Homeopathic Materia Medica

Lectures on Homoeopathic Materia Medica, James Tyler Kent

Hysterical sensitivity with extreme aggravation from noise, motion and exertion marks this remedy as unique.

The pains are aggravated from noise, and motion, and the nerves are in such a state of sensitivity that a painful thrill passes over the body in waves and nausea follows. Nausea from noise is strikingly strange.

It cures the most stubborn cases of spinal irritation, when the symptoms agree. Chronic catarrh of the nose. Necrosis of bone. Quick consumption. Emaciation. Enlargement of glands. Constant hunger and thirst. It was a remedy with the old masters for scrofulous conditions. Great lassitude.

Complaints are ameliorated by warmth, and during rest. Fainting from least exertion, Chilliness, trembling and anxiety. So restless that she must keep busy, though she accomplishes nothing. The bones are sore.

Sadness and mental depression. Hysterical conduct, hilarity. Aversion to work, and to his business. joyousness and singing with headache.

Vertigo on closing the eyes, from motion, from stooping, on board a vessel, from every noise, with nausea, vomiting, and cold sweat. Awakens at 11 P.M. with vertigo and slow pulse. Vertigo with dim vision and pain in eyes. Vertigo and nausea from closing the eyes when kneeling in church. Vertigo like sea-sickness.

The headache is most violent, aggravated on motion, aggravated talking, aggravated from warm drinks, with nausea and vomiting. Sensitive to light and noise. Pain in forehead extending to occiput, aggravated from noise, motion, and cold air. Headache on beginning to move. Sensation as if vertex did not belong to her, as though she could lift it off.

Pain deep in eyes. Complaints from sunstroke. Pressing pain in temples. Pulsating pain over left eye and across forehead. Cannot lie down with the headache. Itching of scalp, and nape in evening.

This remedy cures many nervous eye symptoms. Flickering, even when eyes are closed. Like a veil before the eyes. Double vision. Sensitive to light. Diplopia. Fluttering. Nausea, and cold hands. Pressing pain behind eyes. On closing eyes, nausea and vomiting.

The hearing is very acute, Every least noise penetrates the whole body, especially the teeth, aggravates vertigo and causes nausea. Rushing noises in ears like a waterfall. Pressure about the ears.

Fullness behind the ears. It has cured most obstinate catarrh of nose with offensive thick yellow or greenish yellow discharges.

Pressing pain at root of nose, Dryness in nose. Paroxysms of violent sneezing.

The face is pale and sickly. Lockjaw in morning on waking. Foam at mouth with chill. Teeth sensitive to cold water and shrill sounds. Toothache causes weeping. Burning in teeth. Salty taste in mouth. The tongue feels as if burnt. Mouth feels numb, Taste impaired.

Desires wine and sour drinks. Much thirst. Desires food, but does not know what. Nausea with many complaints and from many causes. Nausea in the morning on rising, from noise, on closing the eyes, when looking too long at one object, on motion, from talking, from fast riding in a carriage, from riding on the cars or on a ship.

Nausea with headache, with vertigo; nausea aggravated from warm drinks. In seasickness of nervous women, when they close the eyes to get rid of the motion of the vessel they become deathly sick. Tenderness of stomach.

This is a useful remedy in many liver conditions, with burning pain, aggravated from touch, motion and noise, and bilious vomiting.

Pain in groin in a man after coitus; on motion, and on drawing up the limb. Constipation, with difficult, soft stool. Contraction of anus. Enlarged prostate gland with sensation of a lump in perineum,

Must arise several times during the night to pass urine. Copious urine during the night. Feeble erection and diminished desire. Seminal emissions during sleep in the afternoon. Sore bruised pain in the ovarian region, aggravated by motion. Menses suppressed. Sighing and short breath on ascending stairs.

Stitching in chest beneath left shoulder to throat. Quick consumption. Anxiety about heart. Very sensitive spine, aggravated from motion or, noise, a jar, stepping. Pain between scapula. Spinal anaemia. Itching of back and nape.

Drawing in thigh with a cold sensation, ameliorated by warmth. Violent itching of calf. Swelling of feet. Heaviness of the limbs. Pains in bones as if broken.

Shaking chill. Sweats easily. Icy cold perspiration with fainting, vertigo and vomiting at night.

Violent itching of skin.

A Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica, John Henry Clarke

Theridion curassavicum. Orange spider. N. O. Arachnida. Tincture of the living spider.

Clinical.─Angina pectoris. Anthrax of sheep. Bone, affections of. Caries. Climaxis. Cough. Dysmenorrhoea. Eye-teeth, pains in. Fainting. Headache. Hysteria. Liver, disorder of; abscess of. Ménière's disease. Nausea. Necrosis. Nose, catarrh of. Ozaena. Photophobia. Phthisis florida. Pregnancy, sickness of. Rickets. Scrofulosis. Seasickness. Spinal irritation. Tetanus. Toothache. Vertigo.

Characteristics.─Therid. was introduced and proved by Hering in 1832. The spider is found in the West Indies, chiefly in the island of Curaçoa. It is about the size of a cherry-stone, is found on orange-trees, velvety black when young, with antero-posterior lines composed of white dots; on posterior of body there are three orange-red spots, and on the belly a large square yellow spot. It is very poisonous. It produces a highly sensitive, nervous condition with weakness, trembling, coldness, anxiety, faintness, and easily excited cold sweat. There are two well-marked keynotes, one or other of which will be found in most cases calling for Therid. (1) Extreme sensitiveness to noise; < by least noise; "sounds penetrate the teeth." The sensitiveness extends to vibrations of any kind, jar of a step, riding in a carriage or in a boat. The symptom also shows the relation Therid. has to bony structures as well as to the nervous organs they enclose: it meets cases of spinal irritation; and also cases of disease of the spinal and other bones. Caries, necrosis, and scrofulous disease of bones have all been cured with it. "In scrofulosis when the best remedies fail to relieve" (H. C. Allen). (2) "< Closing eyes." This applies to vertigo, and symptoms of the head and stomach. This forms the indication in many cases of seasickness, or sickness of pregnancy. The headaches are severe and affect the eyes, especially the left. The ears are highly sensitive. There are hallucinations of sight and hearing, luminous vibrations, and rushing sounds. Although there is "< closing eyes," there is also intolerance of light. A species of intoxication is induced, hilarity, talkativeness. "Time passes too slowly" is a well-marked symptom. Therid. has a peculiar cough: frequent, convulsive, head spasmodically jerked forward, knees jerked up to abdomen. Chackravanti (H. W., xxxvi. 345) relates a case of headache cured with Therid.: Mr. B., 35, well built, of bilious temperament, had for three months severe headache with nausea and vomiting, like sea-sickness, and shaking chills. Dulness and fulness in the head with throbbing beginning in occiput, preceded by flickering before the eyes. Head feels large and heavy. The pains begin in the morning, increase during the day, and last till evening. Excessive irritation, with loss of sustaining power. < From least overwork and motion; > by keeping quiet in horizontal position. Constipation, stools hard, small, dry. Therid. 3x was given, one drop in water twice daily. The pain was much better next day, and was gone in less than a week. Baruch (H. P., viii. 331) says of Therid. "In cases of scrofulosis, where the best chosen medicines do nothing, I always interpolate a dose of Therid., which must act for eight days, and I have seen the most surprising results from it, particularly in caries and necrosis. For phthisis florida Therid. is indispensable, and effects a certain cure if given in the beginning of the disease. In cases of rachitis, caries, and necrosis I depend chiefly on Therid., which, although it does not seem to affect the external scrofulous symptoms, apparently goes to the root of the evil and effectually destroys the cause of the disease." Peculiar Sensations are: As if her head was another strange head. As if vertex did not belong to her. Like a pressing pain in root of nose and about ears. As of a veil before eyes. As if too much air passed into nose and mouth. Mouth as if furred, benumbed. As if some one tapped her on groin when raising leg. As if a lump were lying in perinaeal region. Like labour pains in lower abdomen. As if a child were bounding in body. As if something in oesophagus were slipping towards epigastrium. As if bones were broken and would fall asunder. As if dying. Burning pains and itching are common; and a stitch high up in apex of left chest has proved a guiding symptom for Therid. in the cure of cases of phthisis. "Burning in liver region" has led to the cure of abscess and even cancer of that organ. The symptoms are < by touch; pressure; on ship-board; riding in carriage; closing eyes; jar; least noise. Lying = pain deep in brain; > flickering before eyes. < Stooping; rising; motion; exertion, going up or down stairs; walking. After washing clothes, nausea and fainting. < Every night. Warm water > nausea and retching. Warmth >. Cold <; cold water feels too cold. < By coitus (groin pains). < After stool (headache). Left side most affected.

