Sepia


Dr. S.R. Phatak describes the clinically confirmed symptoms of the homeopathic remedy Sepia in his Concise Materia Medica, published in 1977….


Generalities

      Inky juice of cuttle fish, known as Indian ink, is supposed to be pre-eminently a woman’s remedy, though the first symptoms were found by Dr. Hahnemann proved accidentally by a male artist. It affects the venous circulation esp. of the FEMALE PELVIC ORGANS; of portal system and of digestive tract. Venous stasis and thereby ptosis of viscera is a marked feature. It is suited to young persons of both sexes, of nervous and delicate constitution, who are disposed to sexual excitement or worn out by sexual excess. Children who take cold easily when the weather changes. Relaxed, plethoric females. Weak, pot-bellied mothers with yellow complexion. Affections in pregnant women. Females dragged down by over work, loss of vital fluids, excess of sexual indulgence, who are subject to prolapses, uterine troubles. Symptoms settle in back, in ileo-coecal region, ovaries etc.; upward in head; bearing down in pelvic region. Shuddering from pain. Sudden prostration. Weak empty hollow feeling in epigastrium, chest, muscles, lumbar back, hips, knees etc.; or sensation of fullness. As of a lump or something rolling over internally. Violent ebullitions of blood with pulsation throughout the body. Fits of uneasiness and hysterical spasms. Spasms, clonic, tonic, cataleptic. Short walk fatigues much. Jerking in muscles. Burning pains in different parts of the body. Bleedings. Milky secretions. Fainting fits. Fidgety. Tendency to abortion, from 5-7th month. Tubercular patients with chronic hepatic troubles and uterine reflexes. Feels cold even in a warm room. Ill effects of anger and vexation; blows; injury; overlifting; falls; jar; getting wet; laundry work; boiled milk; fat; pork; tobacco. Faints while kneeling in the church. Diseased conditions which drag on, linger. Warty growths. Atrophy of children, face like old man, big belly, dry flabby skin. Rheumatism, chronic cases or obstinate remains of acute.

Worse

      COLD; AIR; north wind; snowy air; snowfall, wet. Sexual excess. Before menses. Pregnancy. Abortion. Morning and evening. After first sleep. Falling to sleep. Sitting, standing, Kneeling. Jarring. Stooping. Coitus. Before thunderstorms. Touch. Ascending. Rubbing. Lifting. Scratching. Washing clothes.

Better

      VIOLENT MOTION. Warmth; of bed. Pressure. Hot application. Crossing or drawing limbs up. After sleep. Cold drinks; cold bath; open air.

Mind

      Angry; sensitive; irritable; easily offended, and miserable. Wants to commit suicide. Nervous, so that she wants to hold on to something or she should scream. She says and does strange things. Nobody knows what she will do next. Anxious fear; over trifles. Aversion; to family, to those loved best, to sympathy, to company; yet dreads to be alone. Repugnance to customary business; disgust of life. Stifled affections. Poor Memory. Makes mistakes while writing or reading. Sad. Irritability, alternating with indifference or sulkiness. Sad over her health and domestic affairs. Constantly worries, frets and cries about her real or imaginary illness. Sexually minded. Weeps when telling her symptoms. Miserly. Stupid, wants to go away. Indifference. Takes pleasure in teasing others. Feels unfortunate without cause. Sits quietly and answers either with yes or no. Women hate men and men hate women. Breaks down in spells of weeping.

Head

      Fits of vertigo worse walking in open air, least movement of arms or with a sensation as if something rolling round the head. Headache shooting, stinging pain; within out or upwards; over left eye; heavy on vertex, alternating sides of occiput; worse lying on painful side, indoors; with nausea and vomiting. Headache in terrible shocks at menstrual time, with scanty flow; with desire for coition. Jerking of head backwards and forwards; involuntary; with open fontanelles in children, hysterical or from pain. Hair falls out; after chronic headache, at climaxis. Root of hair sensitive to combing. Pimples on forehead along the margins of hair. Vertex cold, and heavy. Hemicrania. Jaundice, with headache. Screams with pain. Headache worse shopping, mental labour, better; meals.

Eyes

      Drooping eyelids. Sees; black spots, veil, points, sparks, flashes zigzags and streaks of light before eyes; then collapse. Tarsi; red, itching cancer. Vanishing of sight during menses better; lying. Tarsal tumours. Vision dimmed; from sexual excess, masturbation and uterine diseases. Cannot tolerate reflected light. Arrests cataract in women. Falling out feeling in eyes. Epithelioma of eyelids. Eyes red with styes.

Ears

      Herpes; behind ears; on lobe of ears; on nape of neck. Oversensitive to noise; esp. music. Sudden deafness; as if caused by the plug in ears. Discharge; thick yellow pus; offensive. Swelling of and eruptions on external ear.

