anenome pulsatilla

Nadia is trying to establish our homeopathic remedies.

I've been reading a very interesting book by one of the great homeopathic practitioners (whose name escapes me so that makes it a useless recommendation), an Indian guy who has spent much of his life studying and practicing and developing homeopathy. He's lucid, he details a lifetime's hard research with much conviction and he has occasional lapses into the kind of philopsophising that reminds me of when I studied Dante at college with a wonderful Dr of Italian who pronounced love 'lurve'and made us all feel like it was the most important word in the world. Smitten then, am I, as anyone who reminds me of the old hook-nosed Italian and indeed, Dr Took, gets my attention.

So apart from the obvious and unhelpfully devisive comments about homeopathy being wonderful as it is a holistic approach to wellbeing rather than a symptom-based scatter gun approach like useless conventional Western medicine (pah!), finding one's homepathic remedy it seems, is the key to a more balanced and productive approach to life. Disease, to the homeopath, is both a means of protecting the body in times of great trauma and a barrier to living out one's full potential. So, for example, it may well have been a matter of survival for me at some point in my life (or at some point before - this is one of the trickier concepts) to be overly anxious, converting anxiety into physical symptoms like migraine and stomach pains and being pathologically reserved, in order to combat a particular issue, but that state of play has proved too irrestible for me and has become a pattern that has affected everything I do, everything I feel and everything I think ever since. My remedy will deal with this root cause and will unblock my system (emotional, & physical etc) and I'll be fully functioning to the best of my body's ability.

Whatever you may think of alternatives to allopathic medicine, it is at least worth giving certain things a try if you are, as we are currently, spending lots of time in the company of a very learned and indeed persuasive advocate of one of those therapies who is willing to heal you for free. Indeed, I have been more than willing to talk expansively about myself for several hours and take a few potions here and there if it leads to a brighter me emerging. Particularly if those potions are mainly vodka with the tiniest percentage of the active ingredient in them. This allows homeopaths to give people remedies such as arsenic to cure things like stomach upsets as there is virtually no arsenic left in the remedy. this also allows opponents to refute homeopathy as a phantom form of healing. My Indian guy admits he doesn't understand why potentisation (the act of diluting a substance until it's barely there and also agitating it in a certain way to 'release the energy') works either, but his patient success rate proves it does.

Homeopaths potentise all sorts of weird and wonderful things, animals, rare Amazonian spiders, the sun, the moon - a great source of excitement for critics too no doubt. The calendular cream you use for cuts, the nux vomica for seasickness, the arnica for bruising is all homeopathic and it seems, as effective as potions and lotions that come over the counter at Boots. Goodness knows if it will work. I have every faith in Nadia and it is hard not respect her expertise even if I may not be able to understand or define it. Perhaps the power to 'heal' just comes from her. Would this be in any way more inexplicable. She listens, is calm, practical and very responsive. All the things a regular doctor hasn't time for in your alloted five-minutes with them. I want to have faith in homeopathy as it seems like such a beautiful set of ideas. But then, i've only read the first few chapters of my book. I am being open-minded. Give me the placebo if it makes me feel better. So far, Nadia has identified that I am probably a plant (sensitive etc) and that I may well be a wind anenome. For a week after taking the first dose i slept better and was relatively anxiety free. Then we started our epic car journey and the insomnia and constant need to cross my fingers whilst travelling returned. Is the remedy wearing off? Is there some sort of cosmic force-field in the Honda Integra that stops it working? Did I lie too much in my interview with Nadia? Are hypochondriacs perversly immune to homeopathy?

Meanwhile, Dan has received something for the deteriorating state of his guts. (Lawrence may have some idea of what I am talking about as he has shared a room with him). He also got stung on the leg by something nasty one night and received several remedies for that. Guts are still an issue, possibly worse (is this a case of got to hit rock bottom before you start to get better again?) and the bite/sting only got better after turning ugly and red and agonising. For one exciting/horrifying moment we thought it might be a white-tailed spider bite. This beast is Australian and poisonous and is creeping into NZ. A friend of friend was bitten and the skin on his leg started to fall off until he was hospitalised. Thankfully, Dan's skin is still intact.