You remember how everyone got into the essential oil craze a few years back? How it was a cure all, a panacea for whatever ailed you? That's how I feel about homeopathy. It's been a much longer, much more skeptical journey for me, but now I'm on it. Locked in tight!
Back when we lived in AZ, one of our friends at church was going to Naturopathic school and she told me about it first of all. She talked how it was the best thing for curing children's ailments, as it was so gentle and harmless. I had no kids at the time, so didn't pursue it further. Just listened and stored it away somewhere. I also had no idea what it was, and wasn't into finding out either. I was still wholly steeped in mainstream medicine. Then we moved up here, and later James was born. He was covered in eczema and we tried so many things trying to make him feel better. While on a trip to AZ, we took him to see this same friend (who was now a Dr.) and she prescribed 1 little bottle of homeopathic pellets for him. Pellets the size of chia seeds. "Give him 3 pellets, once a week" was the dose, if I recall. Huh? That's all? So we tried it. For maybe 2 months. No change. We did phone consults and she kept telling us to wait longer. But, since I didn't know much about it, and the phone consults were getting expensive with no visual results, we stopped them when the bottle ran out. And figured it was just another thing that didn't work. Even though she explained to us that healing came from the inside out ("like peeling back layers on an onion"), I didn't believe in it at all. So we kept on trying other things instead. That was the end of that road.
Many years later we went to another couple of Naturopaths who also prescribed them for various ailments, both acute or chronic. We then experienced almost miraculous results, yet they were gentle with no side effects or expensive supplements to endlessly buy. Cheap too? OK, I'm in. This was around the time of the essential oil craze, and our Naturopathic Dr sold his remedies for $4-6/each. I surely couldn't buy a name brand essential oil at that cost, so I couldn't justify not trying them for that cost either. So we did. We didn't have all successes, but the one biggie convinced me that I at least needed to learn more about how they work and what they can do. So I asked lots of questions at my appointments, and I got all the books that the library had, and I started reading.
Homeopathy uses "vital force" to heal. This is the energy within us that keeps us alive. Without it we would be dead. All healing in homeopathy uses kinetic energy (energy from motion, of which the remedies are shaken/succussed) to strengthen our vital force. It's kind of obscure to describe, but somehow works.
Now I've been on the homeopathic learning path for about 5 years, and I have yet to have met anyone else who knows anything or cares a hoot about them, other than my doctors. So that's kind of lame as I get so excited when I learn new things and I can't really tell anyone because no one "gets it". But that's ok. I still get excited. I do have a few online groups that are as excited as I am, and I have learned a ton from them, and it's also place to ask my many questions.
So, what intrigues me so much? Well, first of all you can heal stuff with them. All kinds of stuff! Weird, unusual, "I'll never tell anyone about this" kind of stuff. Acute, chronic, constitutional, miasmic, animal care, you name it!
Acute would mean affecting or afflicting you right now, and started less than 3 months ago. Bladder infections, sore throats, smashed fingers (treated one of these this week), burns, coughs, etc. But also emotional things like acute grief, anger, nervous about a job interview, etc.
Chronic means something you've had longer than 3-6 months. This can be lifetime symptoms (maybe like insomnia or noise sensitivity when people chew their food, or long term hip pain or breathing troubles), or just things you've been stuck with for a long time that you haven't found a solution to yet. Or didn't think there was one.
Constitutional means more personality quirks and foibles (a minor flaw or shortcoming in character or behavior). Things like OCD or an inability to express your emotions well, or being an overachiever and burning yourself out, or addictions of any sort. Things you think you are stuck with because you think were born that way, and maybe you were. But homeopathy can heal even those. It can balance whatever is imbalanced so those things don't have the power over you that they've had. Self-esteem too low? Yep. Self-esteem too inflated? Yep. Either way it can be balanced. Which leads to...
Miasms. These are generational characteristics that come down through family lines. They are not DNA, so they are not genetic; but seem to be passed down more through the microbiome (gut health or illness) from parents to children and on to their children because you all live in the same houses and share life together. These can be "tendencies" or addictions or illness weaknesses, and can even be healed from several generations back, whether it be disease or trauma that happened several generations ago. Great grandfather fought in the Revolutionary war and you struggle with anxiety? Check. Great grandmother had TB, and now your family has extensive lung troubles? Check. Fascinating, hey?!
