“On the 6th day moral symptoms were developed. I do not want to be pleased; don’t care to talk; desire to sleep. Slept well all night, with unpleasant dreams. Omitted medicine two days, during which the nausea and full feeling subsided. At intervals the skin of the abdomen felt stiff and stretched. On the 7th day took five drops of the 3 degree, and in a few hours the nausea was much increased, with the same bloated sensation in the abdomen, particularly across the hips and in the region of the uterus; darting pains in different parts of the head, some tearing pain in the lower part of the abdomen from the region of the ovary down both sides. I ate as much as usual, but felt no appetite for it; was restless, with a desire to do something, but no ambition. A sensation of pressure in the vagina, and pain at the top of the sacrum extending to the hips.
“8th Day. Worse on going to bed; can’t go to sleep; wild feeling in the head, as though I should go crazy and no one would take care of me; thoughts of suicide; how much opium would put me to sleep forever, and who would find my body, and who would care; nausea constant.
“10th Day. Pain in the right iliac region, better during motion; the head grows wild after I have been quite for a short time. At 2 P.M. of the 10th day (Oct. 10), took five drops of the 3 degree. Increased depressing weight over the pubes; worse in the evening. The knees ache.” No more medicine was taken by this prover.
Eight days afterward (Oct. 20th), she came to me to state her symptoms, her mind being in such a state that she could not herself record them. The following symptoms had come on the 20th (ten days after last dose), and steadily increased; A sensation in the pelvis as though everything was coming into the world through the vagina. Last night it was very distressing, and not relieved by change of position. The dragging downward toward the pelvis is felt as high as the stomach and even the shoulders; not relieved by lying down, though worse when standing; a disposition to place the hand upon the hypogastrium and press upward in order to relieve the dragging sensation. Likewise an aching and pressure across the lumb-sacral region, and some pressure upon the rectum. Likewise pressure and a crazy feeling upon the vertex, so that she cannot write her symptoms. To-day (22d), when walking, a sensation as if everything were pressing down in the pelvis and into the vagina, so that she inhales forcibly in order to draw up the thorax and clear the pelvis.
She wants somebody to talk to her and entertain her. Feels quite nervous; wants to cry from a feeling of irritation and of something wrong in the abdomen and pelvis. Feels hurried and yet incapable, as if she had a great deal to do and cannot do it; much thirst; drinks often, and much at a time.
Bowels generally regular. Now she has alternately a solid and a loose stool, several during the day, and a constant feeling as though she must have a stool; this feeling resulting from a sensation as if something were pressing against the anterior wall of the rectum at the anus and about one to three inches above it.
She is conscious of feeling nervous and irritable, and yet says she feels jolly. Grumbling pain in right side of head and teeth.
Yesterday, when walking, pain in both ovaries, worse in the left, extending down the anterior and inner aspect of the left thigh, as if it would be impossible to take another step; as soon as she extended the limb she must immediately flex it again, and then, because of a restless discomfort, must again extend it. At length she went to sleep on the back with knees and thighs flexed.
She cannot tell which pelvic pain is the worse, that in the back or that in the pubic region. The whole contents of the pelvis seem to drag downward and forward and quite from the epigastric region.
She cannot record her symptoms. Don’t want to complain, and yet don’t avoid people. Feels bloated, but is not so. Somewhat tender on pressure in the region of the ovaries, especially the right.
Oct. 23. Aching in the pelvis between promontory of sacrum and the pubes. It feels to her as if the aching were not in the uters but around it. She feels constantly the two spots corresponding to the ovaries, and which ache and feel like little coals of fire. In the pelvis, a feeling like a dragging out, as if the whole contents were pushing down into a funnel, the outlet of which coincided with the vagina.
Oct. 25. For the last 36 hours constant desire for stool from pressure on the rectum; a stool every half hour, lumpy, diarrhoeic, with flatus; constant tenesmus, and burning in the urethra. These symptoms continued along with those before described, for several days. The pain in the right ovary increased, until on the 16th she described it as if a knife were inserted into the ovary and ripped down the groin and the anterior part of the thigh; the pain extended over the lumbo-sacral region, and she must cry herself to sleep. Somewhat relieved by pressure on the ovarian region.
