A warm welcome to anyone who has questions about the healing process in homeopathy! We cannot comment on the underlying physical principles, but can simply share our knowledge and experience. This article has been written in response to comments and queries from patients; we felt it was important to clarify once again what patients experience during a Hahnemannian homeopathic treatment.
Homeopathy is a genuine long-term therapeutic option, a genuine conceptual leap that can be unsettling for those who are used to an all-chemical approach and retain a materialistic view of human beings. Illness is no longer a binary state – ‘I am ill’ or ‘I am cured by medication’ – but, just as a wound takes time to heal, the body, through homeopathy, receives information that enables it to gradually regain a sense of wholeness and balance.
An example of this process
Imagine that you have been living with high blood pressure for four or five years, and that your condition is not being effectively controlled by antihypertensive medication.
The first step is to stabilise your blood pressure whilst continuing to take your antihypertensive medication. As the homeopathic treatment progresses, you will have more energy and be better able to follow lifestyle and dietary changes – less salt, more exercise, and perhaps less stress. At the same time, the hormonal mechanisms underlying your high blood pressure begin to change. This is the time to start reducing the dosage of your chemical medication. The dosage is reduced as long as your blood pressure readings remain stable and within acceptable limits. To achieve this result, it is essential to have identified the ‘similimum’ – that is, the homeopathic remedy best suited to your overall condition.
At some point, the chemical treatment will no longer be necessary, as your blood pressure will have returned to normal. There will still be moments of stress and frustration when your blood pressure may still spike, but by continuing the homeopathic treatment until you experience a fever or a rash, you will be – almost – permanently cured, without needing any chemical medication. Simply with a single drop of water, once a week. All this often happens very gradually, almost without you realising it.
Those with a strong ego will believe that they alone are responsible for their recovery through diets, exercise or other measures, but from a homeopath’s perspective, if the accompanying symptoms have disappeared and the illness has shifted to more superficial levels, we know that this is not the case and that this recovery is the result of homeopathy.
Homeopathy, a centrifugal force
The factors involved
Homeopathy is humble and faithful. We often post examples of spectacular cures on the forum to inspire one another and because these are the most instructive cases. The reality, however, does more to erode the egos of practitioners as a whole, particularly in the West.
Whilst we can still hope for recoveries that are all the more remarkable given that people are living in poverty (on the other hand, if they do not have enough to eat, or are subjected to undignified living conditions, the recovery process will be hampered) the situation is quite different here, where the majority of illnesses today are chronic, and in particular mental and emotional.
Yes, homeopathy can cure these conditions. However, a number of limiting factors can hinder this process, as we are working with organisms that have low energy levels, that is to say, those in a poor state of health.
1 – The weather : If you have been struggling with an insidious anxiety-depression condition for more than 10 years, do not expect a full recovery within a year. You will feel better, but you will still experience anxiety and difficulties, and your old symptoms may return temporarily during periods of intense stress. Depression indicates a more profound condition than recurrent angina. Recovery from severe depression typically takes around four years. So, even though some people harbour the unrealistic dream of a full recovery within a few weeks, this is NOT POSSIBLE.
Some patients, believing that homeopathy is a substitute for chemical medicines, are unable to grasp the self-healing process that is taking place. After a few months, the benefits are not sufficiently measurable in their eyes; homeopathy seems pointless to them, so they become discouraged and give up.
There is a dynamic to the treatment. As you take the remedies, unlike with a placebo, the homeopathic treatment becomes increasingly effective. The initial effects may be subtle or imperceptible, but over the weeks and months, you increasingly feel more like yourself, more balanced and creative, and more in control of your own life; the minor ailments of daily life gradually disappear, until the illness itself is gone.
It is becoming increasingly difficult to find the simillimum straight away in the West, so we must prescribe anti-psoric remedies tailored to the patient. I treated one of my friends with her Carcinosin nosode, then with the anti-psoric remedy Lycopodium for two all-too-long years before we finally settled on Valeriana, which enabled her to sleep soundly again straight away… It would certainly have been more comfortable for her to start with Valeriana, but this remedy would have been less effective had it been prescribed before the prolonged use of these other complementary medicines. She will certainly return to Lycopodium later on.