(More info on miasms here. Please read part 1 & 2)
(More info on miasms here. Please read part 1 & 2)
This book has been really exciting. I just want to fix everyone! Starting with myself though. I'm still quite a newbie, so am just experimenting on myself, letting go of baggage, dealing with my grief, learning boundaries for my own health. It's caused me to do a fearless moral inventory (AA step 4), which isn't fun. At all. Being honest with ourselves is the only way to healing though. We all have skeletons in the closet somewhere somehow. Coping mechanisms we've picked up over the years, baggage that we've never dealt with properly, forgiveness for ourselves for the sins against us, or asking forgiveness of others who we've sinned against. Hard stuff and I'm not done yet. Still moving forward though.
"One does not surrender a life in an instant.
That which is lifelong can only be surrendered in a lifetime."
~Elisabeth Elliot
Here's some of the things that the Emotional Healing book covers. Yup. Digs pretty deep. Another book on the same subject that comes highly recommended is called Getting Back on Track by Jill Turland. I have not read it yet, but hope to soon.
Here's a couple of the books below that I've acquired over the years. The library has plenty, but I've found that having my own reference books at home written by various authors is most helpful (it can add to the confusion also though, when they contradict each other). I love to highlight stuff too, so that isn't good to do on library books!
This book by Sue Meyer is great, as it gives in depth info on so many remedies (there's around 5,000 total). Sue has a podcast called Homeopathy for Mommies as well and she talks a lot, so you have to learn as she talks. I much prefer learning by reading, so don't do best listening to her as it takes far more time than skimming a book does to find what I need. She also has it organized by symptoms so you can compare them better when trying to find the right remedy.
This book is my favorite, by Joette Calabrese. (sorry for the sideways pic) She's the homeopath who I've learned the most from, as she shares the most free information online. She has a very thorough website chock full of free info, writes regularly for the Weston A. Price Foundation, has classes you can take and then her book shown above, along with every Monday she posts a video on a new remedy. They can all be found on YouTube or her FB page. I'd absolutely love to take all her classes, but right now my bandwidth is pretty limited for time and learning so I'll just stick to my book learning. Someday...
Joette uses a different kind of homeopathy dosing methodology, which is called the Banerji protocols, which are a honed in system formulated by the Banerji doctors in India. She has trained under them and they treat thousands of patients, sometimes each day and needed a more streamlined process for seeing more patients, as well as making it cost effective for the lower income ones. So, they came up with protocols that are used in a systematic format according to symptoms. These protocols work approximately 80% of the time, and the rest of the time another method (called Classical homeopathy) is needed to treat the patient's symptoms. Classical homeopathy takes a very thorough patient history and assessment (2 hours usually) and then the Homeopath chooses a remedy based on the results. The protocols are based on knowing a diagnosis and giving a basic remedy protocol for that. Both work, it's just more what you want for what you're dealing with.
Christina Villacorta is another Banerji protocol homeopath with lots of good info. You can also look at my extensive list of pins on Pinterest if you're just looking for something specific, or just want to see what kind of stuff is treatable.
Right now we are working on some symptoms with one of our kids. Our Naturopath chose 2 remedies this last round (she uses the Classical method). She put about 5 little pellets in a little paper envelope and her dosing instructions were to take the first packet when we got home, and then wait 2 weeks. Then take the next 3 little packets (a different remedy) once per week. The end. Sounds too simple. But the last round we did it, she hit the nail on the head and the symptoms became less frequent and then changed format (thus the need to move to a new remedy). This is the healing process as the illness/symptoms/challenges are slowly being worked out of the body to a state of balance and health. So cool huh?!
Now comes the tricky part. How to know what remedy to choose, what dose, how often, what are signs that it's working or not working? And what's an aggravation? That's where I wish I knew more information. These are all ambiguous questions with vague answers. It becomes second nature with lots of practice, but for us newbies it can be like drinking from a fire house to figure out all the rules to follow and then all the exceptions to it. Kind of like learning English as a second language, I would suppose! BTW, An aggravation is what happens as your body is healing and old symptoms come back that are being pushed out of the body to get rid of. Eczema returns as your body is healing the root cause of it from way back in childhood after steroids or meds that suppressed it for years, or it switched to more serious symptoms with the same root cause. Often eczema turns into asthma, as it settles in the lungs. Skin issues are the most common aggravations, but usually clear up pretty quickly.
That's about all for now. Feel free to ask me any questions, and I'd be glad to either answer them or find the answer for them from someone more experienced than myself (more likely!)