Relations.─Antidoted by: Acon. (sensitiveness to noises); Mosch. (nausea); Graph. (more chronic effects). Follows well: Sul., Calc., Lyc. (scrofula). Compare: Aran. d. and Spiders generally. Hemicrania < closing eyes, < noise, Sep. (but Sep. < from noise is less intense). Vertigo and faintness on closing eyes, Lach. Headache, nervousness, hysteria, Trn. Stooping down, violent stitch high up in l. chest, thence to back, Myrt. com. (through to l. scapula), Pix Ord. costal cartilage where it joins the rib). Illic. Ord rib, generally r. side). Time passes too quickly (too slowly Can. i., Arg. n., Nux m.). Vertigo on closing eyes, Lach., Thuj. (on opening them, Tab.; on looking up, Puls. Sil.). Headache < lying down, Lach. Nasal catarrh, thick yellow greenish discharge, Puls., Thuj. Spinal irritation, Chi. s. Bites tongue in sleep, Ph. ac. (Ph. ac. sides; Ther. tip). Effect of washing clothes, Pho. Lump in perinaeum, Arg. n. (Sep. in anus). Scrofulosis; deep-in headache, Bac., Tub. As if a child bounding in body, Croc., Thuj.

Causation.─Sea-travelling. Riding. Washing clothes.

SYMPTOMS.

1. Mind.─Joyous; he sings, though the head is internally hot; oppressed and heavy.─Imaginative excitement in head at night with rushing in ears.─Talkative; after spirituous beverages.─Inclined to be startled.─Time appears to pass rapidly, although he does little.─Despair, want of self-confidence, he gives himself up.─Tries to occupy himself constantly, but finds pleasure in nothing.─Sluggishness, with disinclination to rising in morning.─Thinking is hard when it is of a comparative nature, but not when it is creative.

2. Head.─Vertigo: on turning around; < stooping; with blindness caused by pain in eyes; with nausea increased to vomiting; in sleep, waking her at 11 p.m.; with slow pulse; from every noise; on board vessel.─Whenever she closes her eyes, nausea and vertigo < by noise and motion.─Headache,: at the beginning of every motion; evening when walking, with depression; deep in brain, so that she must sit up or walk, it is impossible to lie.─Thick feeling in head: with nausea and vomiting on least motion, < closing eyes; as if it were another head, or as if she had something else upon it.─Oppression and heaviness hindering his studies.─Painless, indescribable sensation.─Headache like a band in root of nose and around ears.─Violent frontal headache, with heavy, dull pressure behind eyes.─Headache on beginning to move.─Headache deep in sockets of eyes, < l.─Throbbing or pressive headache, sudden, over l. eye.─Aching behind eyes.─Stinging in l. temple.─Pressing together in temples.─Oppression behind ears, with fulness.─Itching on head and nape in evening.─Violent headache, with nausea, cannot bear the least noise; a feeling as if vertex were separated from rest of head, or as if she would like to lift it off.─Effects of sunstroke, with most intolerant headache, nausea and vomiting.─Itching on scalp; on head and nape, evening.

3. Eyes.─Twitching in r. eye.─Burning pain internally above inner canthus on waking.─Sensitive to light, objects look double; fluttering, nausea, cold hands.─Hard, heavy, dull pressure behind eyes.─Closing eyes <; = nausea, vomiting, vertigo.─Nausea while closing eyes; changed into nausea while opening eyes (which was > by Mosch.).─Vision lost, everything seemed very far, as if a veil were before her, with blazing and flickering, when closing eyes, then affection of head and weakness.

4. Ears.─Least noise <; every shrill sound and reverberation penetrates whole body, esp. teeth, < vertigo, = nausea.─Loud noises make too strong an impression (> Acon.).─Pressure above ears; fulness behind ears.─Violent itching behind ears.─Roaring in ears.─Rushing in ears like a waterfall, with impaired hearing.

5. Nose.─Nose dry, as if too much air passed in; itching in nose.─Sneezing: in evening, with running coryza; all day, with discharge of water from nose, but without coryza; violent, with frequent necessity to blow nose.─Pressure in root of nose and heaviness.─Chronic, offensive-smelling discharge, thick, yellow, or yellowish green; (nasal catarrh; chronic ozaena).