"Cocaine provides instant relief," promises the advert!
2 –Tolerance the spread of the disease. Hering’s laws are used to understand the necessary progression of a patient’s symptoms with a view to achieving a cure.
Eczema that appears whilst the antibodies typical of rheumatoid arthritis disappear or decrease drastically is an excellent sign for the homeopath. If the patient cannot tolerate this eczema and applies cortisone, the case may be irreparably compromised. You are worsening the prognosis of the condition, which was favourable, or at the very least prolonging the treatment period. We are not monsters, so we will do everything we can to minimise this inconvenience; we will even allow you to use cortisone if it becomes too unbearable.
But if the patient’s desire to recover is not greater than the discomfort they are experiencing, we quickly find ourselves going round in circles. This is a far cry from the supposedly benevolent siren song of modern medicine, which advocates zero pain whatever the ultimate cost, but perhaps we are more realistic and aware of the frailties of our poor human bodies. The same applies to fever.
If the thought of falling ill fills you with dread, and you’re living with a chronic condition, don’t waste your time on homeopathy. There’s no such thing as a life free from suffering on this earth, despite what the adverts keep droning on about all day long to lull you into a false sense of security. Listen to the philosophers and sages from every country in the world and every era; we are no better than them.
3 – Energy levels Some patients have become extremely weak. We can no longer hope for as full a recovery as in the past, due to the use of medicines and vaccines, various forms of pollution, and the way our society has been transformed into a selfish and unhealthy cesspit.
Patients can help themselves by being strict (without being inflexible) about following daily hygiene and dietary guidelines, and perhaps by practising qi gong. Human organisms (and probably animals and plants too) have never been so fragile; we simply have to live with it.
4 – Madness and the pressures of the world we live insituations where the fool appears wise and the wise man appears foolish, in the words of David Little. This is a variable over which we have little control. It is up to each of us, in order to limit this, to practise moderation and the principle of the golden mean in the face of life’s trials, or even – why not? – to try our hand at a spiritual practice…
5 – Homeopathy forces you to take a hard look at yourself, it’s very difficult for some patients. You will no longer be able – especially at the start of treatment – to keep hypocritically bottling up the anger that’s boiling inside you. It can feel like being put through a proper high-pressure wash. So, of course, we try to minimise this discomfort as much as possible; you can choose to spread the treatment out so that this process unfolds more slowly. But you won’t be able to avoid coming face to face with who you really are.
Homeopathic treatment is a genuine journey undertaken together with the practitioner. At the first consultation, it is as if you were a ‘black box’ to be analysed bit by bit. The initial prescription is, in a way, a test of responsiveness. By sending a ping-pong ball (the remedy), we gauge the response in order to adjust the prescription. Despite all our precautions, surprises are not uncommon: reactions that are too strong or too weak, or an old, repressed trauma that suddenly resurfaces, and so on.
The better the practitioner gets to know you, the better you get to know yourself as well. Mutual support grows exponentially, as does the treatment. Patients with mild chronic conditions are often able, after four years of treatment, to suggest a particular homeopathic remedy for their flu, minor abdominal pain, and so on. This development of their independence is wonderful.
6. There is no such thing as a single ‘miracle cure’ that lasts a lifetime, especially these days. Although it was once referred to as a panacea, Hahnemann made it clear from the outset that only a course of treatment involving a sequence of carefully selected remedies could bring about a cure.
Here is a brief outline of the main difficulties encountered. Despite all these limitations, which diminish as treatment progresses, homeopathy rewards the patient a hundredfold. Your health improves; in other words, you move ever further away from serious, chronic illness, (barring any terrible accident in life). You build up your health capital and increase your prospects of a high-quality, independent life. Old age arrives with greater peace of mind, without too much pain or discomfort, and certainly without endless prescriptions for chemical medicines! If you are of an age to have children, you enhance their potential for good health. Your creativity and talents blossom, enabling you to find the role in society that best suits who you are.
Personally, I think it’s well worth it!
Dr Goudard.
