This case study concerns a 43-year-old woman, born in 1953. She came to my practice with her husband and looked so ill that I immediately assumed she was the patient. Her hair was very short and thin, as if it were growing back after chemotherapy. She wore dark glasses to protect her eyes from the light. She was thin and pale, with bluish-coloured lips and icy cold, bluish hands. It turned out she was not there for treatment but to accompany her husband. She realised I had misjudged the situation and said that almost everyone, because of her appearance, believed she would die soon. She was already receiving homeopathic treatment from another doctor but was making no progress in therapy. She had been very ill all her life, had been treated by various specialists who could not help her, and was afterwards regarded as a hypochondriac. She herself was convinced that her problems stemmed from a previous life and she actually wanted to consult my husband, who works as a regression therapist.
During regression therapy (a light trance form, not hypnosis) she experienced several very different lives. In the second session she was taken back to the origin of her current problems. The first session usually serves to get to know each other and to build trust with the therapist. In the second session she experienced herself as 'he', a six-year-old Polish boy named Jarich. 'He' was locked into a train with other people, in terrible distress. As 'he' looked further back into the past, he saw himself in his parents' home where his parents were arguing heatedly about whether they should flee and where to go. Then they were herded together and put on a train, not knowing where the journey would take them. When they finally disembarked, he was momentarily blinded by very bright lights, which was especially disorienting after a long journey in a dark wagon. He lost his parents in the chaos and clung to his teddy bear. He was herded with a group and told to undress because he was to take a shower. Many naked people were crowded into a large room, they began to scream and fell on top of him. Because he was smaller than most, he was one of the last to inhale the lethal fumes of the gas Zyklon B (cyanide). He died a terrified and painful death.
The healing part of a session is not just to relive the trauma but to understand it in its context and then let it go. The client is encouraged to complete everything that remains unfinished in that world and then go to a place from which he or she can view and understand the whole. That leads to healing. In this case 'he' recognised that he had died as a Jewish boy in the gas chambers of Auschwitz. When asked whether this short life had any significance for the patient's present life, the answer was: "The gas, the gas." The gas (Zyklon B) was already known as a homeopathic remedy under the name hydrocyanic acid. A dose of the remedy in C30 produced dramatic changes in the woman. She gained weight, something she had never managed before. Her hair grew back and soon she had wonderful, strong hair and lots of energy. Previously she had always been so exhausted that she could barely manage daily household tasks and only with many breaks in between. Even short car journeys exhausted her. We compiled a list of all the complaints she had suffered from her entire life and observed how these diminished over the course of the treatment.
"I have been sick my whole life. I had breathing problems, asthma and a blocked nose. My digestion didn't work at all; I had a nervous, oversensitive stomach. I am allergic to almost all foods – it is easier to ask me what I CAN eat than what I can't. My oesophagus has always been too narrow and has caused problems with swallowing. Almost everything I eat causes wind; sometimes I even get wind from drinking still water. When I was four my tonsils were removed because they were always swollen and inflamed. It didn't get better. At seven I had a kidney infection with blood in my urine. Afterwards I couldn't concentrate properly and had problems at school. I very often had a high fever, but I never wanted to stay in bed because I was too restless. My ears always crackled, made a roaring noise, so I couldn't hear properly. I always felt like I had the flu. On the right side of my neck I have a markedly enlarged gland. My eyes were always sore, sticky, irritated and itchy. My thyroid was swollen and nodular. On the right side of my neck I have a swollen artery, so I cannot turn my head properly. I seem to be allergic to all sorts of chemicals; for example I cannot tolerate the smell of turpentine, paint fumes and other gases. I can smell the smallest gas leak before everyone else notices it. My parents took me to a convalescent home for sick children; they left me there and went away. I felt so abandoned. As a child I played "concentration camps", although I did not know what the word meant. I always dressed my doll in many warm layers to be sure it would be warm if it had to flee or bad times came. I used to have dreams in which many soldiers appeared, to whom I would sing something so they would like me. I have flashbacks in which I am pushed among the naked, stinking masses of people; the stench is disgusting. I have always been interested in the Jewish people and the Hebrew language (although there are very few Jews in her part of Holland and she herself is Protestant). It is as if I could understand the language if I heard it more often. Every year I hold a special memorial ceremony on Remembrance Day in Holland (5 May). My parents do not; for them it is just a holiday. But I have always wanted this to be a day of silence and respect. My parents do not understand my fascination with the Second World War – I have always had the need to read as much as possible about it. If I were healthy and had enough money I would travel to Israel, not for pleasure, but because I have to be there."
Slowly but surely the patient's complaints disappeared. Her eyes (diagnosed as M. Sjögren) began to produce tears again; they were less irritated and crusted. She was able to eat more and a greater variety of foods without palpitations and digestive problems. She could breathe better; her nose cleared up. Her hair also grew back. She felt more psychologically stable, had more energy and became more enterprising. She travelled to Israel and described it as "a coming home", where she could meet many other Jews. She learned to pay more attention to her own needs and could judge well when she needed another dose of her remedy (for example when she had an opisthotonus – the back tenses and arches backwards). At that time she also had circulatory problems: a hot head, icy cold feet and low blood pressure. She was also very sensitive to the smell of gas, which caused nausea.
On one occasion Ignatia seemed to be the indicated remedy. She was tearful and very depressed and described it like this: "I feel like I always want to call for my mother and she is not there. I feel like a small, abandoned child. Very likely I feel this way because I emigrated from Holland to New Zealand." That could have triggered the feelings of abandonment she experienced as a little girl in the convalescent home for children. This feeling in turn echoes the extreme abandonment of little Jarich, who was torn from his parents in the concentration camp. Ignatia helped her to overcome this feeling, although in retrospect I wonder whether Hydrocyanicum acidum (hydrocyanic acid) would have done the same. Also interesting here is the fact (for those who broadly claim that "collapse remedies" such as Arsenicum or Carbo vegetabilis are indicated in every case) that she had previously been treated with Arsenicum and many other such remedies without success.
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Source: http://www.interhomeopathy.org/case_hydrocyanic_acidum_1
