Drosera in wasters. What a large clinical field lies before those true healers who are willing to try out the virtues of this noblest of our plant remedies! They held malnutrition clinics in London before this war for the thousands of wasting children who simply would not get on, remained stunted and undersized and weakly. No particular cause could be discovered frequently, the city life did not suit them, perhaps; they were put on extra milk, extra cod liver oil and malt, and yet many of them remained in a state of malnutrition, they could not assimilate the extra food that was given them.
I had a good few through my hands, and I found Drosera in many cases acted like a charm. It does not work out in the repertory; you have to go more by the family history, and if a case is going to do well on Drosera, it will do so at once; if it does not act within a week or so, you have to look for another remedy. I can remember one of these bad-doers, the bane of my life for years.
I knew little Beryl from the age of three weeks; she was never actually ill, only just looked delicate and fragile, one of those charming pieces of Dresden china you are afraid to touch for fear it should break; one of the real platinum blonde fairy children with transparent, lily-white skins and bright blue eyes, the kind of child you expect to develop tuberculosis sooner or later, she flatly refused to grow, developed septic tonsils and enlarged glands of the neck early on, so she had an operation for removal of the tonsils at 30 months, and she remained stationary in weight for the following 7 months.
At 4 years of age she only weighed 33 lbs., she was 3 lbs. underweight and still looked delicate and frail, even though she had good holidays. Six months later she still weighted 33 lbs.; then she was given Tuberculinum 30, which started the ball rolling, so that in a year she gained the normal 4 lbs., better than she had done for 2-3 years before that. Then we came to january 22nd, 1934. The weight had been stationary again, round about 37 lbs. for 5 months. At the age of years 9 months, she was about 9 lbs. underweight, and I thought to try the effect of Drosera, which I gave as a single dose of the 30th potency.
The effect of this single dose was more than alarming; she put on 1 3/4 lbs. in a fortnight, a thing she had never done before. On May 14th, 1934, 6 weeks after the first dose, she weighed 40.4 lbs.–again of over 3 lbs. in 6 weeks. On january 17th, 1935, she weighed 43 lbs., she had gained 6 lbs. in a little over 9 month; but there had been no gain for 22 months, and she had stories in her eyes for several weeks. So I thought I could safely repeat. The second dose of Drosera 30 was given 92 months after the first dose, and she had dine more during those months than she had done all the years before, in spite of cod liver oil and malt and months of ultra-violet ray treatment.
On November 18th, 1935, she had not been well, so she had a dose of Drosera in the 1,000th potency, She was not weighed again until January 6th, 1936, when she weighed 48 lbs., a gain of 11 lbs. in 22 months. Drosera 30 one dose, was then given, as I did not have a higher potency by me. On October 12th, 1936, weight was 58.8–gained 42 lbs. in 9 months. I did no see her very often after that, as she lived a long way out of town.
On september 27th, 1937, she weighed 57 lbs. 2 oz., at the age of 9 years, a gain of 20 lbs. in 32 years. Then she developed bedwetting, which often shows itself in children with a tubercular family history. This child had a tubercular history on both fathers and mothers sides. Therefore she had Tuberculinum 30, nightly doses for fourteen days which cleared up this nasty habit of bedwetting at once, though it had been going on for the previous 6 months. The steady gain in weight went on, she had an occasional dose of Drosera 30 at the rate of one dose per annum, and at 10 years of age she weighed 62 lbs, and was 562 inches high.
The local school doctor cold not make out way her mother thought she was so delicate; she looked in the pink, he considered, After that I only saw her once or twice during 1939. On January 2nd, 1939, she weighed 4 stone 11 lbs. and was well and strong. Unfortunately in May, 1939, she developed appendicitis and was sent to a small local hospital, where a septic appendix was removed, which was followed by peritonitis and subphrenic abscess, an abscess near the liver, which required a good deal of surgical attention. She had at least 4 or 5 operations during the next 3 months.
The surgeon thought she must have had a wonderful constitution to stand the weeks and weeks of high temperature and the repeated operations. Her parents passed many anxious weeks; again and again she was nearly given up; but she pulled through, thanks to the resistance and the vitality the homoeopathic treatment she had received for the previous five years had given her. She was thinner than ever when she came out of the hospital; she was just over 3 stone at her worst and 4 stone on September 1st, 1939. I saw her on September 21st, 1939, and gave her another dose of Drosera 30 and by October 23rd, a month later, she was 5 stone 132 lbs. She had gained nearly 2 stone.
After such a drastic cleansing process as surgical operation are, the weeks and weeks of the drawing away of toxic matter in the from of pus, left her weak but pure and clean, and as soon as her vital force reasserted itself, she started to gain by leaps and bounds. She has been wonderfully fit and well since, indeed she is kicking now, because I am restricting her dancing classes and her gym. She dose not see why she cant do it now, why she cant be like the other children.
And this child, who was a bed for years, always delicate and frail, built up such a strong constitution under a few years of the correct homoeopathic remedy-that she was able to withstand a strong siege of the enemy, septic appendicitis-a most deadly and often fatal disease in children about 10 and 11 years of age.
This is what Drosera did for her!.
I have other cases as remarkable which did as wall on Drosera, only the exact records are not available.
Drosera is a many sided remedy.
We shall now turn to a totally different aspect of the curative power inherent in this little insignificant herb, that is the power it has curing mental diseases, such type of mental diseases which show delusions of persecutions, in cases of paranoia and megalomania.
Let us go over the symptoms as mentioned by Hahnemann in his Materia Pura:.
Very irritable, any small matter can upset him very much; is highly irritated by even mild criticism.
Obstinately carries decisions which he has thought over for long, in spite of opposition.
Extreme restlessness; cannot be bothered reading books, cannot stick to one subject for long, must always change his reading and his occupation.
Full of great anxiety and mistrust, thought he was surrounded by none but false people. Uneasy, sad disposition.
Full of imaginary ideas that he was being deceived by spiteful and envious people. Anxiety, as if he enemies would not leave him in peace, envied and persecuted him.
Silent and reserved, with great anxiety; he feared that he was just about to receive unpleasant and disagreeable news.
Anxiety and fears especially about 7 or 8 p.m., as if he were compelled to jump into water to take his life by downing; no other mode of death appealed to him.
Great anxiety when he was alone; he always wished to have somebody round him or near him all the time; was quieter when he could speak to somebody, could not sleep on account of his great anxiety.
Very peevish, mere trifles upset him. Quite unimportant circumstances so upset him that he was beside himself with rage.
Stupid and not disposed to work either with his hands or with his head.
A most unpleasant mentality and difficult person to deal with.
Quite recently I read a book, describing such an individual. Let me quote from this book.
This man was filled with an immeasurable hatred and seemed to feel the need of something to heat. Almost anything might suddenly inflame his wrath and his anger. The transition from anger to sentimentality or enthusiasm might be quite sudden. Specially among intimate friends he let himself go. The slightest contradiction threw him into a rage. I often her him shout and stamp his feet. His technique was by well-timed fits of rage, to throw his entourage into confusion, and thus make them more submissive.
He often sits in morose silence and then joint in the conversation and soon talks himself into a rage. Even at a very period, he disliked hearing anything not calculated to strengthen his own convictions. He was never told the uncomfortable truth. A policy grew up of keeping anything from him might excite him. His excessive fits of rage tempted few people to provoked such a storm. . . . Amid the ecstasy of his speeches, or in his solitary walks, he feels he possesses the qualities of a supreme magician, much superior to and outdistancing the qualities of a great statesmen.