6. Face.─Face pale.─Froth before mouth with shaking chill.─Jaw immovable in morning on waking and at other times of the day, then opening involuntarily.

7. Teeth.─Teeth feel as if cool water were too cold.─Burning and tensive pain in teeth, gums and palate.─Every shrill sound penetrates the teeth.─Raging pain in all teeth in afternoon and evening, causing weeping, but drawing particularly in roots of sound eye-teeth.

8. Mouth.─Gums, mouth and nose dry, and feeling as if too much air passed into mouth.─There is no proper taste, her mouth feels furred, benumbed.─Salty taste, hawking of salty mucus.

9. Throat.─Sore throat; chilly; bones sore; difficult swallowing; constipation; urine scanty and high-coloured.─Pressure in lower part of oesophagus towards epigastrium, taking away the breath.

10. Appetite.─Constant desire to eat and drink, he knows not what.─Appetite for acidulous fruit.─Craves oranges and bananas.─Increased desire to smoke tobacco.─Thirst: great after midday sleep; for wine and brandy.

11. Stomach.─Nausea: in morning; on rising; from vertigo on least motion; on closing eyes; on opening eyes (> Mosch.); like seasickness; when looking steadily at an object; on motion; on talking; from fast riding in a carriage.─Sensitiveness in region of stomach and epigastrium.

12. Abdomen.─Violent burning pains in hepatic region < from touch; retching, bilious vomit.─Abscess of liver.─Anthrax of sheep.─Emission of more flatus than usual.─Pains in groins: after coition: in region of groin on motion, when she draws up her leg it seems as if some one tapped her hard on the groin.

13. Stool and Anus.─Stool: papescent, scanty, urgent, next day thin and scanty, omitted on third day.─Stool difficult towards the end, though not hard.─Bowels open twice with colic and flatulency, after which headache is <.─Anus protrudes and is painful, < sitting.─Spasmodic contraction of rectum and anus.─Heaviness in perinaeal region, which he has had for a very long time, is now felt at every step, with feeling of a lump there.

14. Urinary Organs.─Urine increased.─Has to rise four or five times in night to micturate; does not pass much during day.

15. Male Sexual Organs.─Red spots on glans.─Erections: strong, in morning, without desire; weak during coition; absent; desire vanished.─Scrotum shrivelled.─Violent and profuse emission during nap after dinner (had taken Anise during the day).

16. Female Sexual Organs.─Hysteria, during puberty; at climaxis.─Menses omitted in a woman at climaxis; gave birth to a son the following year.─Bruised, sore pain in both ovarian regions; < motion and pressure; labour-like pain in lower abdomen, with sensation as if child bounding in body; tickling in both sides.─Dysmenorrhoea, intense, in l. ovary, with intense headache, extreme sensitiveness of the cervix, chilliness, etc.

17. Respiratory Organs.─Cough at night.─Convulsive cough, with the peculiar vertigo.─Violent cough, with spasmodic jerking of head forward and knees upward.─Increased inclination to take a deep respiration, to sigh.

18. Chest.─Violent stitches high in chest beneath l. shoulder, felt even in throat.─Pinching in l. pectoral muscle.─Pressure as if something in oesophagus were slipping towards epigastrium, taking away breath for a few moments.

19. Heart.─Anxiety about heart, sharp pains radiate to arm and l. shoulder.─Pulse slow with vertigo.

20. Neck and Back.─Itching on nape, at top of shoulder and on back.─Pain between the shoulders.─Spinal irritation; great sensitiveness between vertebrae.─Sits sideways in a chair to avoid pressure against spine.─Could not bear least noise, and jar of foot on floor was so aggravating it made her cry out.─Loins affected after vomiting.

21. Limbs.─Heaviness in all limbs after breakfast, necessity to lie down, internal chill so that he trembles.

22. Upper Limbs.─Stinging from elbow to shoulder.

23. Lower Limbs.─Peculiar drawing in r. hip, passing down thigh in evening when sitting and afterwards, with internal coldness below knee; > external warmth.─Knees trouble her in afternoon.─Feet swollen.─Pain in little toe as if pressed in walking.

