Why I Choose Homeopathy

It's Homeopathy Awareness Week.

Kind of like a birthday, it comes up as a time for reflection for me. Homeopathy is woven into the matrix of my life, enmeshed with significant events in my life and like a photo album, I can review those snapshots in time and remember.

I remember the first conversation I had about homeopathy. My husband- who was not my husband, or even my boyfriend, but my housemate who I had an un-acknowledged crush on- and I were driving in his dad's old truck. He was giving me a lift home from the University. He was telling me a bit about his family, how his dad was a veterinarian and incorporated some holistic approaches. I was a vegetarian and as into natural medicine as one can be at 20, being healthy and therefore never really faced with any big medical decisions anyway.

He said his dad was taking a homeopathy course, or had taken one. I made the classic assertion that it was like herbalism.  Kevin challenged me strongly that no, it was not. He explained that it was an energetic modality and maybe a bit more than that, but mostly I was like, huh? And went back to trying not to focus on the crush.

But like a tiny pebble dropped in a still pool, that ripple resonated.

I didn't think about homeopathy again until years later, our crush not only firmly acknowledged but consummated in marriage and a baby, I sought out a homeopath to treat our daughter. We had moved across the country, starting to set up our life in midcoast Maine. I asked around for a homeopath and my stepfather told me to see Dr. Dirk Vandersloot- the best guy in town.

I remembered the conversation years back with Kevin in the truck, but mostly I wanted to choose something natural and holistic for my baby. Dirk was a doctor, no longer practicing conventional medicine, but as a new mother still figuring this whole thing out, it bolstered my confidence. We used a few remedies with my daughter for teething and fussiness (pulsatilla, of course), and I saw him myself for a transient vertigo I sometimes experienced. I felt well, the vertigo went away. My daughter seemed to respond to the pulsatilla.

But still... I didn't really get it. I knew I wanted to learn more. I was intrigued. Dirk suggested a book, Miranda Castro's Complete Family Guide to Homeopathy. I bought it. I read the introduction. Many times. I acquired some remedies.

Homeopathy at that point remained like a picture on my wall. One I saw everyday, but didn't truly engage with. It was there, I acknowledged it, even stopped to ponder it a bit. But it remained separate, a part.

When my daughter was a month from turning 3, I gave birth to my son. It was fast. Two hours. The midwife barely made it time. The cord was around his neck, he was blue. He needed oxygen. When he came around, he screamed bloody murder, and wouldn't stop. The midwife asked if I had Aconite (for shock, fear, trauma). In fact, I did. The instant the remedy was on his tongue, he stopped screaming, and looked into my eyes.

This is the moment when picture came off the wall, the moment it stopped being something I looked at, and became what I lived.

If that seems strange, because I had already had a healing experience with homeopathy and so why did it take this moment to become three dimensional for me, I can only say that having talked to many people about homeopathy and their experience with it, my situation is not unique.

I have said before that homeopathy is fast, slow medicine. Unless one witnesses an experience like I did with my son, an instantaneous acute response (that's the fast part), the medicine is slow enough and gentle enough that sometimes we almost dismiss it. Maybe it was that I ate better those two weeks. Maybe it was that I slept better. Maybe the symptoms moved off on their own.

We never think - the remedy supported me to eat better.
                         - the remedy supported my sleep
                         - the remedy gently helped my symptoms move away

Many a homeopath, and patient, I have spoken with have concurred that despite having several positive experiences with homeopathy, it took time and some significant event to make them sit up and pay attention.

The instantaneous response of my son to the remedy was undeniable. When he went on to develop consistent croupy coughs, I discovered Aconite, Spongia, and Antimonium- tartaricum moved him through the symptoms within days. Rather than hanging on to colds and coughs for a week or weeks, we were through and moving on.

I needed to know more, and I knew this medicine was to be what I did in this world.

And so it has become that.

I call this post 'Why I CHOOSE Homeopathy' and not why I CHOSE homeopathy, because it is a choice to make, every day, at every opportunity that arises.

