This may be easily demonstrated, Let purgatives be taken for a week, and, however good may have been the state of health previously, at the termination of this period all sorts of impurities will be discharged, especially after taking jalap and calomel. As this is an invariable result, even in the case of those who have never been ill, it proves that impurities are produced by those drugs.
In sickness purgatives are also most injurious. Disease weakens the whole system; “the bowels therefore,” writes DR. YELDHAM, “in common with the legs, the arms, the stomach, the brain, and every other organ, partake of the general debility, and become deprived of that power by which, in a state of health, they are enabled to discharge their proper functions. Why should they, more than the other organs, be impelled to the performance of a duty to which, at the time, they are totally unequal?
“Again, under the process of diseases, the whole vital power is devoted to the struggle which is going on in the affected part. The attention to the system is, as it were, drawn off as well from the bowels as from every other organ not immediately engaged in the contact. On this account also they remain quiescent; and any interference with that quietude, by diverting the vital energy, weakness that force which nature requires to be undivided, to enable her to conduct her combat with disease to a successful issue an additional reason why purgatives should be avoided.
“Constipation is an effect, not a disease; if it were, there might be some show of reason in the use of aperients. But being merely a temporary loss of power, we can no more restore that power by forcing the action of the bowels, than we can impart strength to a weakened leg by compelling it to walk. In the latter instance, we should instinctively rest the part, until, by the removal of the disease, motion might be resumed. The same reasoning applies with equal force to the removal of Constipation. The exercise of a little patience, and the employment of judicious means for the eradication of that disordered condition on which the inaction depends, will as infallibly restore the bowels to their duty, as in every other instance the effect must case when the cause is removed.”
CAUSES:
Sedentary habits; dissipation; an improper quality of food, especially the too exclusive use of bread without vegetables; the use of superfine flour; the adulteration of bread by alum, 1 Alum is very extensively used to improve the appearance of inferior flour. mental anxiety; diseases of the liver; exposure to the action of lead, as in painters; mechanical obstruction from Scirrhus, Polypi, and other tumours, Hernia, Stricture of the rectum, etc.; inflammatory disease of the intestines, brain, or spinal cord, or their membranes. But a frequent cause of Constipation is loss of tone of the mucous lining of the bowels from the habitual use of purgatives. Many persons take a purgative once a week, the primary effect of which is a sort of Diarrhoea, but the secondary effect is Constipation.
An important point will be gained if we can bring persons to consider Constipation simply as a result of other causes, and a want of balance in the general system; and when measures shall be directed to the correcting of this condition as the only rational means of curing Constipation.
CONSTIPATION AND OLD AGE.
Daily evacuation, which, perhaps, should be the rule in youth and middle life, is often an excess in advanced life, when thrice or even twice a week is often sufficient. It is desirable that this physiological fact should be known, as old persons often trouble themselves needlessly on this point. The chief evil of the condition lies in the nervous anxiety it occasions.
TREATMENT:
If headache, dry tongue, hot skin, etc., co-exist with Constipation, one of the following remedies may be selected.
Nux Vomica. Frequent ineffectual inclination to stool; irregular action of the bowels; Constipation, with nausea and sickness in the morning, distention and heaviness in the stomach, ill-humour, fulness or pain in the head, uneasy sleep, etc. It is suited to Constipation following intoxicating drinks, eating too much or too great a variety of food at one time; over-study, and sedentary habits. It is especially suitable to patients of a dark, bilious temperament.
Bryonia. Torpor of the bowels (thus differing from the ineffectual or irregular action indicating the previous remedy); Constipation, with chilliness, headache, and irritability, or associated with Rheumatism, on heat of the weather.
Opium. Constipation from a general paralysis condition, leading to inertia of the intestines; obstinate Constipation with a feeling as if the anus were closed; hard, lumpy motions; headache, dizziness, dry mouth, thirst, listlessness, and dusky face; also in chronic cases, from too little out-of-door exercise. Especially adapted to the aged.
Lycopodium. Itching and tightness of the anus; rumbling and flatulence in the abdomen; waterbrash; heartburn; the bowels feeling warm, dry and distended; loaded urine.