24. Generalities.─Tetanus with trismus.─Every shrill sound and reverberation penetrates her whole body, < teeth, and increases the vertigo, which then causes nausea.─Pain in all bones, as if every part would fall asunder, feeling as if broken from head to foot, then coldness.─Weakness: in morning, with sleepiness; with tremulousness and perspiration.─The sudden, violent symptoms were > by Acon.; later symptoms were > by Graph.

25. Skin.─Hard pimple beside ball of thumb.─Itching: on back; calf; nape; at edge of shoulder in morning; on nates with knots; burning, on inner and upper part of l. ring-finger, with redness.

26. Sleep.─Sleepy in morning.─Sleeps all day.─Deep sleep at night.─He often bites tip of his tongue in sleep, so that it is sore next day.─Sleep long and dreamful at midday, dreams of journeys in distant regions and of riding on horses (in one who scarcely ever sat upon a horse).─Dreams that he broke off a tooth.

27. Fever.─Shaking chill: with foam at mouth; with headache and vomiting.─Sweats easily after walking and driving.─Icy sweat covering body, with fainting and vertigo, and vomiting at night.

Keynotes and Characteristics with Comparisons of Some of the Leading Remedies of the Materia Medica (Allen's Keynotes), Henry Clay Allen

Orange Spider (Araneideae)

Time passes too quickly (too slowly, Arg. n., Can. I., Nux m.). Vertigo: on closing the eyes (Lach., Thuja - on opening them, Tab.; on looking upward, Puls, Sil.); from any, even the least noise; aural or labyrinthine (Meniere's disease). Nausea: from least motion, and especially on closing the eyes; from fast riding in a carriage. Headache: when beginning to move, as of a dull heavy pressure begin the eyes; violent, deep, in the brain; < lying down (Lach.); very much < from others walking on the floor, or from least motion of head. Every sound seems to penetrate through the whole body, causing nausea and vertigo. Chronic nasal catarrh; discharge thick, yellow, greenish, offensive (Puls., Thuja). Toothache: every shrill sound penetrates the teeth. Seasickness of nervous women; they close their eyes to get rid of the motion of the vessel and grown deathly sick. Violent stitches in upper left chest, below the scapula, extending to neck (Anis., Myr., Pix, Sulph.). Pains in the bones all over, as if broken. Great sensitiveness between vertebrae, sits sideways in the chair to avoid pressure against spine (Chin. s.); < by least nose and jar of foot on floor. For extreme nervous sensitiveness; of puberty, during pregnancy and climacteric years. "In rachitis, caries, necrosis, it apparently goes to the root of the evil and destroys the cause." - Dr. Baruch. Phthisis florida, often affects a cure if given in the early stages of disease. In scrofulosis where the best chosen remedies fail to relieve.

Relations. - Follows well after, Cal. and Lyc.

Leaders In Homoeopathic Therapeutics, Eugene Beauharnais Nash

Vertigo, with nausea, on closing the eyes, or the least noise.

Over-sensitiveness of nerves; scratching on linen or silk, or crackling of paper is unbearable.

Pain running through upper left chest to shoulder.

Theridion curassavicum is another spider poison proven by Hering. There is one peculiar and characteristic symptom under this remedy, which has been verified by myself and others – "Vertigo with nausea especially on closing the eyes". Allen puts it – vertigo on closing the eyes (Lach., Thuja), on opening them, Tabacum; on looking upward (Puls., Sil.) from any even least noise; aural or labyrinthine (Menière's disease).

Again "every sound seems to penetrate through the whole body, causing nausea and vertigo" Asarum has a somewhat similar symptom which is worth remembering. "Oversensitiveness of nerves, scratching of linen or silk, crackling of paper is unbearable." (Ferr., Tarax.) The vertigo occurs in different affections of the head or stomach, and cures the whole trouble when it is present. It seems like a small thing to "go by", but no smaller than "vertigo, worse on lying down, and turning the head" (Conium), or "vertigo on looking upward" (Silicea, Pulsatilla) and many other symptoms of other remedies which have been verified many times. Another symptom which seems to be very valuable in chest affections is, "pains run through upper left chest to shoulder". (Phthisis florida has been cured on this symptom for a guide, if given early.) This is like Myrtus communis, with which I have helped many cases having that peculiar local symptom. (Sulphur, Pix liquida and Anisum stellatum also have it.) Dr. Baruch says: "In rachitis, caries and necrosis it apparently goes to the root of the evil and destroys the cause."