goes back several times (at least every dog I have had does that). Each time they go back would be another dose.

When dosing we have to take into account 3 things - potency, frequency, and size. Size of the dose is often overlooked or even ignored. A whole bowl of water would be considered a very large dose.

If she doesn't seem sensitive, just place 2-3 drops directly into her mouth from the bottle rather than worrying about doing all this extra diluting. It isn't necessary.
 
Evocationer 9 years ago
One other thing - I think she's now less touchy about being petted on the head - she still doesn't seem to want to be touched very much at times, but I just petted her head and she's fairly relaxed at the moment.

Another noteworthy symptom I almost forgot all about - when I gave her Ars Iod her skin suddenly became covered in pale, brown spots about the size of chickpeas. This went along with her improved condition and they completely disappeared as her condition worsened. Sepia? In older notes, I said she was reluctant to go out for a walk until she got out for a while and then remembers that she likes it. I wonder if that could be interpreted as 'worse on beginning to move but better by getting warmed up'. Hard to tell. When she was healthy, she loved to go out and run around blazingly fast. Also, Glen, our other chihuahua came along just after her troubles began so he's never known her when she was healthy. She has always been nothing but hostile in the face of his sexual advances. She growls and retreats when he makes his moves on her. Is this something like indifference to her 'husband'?! She also seems dull-witted. But I recognize that when I get reading a remedy, there are often things that seem to fit, but I can't ask for clarification.

Regarding dosage, I understand. I'll try putting it directly in her mouth - that will save a lot of hassle.

Actually, she does drink her water all at once, under the circumstances. The bowl I use is only about 2 and half inches wide and an inch deep so it's not as much as you might think. Just to explain, when I try just putting it in her regular water dish, and leave it to her, she usually eats first, then takes only a bit of water immediately after eating and leaves the water a filthy mess for the rest of the day and does most of her drinking at night. I didn't want her to contaminate it too much before getting any good from it, so I'd keep her just thirsty enough that she'd want it when I put it out - and before any food.

I looked over the remedies I'd given with this method - when I only had globule form:

apis 30c
vespa 30c
calc carb 30c
ars 30c
ledum 30c
phos 30c

These are remedies I tried at 30c with my dilution method, but then followed with 200c bought in an alcohol base, where I simply spray some in the bowl of water and stir it in:

nat mur
hepar sulph
sulph
graph
lyc

Other remedies which I have tried, bought in an alcohol base:

iodium 30c
silicea 30c
petroleum 30c
ars iod 30c
mezereum 30c
psorinum 30c
[message edited by rtc35 on Sat, 05 Jul 2014 04:02:18 BST]
 
rtc35 9 years ago

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