Sulphur. Habitual costiveness, Piles, burning and itching of the anus, etc. It is also valuable as an intermittent remedy, and frequently aides the action of Nux Vom.
ACCESSORY MEASURES:
No medicines can be of permanent benefit if the bad habits which led to the Constipation are persisted in. Moderate walking exercise is useful, particularly in the morning in the country. Water (see p. 48) is an extremely valuable adjunct, both for internal and external use. Cold baths, especially the shower and the sitz, are strongly recommended as being easy of application. The wet compress at night is often an invaluable remedy; also injections, as recommended further on. Regularity in attending to the calls of nature is important; the best time to solicit the bowels to act is the morning, usually after breakfast. By fixing the mind on this operation for a few days, the bowels will generally respond, and constipation be sometimes removed by attention to this point alone.
DIET:
Meals should he taken with regularity, animal food eaten sparingly, but vegetables and ripe fruit freely. Peas, pea-soup, hard eggs, boiled rice, boiled milk, coffee, strong or green tea, claret, port wine, spirits, highly-seasoned food, and late suppers should be avoided; roasted apples, stewed figs, and prunes and tamarinds may be taken. Oatmeal porridge, with treacle, may be taken for breakfast; and brown bread should be preferred to white. If brown bread be not eaten exclusively, a little should be taken with nearly every meal; its effects will thus be more uniformly exerted through the alimentary canal than if only taken occasionally.
INJECTIONS:
In obstinate and protracted Constipation, and when the lower bowel is obstructed with faecal matter, either in too large masses, or too hard and dry for discharge, and if the means before suggested prove ineffectual, the enema may be used at a certain means of obtaining the desired relief, while it reduces the temperature of the rectum, and removes the sensation of congestion.
At the same time, the use of the enema does not interfere with the administration of any homoeopathic remedy necessary to cure the disease, of which the Constipation is a symptom. The injection should consist of a pint or more of water, according to the portion of the bowel where the accumulation exists, and should be slowly injected up the rectum by means of an enema apparatus. On commencing to use injections, the temperature of water for this purpose should not be lower than 72 degree, and gradually reduced to 64 degree.
Unirritating in its operation, and acting directly on the seat of obstruction, an injection is greatly preferable to deranging the whole alimentary tract with strong drugs, which, after the unnatural excitation has subsided, only settle back into a state of greater debility and torpor than before. 1 See Homoeopathic World, February, 1887, containing an article from the Lancet by Sir Andrew Clark with comments by the Editor of the H.W.
57. Piles (Haemorrhoids).
These consist of small tumours sometimes outside (external Piles) and sometimes within (internal Piles) the opening of the lower bowel, either with or without bleeding. They vary in number, from one small intensely painful swelling, to a number clustering together like a bunch of grapes. These swellings are attended with pricking, itching, shooting, throbbing, burning, or pressive pains, increased on going to stool, and sometimes with dull pains in the loins. Blood is often passed with the evacuations, sometimes only in drops, but at other times in considerable and even alarming quantities.
CAUSES:
Obstinate Constipation; drastic purgatives; heating and stimulating food or drinks; a luxurious life; sedentary habits; pressure of the enlarged womb upon the vessels of the pelvis during pregnancy; 1 For the treatment of Piles during Pregnancy, are the “Lady’s Manual of Homoeopathic Treatment,” 11th Edition; also Dr. W. Morgan’s work on Pregnancy. sitting on cold stones, damp grass, or on warm or soft cushions; excessive boat or horse- exercise; over excitement of the sexual organs; or whatever causes a relaxed state of the mucous membrane or hinders the return flow of blood from the lower bowel.
LICENTIATE OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS; MEMBER OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF SURGEONS; LICENTIATE IN MIDWIFERY, LONDON AND EDINBURGH, ETC. PHYSICIAN TO THE READING AND BERKSHIRE HOMOEOPATHIC DISPENSARY.
Author of "The Stepping Stone to Homeopathy and Health,"
"Manual of Homoeopathic Treatment". Editor of "The Homoeopathic World."