Diarrhoea and pressure on bladder continue without relief until the 27th. She remarks that her symptoms are all worse when she gives up active resistance to them and control over herself, as for example, when she sits down to rest or tries to go to sleep.
Oct. 28. Menses occurred at the regular day and normal, but only while she keeps moving. The flow ceases when she becomes quiet. She feels much hurried and driven, but knows not why; walks fast and constantly, but aimlessly; is much confused in mind.
Oct. 29. She noticed some heart symptoms, not very definite. On the 30th, after walking, a sudden fluttering sensation in the heart. This, like all other symptoms, is less felt she can busy herself much. A hurried feeling about the heart with faintness and fluttering as though she could make no exertion but must sit still. The seat of pain is the apex of the heart. Twice she had a sharp pain there. Feels hurried as though she must breathe quickly, yet does not.
The prover feels that her whole system has been profoundly affected by the drug. “She is not the person she once was;” feels hurried but incapable; no heart nor strength for business; discouraged and despondent.
Nov. 1. A dry, single cough; heart symptoms very troublesome; short of breath, especially on going upstairs.
Appetite very much increased, especially for meat, and the more so the more pronounced the symptoms were. The mental symptoms are striking; she is averse to being alone, which formerly she liked (but does not dread it). Her sexual instincts, formerly dormant, are now quite strong; wits and intuitions dull and languid.
Nov. 10. The prover reports: She had been quite well since the 4th, and supposed the action of the drug exhausted, but on the 7th the bearing down sensation in the pelvis returned; everything seemed to be pressing out of the vagina. This continued on the 8th like light labor pains. Leucorrhoea also occurred (a thin acrid discharge, leaving a brown stain). She had never before had it. All these symptoms worse afternoon and evening till midnight. On the 9th leucorrhoea had ceased, but in the afternoon it returned worse than ever, and she could not sleep for the pelvic distress.
Nov. 11. She feels depression; has pressure on bladder and rectum; is inert, yet restless and peevish; leucorrhoea continues. With these symptoms comes the desire again for meat. Burning pain across the hypogastrium from groin to groin. In short, the symptoms first experienced repeat themselves. She had not taken any more of the Lilium tigrinum. In addition she notices a peculiar mental condition; a desire for fine things of every kind. She is dissatisfied with what she has, and envious of others.
Nov. 12. While attending a lecture, much irritation in the womb and a singular state of mind desire to strike the lecturer, and in the evening a disposition to swear at everybody and everything, and to think and speak and of obscene things; as these feelings came, the uterine pains passed away. To day the leucorrhoea ceased.
Nov. 13. She has been languid, dull, and forgetful since the last report. Menses recurred (14th) after an interval of only two weeks; a slight, dark, thick, and offensive discharge.
Dec. 1. It is eight weeks since she took Lilium tigrinum. Yesterday, great hunger, and she ate largely, yet felt as if she should starve. Felt the old hurry and incapacity; the old pains in head and teeth relieved by motion and occupation, followed by the diarrhoea and the pressure on the bladder.
Dec. 4. She is now passing this, the third series of symptoms produced by the Lilium tigrinum; the passionate excitement, the aching and burning pain in the ovaries (in the right), which organs are distinctly defined to her sensation; then despondency with aggravation at night and diarrhoea in the morning; then pressing down in the pelvis and burning all around the pubes and genitals, worse from 3 to 5 p.m., and passing away from 8 p.m., accompanied by pressure on the bladder.
Dr. Dunham graduated from Columbia University with Honours in 1847. In 1850 he received M.D. degree at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of New York. While in Dublin, he received a dissecting wound that nearly killed him, but with the aid of homoeopathy he cured himself with Lachesis. He visited various homoeopathic hospitals in Europe and then went to Munster where he stayed with Dr. Boenninghausen and studied the methods of that great master. His works include 'Lectures on Materia Medica' and 'Homoeopathy - Science of Therapeutics'.