Concerning Homœopathy
for children.
by Dr. Margaret Lucy Tyler
Presented by Sylvain Cazalet
*
Dr Margaret Lucy TYLER
(1857-1943)
CONCERNING HOMŒOPATHY FOR CHILDREN.
CHILDREN
respond splendidly
to the homœopathic remedy. And children’s work is most fascinating :
usually less complicated : the indications for the remedy are
generally more clear ; and the results more rapid of attainment.Children are in the acute stage of
life, rapidly growing and developing. The cell-life that clothes and
binds them to earth is in a marvellous state of activity. They are
hypersensitive to influences that normally exercise less power later on.
They are subject to diseases that seldom attack adults. Besides which.
with them, labelled diseases do not always run the same course as with
their elders. For instance, what we call rheumatism -acute rheumatism-
is a very different proposition, with widely different symptoms and
outcome, in children and in “grown-ups.”The condition of high fever -profuse,
sour sweating- tender, inflamed, painful joint or joints has very little
in common with the, often trivial, “growing
pains” the scarcely elevated
temperature, probably unnoticed till a thermometer is put
into the mouth -the no sweat of the
child ; – where the heart is the subject of grave attack, and where
extreme care and most skilful prescribing are essential if the condition
is not to go on to a life -sentence of disability and suffering- to a
dreary vista of cardia break-downs, each one more damaging than the
last.Well, first -as elsewhere- one has to
settle whether the ailment is acute or chronic ; and, if the
former, whether it occurs in a healthy or a diseased child. For a
healthy child may he sick unto death, whereas a diseased child may be a
museum of pathology and yet not “ill.” In the latter case,
treatment may have to la modified, or rather supplemented, in order to
cover the whole case. A pneumonia in a child with T. B. glands or a T.
B. family history, will probably not clear up till you give a dose of Tub. bov. And it is pathetic to find how
often one has to come to Lueticum to
make headway with the acutely sick hospital children.In Homœopathy the essentials, -i.e.
the symptoms so easy to get in the child, and so all -important, if
marked, for a successful prescription, are, briefly,(1) DISPOSITION :
or, more important still, change of disposition due to illness.(2) FEARS :
habitual, or, more important, new to the child,(3) SENSITIVENESS.
One remembers a wee boy in of r Children’s Ward wandering about, just
the right height to use the brass shields at the foot of endowed cots as
a mirror (his head and face were covered thickly with an eruption). He
used to wail, “The children make such a noise !”
-and the rattle of spoons on plates was, to him, torture. Such a
symptom, in a child of his age, would be important, and must be
considered when piecing together his disease-picture to be matched with
the drug-disease-picture of a remedy.(4) FOOD
CRAVINGS AND LOATHINGS.(5) THE
GROSSER PATHOLOGICAL SYMPTOMS, when qualified by something
that makes them rare and peculiar, and therefore diagnostic as regards
the choice of the remedy.
Disposition
. There is a
broad distinction between the “child you want to spank” and
the child you instinctively comfort and caress : and here one is at
once shifted onto one or other of a totally different class of remedies.
Natrum mur. and Sepia. Children are not amenable to sympathy.
Pulsatilla children are weepy, but
engaging little mites that claim attention and love. Then there is the
heavy, lethargic, rather dull Calcarea
type the restless, suspicious, anxious Arsenicum
type : the defiant, obstinate, passionate, sensitive, irritable Nux type while Chamomilla
demands a thing only to hurl it away, and cannot be placated… and so
on. Whatever the disease, these things must be taken into consideration,
if the prescription is to be successful.Then fears.
One little child will wander alone in the dusk through extensive school
buildings where her parents are caretakers : another, put to play
in the garden, hugs the window, and wants to be assured that his mother
is on the other side of the glass, within call. Fears of the dark -of
wild -of thunder of strangers -of falling -of a bath.The third useful point in determining a
remedy for a child, is appetite : –cravings
and aversions. One child craves fat, and will gnaw raw
suet : another hates and is nauseated by the least morsel of
fat ; which has to be carefully cut off its meat (Sulph. has both of these). You must put the
salt on a high shelf, out of reach of some children (Nat. mur., Phos.,
etc.) while the next will steal sugar, and cries for
“sweeties.” Some children will eat earth, chalk, and crunch
slate-pencils (Alum.). Some cannot
be made to swallow meat.This wee girl is greedy -always hungry-
“will eat anything” : while her delicate little brother
can hardly be induced to eat enough, so it would seem, to keep body and
soul together.There is the untruthful child ;
the shy child, in terror of strangers, a bit difficult for a doctor.
But-children are very susceptible to flattery. Tell a child that it is
opening its mouth splendidly, “now, just a
little wider !” and you may see its throat. The
same in breathing, when you want to listen to a chest. Or you may
establish relations by expressing interest or admiration for a bracelet,
buttons, scraps of embroidery : or, when nothing helps
“Ta-ta !” will abruptly suspend the sobs.“With children, lunatics, and
liars you have to observe for yourself” : -and you have to
“keep your eyes skinned” when children are concerned. There is
the child that always kicks the clothes off ; that never will he
covered at night (Sulph.) :
that is found with its feet on the pillow and the bedclothes on the
floor. There is the infant of only a few weeks that will wriggle over to
lie on its face, till the mother is in terror lest it suffocate. But it
may be kept right side up by a dose of Medorrh.
-one has seen that.The “dirty-nosed child”, with
nostrils always running, and red, and sore, is easy to prescribe for (Sulph., Kali iod.).
The puny boys that won’t grow or thrive (often Sanic.).Then the diseased, -or the children
with heritage of poor resistance to tubercle- they are some of the joys
of prescribing : children of eight years, who have never, in all
their lives, been without bandages about their necks ; with glands,
sinuses and scars left by cuttings, and scrapings, arid
aspirations : -how they respond to Homœopathy ! to Tuberculinum–Silica–Calcarea–Drosera–Sulphur, according to their make-up and the
symptoms they present. It is to Homœopathy alone that these tuberculous
gland and bone cases respond so magnificently ! and it is here
especially that the homœopathic physician tastes triumph.(source : Tyler, M. L. : Pointers to the common
remedies.)Copyright ©
Margaret Tyler 1912
Mise en page et arrangements Copyright © Sylvain Cazalet
2003