While there are a few go-to remedies, say Arnica for an injury, or the Aconite my son received for a physical shock, homeopathy is not, by its nature, 'match the best answer.' It requires us to stop and pay attention. Our symptoms are not a static picture to be looked at, but the story and action of our lives that we live, everyday.

When we view our symptoms as the static picture on the wall, many of the medical options presented to us are the equivalent of moving it to a different wall. Changing the frame. Moving it again. Touching it up.

When we take the picture off the wall, when we step into it, answer all those questions the homeopath asks, consider the present snapshot in the movie of our life, there's a flow, a continuation of one thing to the next, an opportunity to make sense of the whole- and not just the piece.

When you see the whole, you can make decisions for the whole. What does this ear infection need right now? Does it need antibiotics? Again? Does the ear need antibiotics right now, but because it keeps coming back, the child needs to be considered and treated in the bigger picture so the ear infection doesn't come back.

Does this back pain need anti-inflammatories day after day and maybe the opinion of a surgeon, or could this person benefit from a remedy to help manage stress, increase energy to enable exercise, a shift in perspective and confidence that may lead to changing an unsatisfying career, relieving the back pain?

Is more medication the only option for the side effects of cancer treatment, or can the patient consider homeopathic support to help tolerate the symptoms, and then a constitutional remedy for the whole being to help repair the vital force, build strength, and hopefully ensure the cancer does not return- as opposed to living in quiet anxiety from check up to check up?

This past fall, when I discovered that my left ovary had thoughtfully grown a very large cyst, I took that picture off the wall and stepped into it. I chose the advice of my very caring and experienced ob-gyn surgeon *and* I chose homeopathy and other modalities that helped me consider that moment, in the context of my whole life.

Homeopathy helps me to walk through life with my eyes and ears open. When patients come to me, having chosen homeopathy for their own reasons, I show up ready to help, having made that choice too.

Croup, no more! Three Essential Homeopathic Remedies

I might start sounding like a broken record about how much I love the three remedies I am going to share. Probably because when I found these three remedies to ease my son's croupy cough, they were the stones that paved the road of homeopathy love :)  Seriously, I had dithered around in some homeopathic remedies, and we saw a homeopath, but when I figured out this little trio for LC's bouts of barking coughs it was like striking gold.

I didn't even know what croup was before I had children, and not all children are susceptible to it. But those that are, tend to get it more than once. It is easy to recognize- a harsh, barking cough that sounds like a seal barking. It's a viral infection, and the inflammation causes a swelling of the throat which narrows the air passage. Croup can impede breathing, but except in severe cases it isn't an emergency.
(It is important to be aware of epiglottitis, a life threatening bacterial infection that causes the epiglottis to swell. If the child is having difficulty breathing with shallow, rapid breath with stridor (wheezing), and drooling, it may be an emergency situation. It's rare, but it's good to know the signs.)

Croup tends to attack at night, and that will be your first sign for this initial remedy.

Aconitum napellus 
I write about aconite a lot, because it is so essential especially for young children.  The mental/emotional indications for aconite are fright and shock. But physically, when you hear that dry, barking seal cough out of nowhere in the middle of the night, after midnight, aconite should be the first remedy you think of. There may be a high, dry fever, but fevers aren't common with croup. Just the presence of the cough is enough to indicate giving the remedy.

Aconite is pre-gunk and post- wind.
What??
Pre-gunk is no goopy yellow snot, or congestion in the chest. There may be a clear, thin runny nose, but anything beyond that likely indicates a different remedy.  Remember that this remedy is for quick, acute conditions that come on fast. Conditions that have a chance to settle in pass out of that category pretty quick.

Post-wind means that you will often hear this cough come on after being outside, in a cold, dry wind. Out hiking, playing in the yard into dusk, sledding on breezy winter days. When you hear the cough later that night, it's probably not viral croup you're dealing with, but the result of that wind drying out air passages. Aconite often makes quick work of those situations.

