9 / 13
Jürgen Hansel
¦ BRYONIA ALBA
SPECTRUM OF HOMEOPATHY
7
RHEUMATISM
PSYCHOSOMATIC ASPECTS
OF RHEUMATISM
There is a series of psychological studies looking at the spe
cific personality characteristics of patients suffering from
chronic polyarthritis and the possible triggers preceding the
outbreak of the illness or relapses. The inhibited aggression
seen in those suffering arthritis is a psychological phenom
enon that is generally recognized and can often be observed
in our practices. It is not so much that these patients con
sciously repress their aggression – they simply do not feel it
in the first place.
This was shown in an American study observing 300 patients
suffering from arthritis over a period of 30 months: the pa
tients who stated that they only rarely felt rage or could
not remember such feelings, suffered arthritic episodes sig
nificantly more often than patients who could remember
a recent episode of rage. So the high levels of inhibited
rage seem to be less an expression of the illness than of a
predisposing personality type. The inhibited aggression is
frequently associated with a general blockage in the expres
sion of emotions.
The failure to live out one’s aggression is compensated at
the physical level. Rheumatism patients frequently report a
strong tendency to physical activity in the period before the
outbreak of their illness. When people with such a personality
type and a genetic predisposition to rheumatoid arthritis are
subject to particular emotional burdens, the result can be
an outbreak of the illness. Such burdens primarily concern
events that signify a loss of personal security – such as job
loss, financial difficulties or family disputes.
Evidently the symptom picture of rheumatoid arthritis is as
sociated not just with typical physical symptoms but also
with specific personality characteristics. For homeopathy this
means that – even if not doing clinical homeopathy – we
can expect to frequently encounter certain specific remedy
pictures or remedy families that cover these characteristic
psychophysical symptom patterns.
is threatened with closure, which greatly upsets and unsettles
him. Just a few years before retirement, he now feels that his
life work is threatened. Yet he can do nothing about it – he
simply has to wait and see how things turn out.
He is similarly disturbed by the fate of his son, who has had a
child “thrust on him.” His son is deeply affected and hurt that
the woman has set him up in this way. When the patient as
father says: “My son can no longer do what he wants," the
patient is in fact the one suffering most of all because there is
nothing he can do to ameliorate his son’s crisis. His emotional
reaction to the threat to his job and his son’s predicament is a
feeling of profound disappointment. Never before in his life has
he felt such a sense of disappointment.
ANALYSIS
In this case we recognize a striking correspondence between the
emotional and the physical sensations. The patient experiences
two major disappointments. He is most of all disturbed by the
fate of his son, with whom he strongly identifies. He himself is
disappointed, upset and deeply hurt about what has happened
to his son and this profound emotional disturbance is reflected
physically, since he finds great difficulty otherwise expressing
his emotions: his wrist feels like it has been hit by a metal bar
and severely injured.
What is the effect on him of this emotional hurt and physical
pain? He becomes literally unable to function and suffers most
of all from being unable to do anything. This state of being
unable to function, as if someone has smashed him on the wrist,
can be repertorised in
Kent
.
The typical symptom:
The essence of this case can be crystal
lized in this symptom: Extremities – lameness – wrist – bruised;
as if; calc-p.,
RUTA
.
This symptom combines the localization, type and depth of the
pain with the effect – the inability to function or lameness. It
is a very specific rubric – not just for this symptom picture but
also for the remedy
Ruta graveolens
. It is obviously dubious to
prescribe a remedy solely on a single rubric. Yet the rubric in
this case is sufficient to examine
Ruta
more closely. We know
this remedy especially from its organotropic connection to the
eyes, tendons, cartilage, periosteum and joints. It is above all
the wrist where the effect of
Ruta
can be seen. It is a major
remedy for complaints of the wrist, specifically for rheumatic
illness. Therefore the quality of the pain is very typical: soreness,
as if smashed or broken. We can see this clearly in
Hahnemann’s
remedy proving:
•
Paralytic pressure on the outside of the right forearm
•
Tearing pressure in the right wrist, worse with strong movement
•
He has pain in the left wrist, as if shattered, even at rest
•
The bones of the wrist and the back of the hand are painful
as if smashed, at rest or in movement
THE RUTACEAE FAMILY
Rutaceae according to Sankaran:
According to Sankaran,
this type of pain is typical of the entire remedy Rutaceae
family. The Indian homeopath describes the vital sensation of
the Rue family as 'squeezed, then crushed.' 'Squeeze' means
squeeze (out), press (out), or jam. And figuratively it means
to go to the limits of one’s strength. 'Crush' of course is
even stronger, meaning to squash, pound, squelch, shatter,
or break to pieces.
Rutaceae according to Scholten:
The squeezing and going to
the limits of one’s strength, according to Jan Scholten, charac
terise the entire picture of this family, to which the citrus plants
also belong. Scholten compares this to a glass of orange juice,
which in the morning confers energy and good spirits for the