Nose

      Great sensitiveness to odours; which are repulsive; to the smell of cooking food. Pressing pain at root. BROWN; YELLOWISH; STRIPE ACROSS. Thick greenish discharge; thick foul, plugs and crusts. Post-nasal dropping of heavy, lumpy discharges, must be hawked from mouth. Epistaxis; when the nose has been struck by anything even lightly; during menses; during pregnancy; with piles. Ozaena. Ascending throat colds. Pain in occiput with drawing in arms and legs during cold.

Face

      Changing colour. Dark circles under eyes. Chloasmae. Acne worse before menses. Malar bones numb. Swollen cracked lower lip. Cancer of the lips, epithelioma. Old, wrinkled with spots. Jerking of facial muscles while talking. Warts on.

Mouth

      And tongue feel burnt. Taste; cheesy, fishy, bitter, sour, putrid, offensive. Hawks foul or cheesy grains in the morning. Everything tastes too salty. Painful teeth, during pregnancy, menses and during cold, worse lying. Tongue dirty, becomes clear during menses.

Throat

      Sensation of a plug. Pain as if it is raw. Ascending throat colds. Pressure in the throat, feels neck cloth tight. Hawks foul mucus or balls, in the morning.

Stomach

      Nausea; at thought or smell of food; in A.M.; thought of coition. Vomiting; of solid Food only of milky fluids; during pregnancy; in the morning; rinsing mouth. Longing; for vinegar, acids and pickles, sweets. FAINT SINKING FEELING AT EPIGASTRIUM; not better by eating; or a lump in. Burning in pit of stomach. Boiled milk disagrees. Acidity. Dyspepsia from over- lifting; from tobacco. Voracious appetite, or no appetite; sudden craving, sudden satiety. Sense of something twisting about in stomach and rising into the throat. Distress or pain in stomach worse vomiting. Eructations; milky, sour, bitter, rancid; of tough, foamy mucus.

Abdomen

      Pain in the region of liver or gall bladder worse stooping. Liver sore and painful better lying on right side. Falling out or heavy bearing down feeling in hypogastrium better by holding it or crossing legs. Pot-belly of mothers. Constipation obstinate, no urging for days. Large hard stools; feeling of a ball in rectum. Rectum constricted and powerless, almost constant oozing from anus. Diarrhoea; greenish, infantile; from boiled milk, with rapid exhaustion. Piles; prolapsing; worse walking, bleed while walking, with sticking pain; of pregnancy. Stools, then gelatinous mucus. Pains shoot up in rectum. Brown spots on abdomen. Stools are passed after prolonged straining, followed by cupful of jelly like yellow-white, very offensive mucus. Prolapse of rectum after smoking. Sense of weight or ball in anus not better by stool.

Urination

      Involuntary urination during first sleep; worse coughing, sneezing; laughing; hearing sudden noise, fright or inattention esp. in women, etc. Slow urination, with bearing down sensation above pubis. URINE; THICK, FOUL; white gritty or ADHERENT RED SANDY SEDIMENT. Urine feeble, slow. Cutting pain in bladder before urination. Urine; bloody, milky. Shuddering when urging for urine is not attended to.

Male

      Sexual desire increased. Complaints after coition. Offensive perspiration on scrotum. Genitals cold. Condylomata surrounding head of penis. Impotency.

Female

      WEAK, DRAGGING or BEARING DOWN SENSATION, as if everything would escape from vulva; must cross limbs or hold parts to prevent protrusion. Griping, burning or sticking in uterus. Coition painful; from dryness of vagina; bleeding after. Dryness of vagina and vulva; after menses; causing disagreeable sensation when walking. Aversion to coition, or complaints after. Menses; absent; at puberty; after weaning. Menses; too late, and scanty; irregular; early and profuse. Labia swelled; abscessed. Leucorrhoea; yellow, greenish, milky, in large lumps in little girls; instead of menses, foul; gonorrhoeal; with stitches up in vagina from uterus to navel; during day. Nipples cracked across the crown. Retained placenta; after abortion. Sub-involution. Exhaustion after coition. Nausea and irritability on thought of coition. Amenorrhoea. Metritis with pain in lumbar region and frequent urination. Motion of foetus is intolerable. Metrorrhagia at the time of climaxis. Sudden flushes of heat, with weakness and sweat during climaxis. Tendency to abortion; from 5TH to 7TH month. Severe itching in vulva causing abortion. Sterility. Mania from profuse menses.

S.R. Phatak
A pioneer of Homoeopathy in Maharashtra, Dr Shankar Raghunath Phatak was born on 6th September, 1896. He did his MBBS from Grant Medical College, in 1924. Started his practice but somehow not satisfied with Allopathic Treatment.

He was convinced about Homoeopathy while going through Sir William Osler's writings on 'History of Medicine' so switched over to an entirely Homoeopathic Practice in 1932. He also started working on Homoeopathic literature along with his Practice.

He has contributed immensely to homoeopathic literature. He was an ardent follower of Dr Boger. His Repertory is based on Boger's ''A Synoptic key to Materia Medica'.