Other indications for aconite include that first, tightening of the throat that indicates you might be coming down with something. Again, no swollen glands, no gunk- just that hint of pain and difficulty swallowing. Children will often present with one bright red cheek, while the other remains pale.

Spongia tosta
As its name indicates, spongia tosta is made from dry, toasted sea sponge. From an iodine-rich environment, spongia is indicated for conditions of the thyroid, glands, and respiratory system. As its name implies ('tosta') you think of spongia when the cough is dry- both for croup but also allergies, asthma, and other respiratory conditions.

Homeopathic remedies are often time-sensitive.  The time stamps come from provings (the process of discovering a new remedy) and cured cases. The way I use time-windows is that when that particular condition and time are marked in a case, I use them in guiding my choice. But if not, I don't throw out the remedy if the other symptoms agree. In this case, spongia is indicated for a dry, barking, croupy cough before midnight. If you can remember in the middle of the night, that spongia is before midnight and aconite is after, then use them accordingly. But you won't mess anything up by using the the other way around, you just might not see the kind of drastic improvement I would expect when the remedy is spot-on.

Other symptoms indicating spongia: 
- nose may either run freely, or alternate stuffed up/running
- a sense of fear and anxiety with the cough and breathing
- the cough is better lying flat, and after a warm drinks, or eating, which palliate the dry throat
- glands may be swollen. Patient may be quite thirsty and hungry.
- sore, painful chest
- worse sleeping/waking from sleep.

In general, spongia follows aconite as it is a more advanced condition. If you miss the aconite window, go straight to spongia if the conditions agree.


Homeopathy speeds up time. It's true. Most of us want our lives to slow down, but not when it comes to being sick. The sooner it's over, the better. So let's say you have a child that gets croup. Without appropriate remedies, he/she may be a week to two weeks dealing with the acute and secondary phases. With remedies? I've had cases resolve from overnight (getting that aconite in) to three or four days. Depending on the strength of the vital force, the depth of the illness, and the accuracy of the remedy, there's a continuum of having the symptoms knocked right out, to still running the course of the illness but in less time.

This brings us to our last remedy.

Antimonium tartaricum

This remedy is not for dry coughs, but the total opposite- wet, wet, goopy ones.
One of the jobs of the immune system is to isolate and dispose of pathogens. It happens in stool, sweat, urine, mucous, and pus. Mucous helps to trap pathogens and foreign substances from entering the body, and when there's an immune response, the production increases.

I observed my son shift from that dry, barking cough to a wet, wet cough after using spongia. Why? The remedy helped to move the cough from a dry, inflammatory cough to a productive one, enabling resolution. I still give a remedy, because although it's wet and productive, I want to assist the body in resolving the illness and there is still an infection present. Most parents feel better when they hear that productive cough, and the child has turned the corner at that point- the energy and appetite are back, etc... it's just that darned cough!

There are lots of remedies for loose, productive coughs. But I have found that antimonium tart really follows these croup remedies well.

Antimonium tart is often indicated for advanced respiratory conditions, and a weakened state. But with children, you may not find such weakness, especially if you have treated the dry cough homeopathically.  When the most characteristic symptom of the cough is very loose, rattling, and wet sounding then I move right in with the ant. tart.  The child might have to swallow the mucous and end up complaining of an upset tummy. The cough is ameliorated by sitting upright, rather than lying and the mucous tends to be thick yellow, or white. They may be irritable and grumpy.

Certainly, you can use antimonium tart anytime you encounter a cough that meets this description.


By presenting these three remedies, I hope to impart the concept of a progression of illness. Parents often have questions about why the sore throat was relieved, but now there's a cough. Or, the cough at night is better, but there is still coughing during the day, etc... It is very common to use 2-3 remedies to support the body in moving through whatever is ailing it- again, homeopathy speeds up time. A two-week illness turns into one week. One week shortens to a couple of days. There is always variation depending on the strength of the person/illness and accuracy of prescribing. The important take-home is  that just because you didn't hit a home-run, doesn't mean you don't round the bases :)