Chronic headaches are one of the most common and distressing problems for many of our patients. Homeopathic medicine can be remarkably effective in treating headaches, regardless of their etiology. In eliciting the patient’s symptoms, a homeopathic interviewer must understand many explicit details concerning the headaches, including how long the patient has suffered with the headaches and any original etiology, quality and intensity of pain, site of the headache and whether it is localized or radiating, causative factors, time of onset, duration, other symptoms of any kind which accompany or precede the headache, and any modalities (ie: what tends to make the headache better or worse). Whereas allopathic, or even holistic, medicine, may not vary treatment of a headache according to the above factors, homeopathy makes definite distinctions.
In Kent’s Repertory, the most standard repertory used by most homeopaths, there are 89 pages devoted to head pain. Listed under the general rubric (heading) “head pain, headache in general”, 259 homeopathic remedies are listed. Kent lists 4l different qualities of head pain ranging from the more common “dull pain”, “shooting”, and “sore” to the more unusual “lan-cinating”, “boring”, “crushed, as if shattered, beaten to pieces”, “grinding”, “as from a nail”, “stunning; stupefying”, and many more. Homeopathy can even determine the correct remedy for a headache according to the etiology, prescribing differently depending on whether the headache was due to exposure to a draft, chill, or heat exposure, followed anger, grief, or “excessive joy” or occurred after ingestion of specific substances such as alcohol, candy, meat, milk, coffee, tea, or even lemonade.
The homeopath learns quite quickly that the only way to find the correct remedy for his or her patient’s very specific symptoms is by an extremely detailled casetaking. It may take five or ten minutes just to gather the necessary symptomatic information about the headaches. In a case, such as the one that follows, where there are several types of headaches, this same type of explicit information must be gathered about each classification of headache. This type of interview, needless to say, requires the full attention and patience of the homeopath. As with any symptom, if the patient has experienced it for more than a couple of months or has had it in the past, it falls into the category of chronic illness and the homeopath must take “the full case”. This means interviewing the patient for one to one and a half hours about all of his or her symptoms, physical, mental, and emotional, rather than just the headache symptoms. On the other hand, if the headache is acute and isolated, not part of a chronic pattern, one may evaluate only the headache symptoms and prescribe accordingly.
All of this information given above will hopefully help you appreciate how exacting the task of a homeopath is in prescribing for chronic headaches and to understand why we asked all of the questions that we did in the following case.
R.M., age 38, came to see us in March of this year because of five years of chronic headaches. She was tall, thin, and had long blonde hair.The headaches had been getting progressively worse and were interfering with her life as a graduate student in an intensive and taxing Tibetan studies program. She was beginning to do research for her dissertation, involving nearly non-stop reading, and wanted to be free of her headaches. She described two different types of headaches. The type l headache involved severe pain in the temples, occiput, or behind the eyes, pressing in the temples and bursting in the occiput or behind the eyes. They occurred once every month or two, started in the afternoon or evening, and lasted several days. She would experience nausea and vertigo with the headache as well as sensitivity to noise and light and a general crankiness. They would be somewhat better by lying down in a cool, dark place and were aggravated by heat, motion, drinking lots of water, or doing should-stand yoga postures. The type II headache was less intense, but occurred every two weeks. It was characterized by a dull ache across the forehead and resulted from eyestrain and being overtired, both of which were inevitable in her rigorous program of study.
She complained of frequent memory lapses during which whe would forget what she was sup-posed to do or what she had read. She had recently forgotten to administer an exam even though she had been reminded about it the previous evening. This disturbed her considerably. She des-cribed her mind as “dull”. When asked a question, she would hear the words, but need to repeat the question in her mind before answering. A review of symptoms revealed the following: She had a history of eczema on the hands, a painful right-sided otitis media several years ago, occa-sional constipation, knee and ankle pain since she jogged regularly, and no gynecologic com- plaints.Her sexual energy was average. She was unmarried and did not want children. She complained of shakiness if she went for a long time without eating, was extremely sensitive to cigarette smoke, and tended to be chilly with cold extremities. Mentally and emotionally she had always been shy, sometimes painfully so, was reserved, a loner, and not overly emotional or sen-timental. She could be perceived by others as being unfeeling and having a cold heart. She was patient with others, but not herself, and became upset if others implied she was stupid. She would take time to evaluate a situation to decided whether or not it was worth speaking up and it would take a lot to make her angry. She expressed that her self-confidence wasn’t great and had fear of not succeeding. She had had a number of long-term relationships with men, none of which were totally satisfying and she wondered whether she was cut out for long-lasting relationships. When asked about food desires, she loved hard, cold ice cream and carrots, and hated slimy foods. She had a stronger than average desire for cold drinks. When questioned, she admitted to suffering from chronic tonsillitis as a child and even now had occasional right submandibular swelling.
This case appeared quite straightforward from a homeopathic point of view. Here was a thin, shy, reserved, delicate woman with a chief complaint of headaches due to an excessively demanding study schedule and accompanied by lapses of memory. In the homeopathic literature, there is a term, “brain fag”, which perfectly describes these symptoms as well as the personality of this patient. That remedy is Silica, sometimes called Silicea, and is made from the mineral, silica (flint). It is a wonderful and far-reaching remedy with many applications. In this case, it applied beautifully to the reserved, reticent nature of the patient, the headaches (one of the most common complaints of a patient needing Silica), and to the marked state of mental debility due to overexertion of the mind. Confirmatory symptoms for Silica in this case were the constipation, glandular swelling and history of otitis and tonsillitis, chilliness, general sensitivity, self-doubt, and her reluctance to speak up for her ideas unless it was really important, even though she did have strong ideas about things.
R.M. was given Silica 30c once daily. When she returned a month later, she complained of no eyestrain headaches, but had a couple of her type l headaches because her doctoral dissertation proposal deadline was approaching and she was beginning to panic. Her mind seemed to be less dull and, overall, she was beginning to feel more energetic. It was difficult to know at the time how effectively the remedy had acted. We knew Silica to be a relatively slow-acting remedy and decided to continue the Silica and see the patient again in a month. At that time she reported that her energy was continuing to improve even though the academic pressure had not let up. She continued the Silica for another month, then stopped. Two months after stopping the remedy, she was not having a problem with the headaches and described herself as more energetic and relaxed, despite having a dental crown put in and being exposed to camphor, both of which often antidote homeopathic remedies. Silica acted in this case just as we expected it would. It is likely that she will need a single dose of Silica 200c to prolong the effect of the remedy and we have instructed her to let us know if her headaches return. She is pleased that she can pursue her demanding academic schedule without being drained by headaches and mental exhaustion.
If you’d like to get in touch to find out how we can help you at Healthy Homeopathy contact us or make an appointment, we’d love to hear from you.
Recent Comments