New thread for brisbanehomeopath please

Hi David,
I am hoping that you might have time to look over my case again since I made a new, easier to read thread. I realize that a lot of my issues have gotten better, specifically issues of boundaries in regards to other people and I feel like I am actively seeking to make positive changes when it comes to my relationships. Learning how to do this is helping me feel more competent. I still am having the issues described below, specifically of sleep, concentration, memory, constipate and skin issues. I also get a lot of anticipatory anxiety when I have a social situation coming up that might be hard on my son. I have taken several other remedies previously, but the ones you prescribed were Nat Carb, Bryonia, and Lachesis. I last took Lachesis 200c on February 17th. I was having especially hard time around the 25th of February and you said it was not an aggravation and I was getting much worse and to get Muriatic acid. I did not, and it passed. Lachesis was the last one I took.

GUIDELINES FOR GIVING HOMOEOPATHIC CASE INFORMATION

It is important to describe all your problems in as much detail as you are able. One word answers and short sentences are not particularly helpful. Discuss each problem one at a time, providing (as a minimum level of detail) the following information.

1. What exactly happens?
I have ebbing and flowing depression and anxiety, which are worse before and after my period and when I witness my son's behavior and difficulty with mood and social issues. I also have constipation and sometimes have to drink coffee to resolve it, bad skin (acne and very dry in the winter), premature grey hairs, lethargy, especially the week before and during my period. Difficulty sleeping also at times and poor eyesight.

2. Describe all sensations and pains. Each pain or sensation should be described in such a way that allows us to imagine having the same pain.
I don't have a lot of physical pain really.

3. What causes the problem to get worse after it has started occurring?
Feeling discouraged about my son's progress, seeing his emotional and social development compared to other kids his age. Also when family members come visit and his behavior embarasses me or makes me feel sad or like they wonder why he is acting like that and he doesn't seem interested in them. It also seems like a lot of people in my life are pregnant and having babies, and I want to be in the place where I could have another baby, especially since my son is 5 years old already. We are not financially able to support another child responsibly at this time and there is a lot of instability in our lives since we live with my mom until we can get our own place. It is a difficult place to be especially when I feel like other people are living the type of life I long for. I am also concerned that another child we have might have Asperger's/autism or something like that. I feel like we have bad genes and it feels unfair to see friends and family members having many healthy children even though I know that we are blessed, it is hard. ng is going wrong in mine. Also worries about my son and stress from upcoming social demands he will have and behavioral issues. Worries that he will never get better and that is he is not like other kids and it makes it hard for us to make playdates and form friendships with other families. In the fall/winter months, I become MUCH worse, very lonely. During the change to spring I have trouble sleeping and insomnia. We used to live in a warmer climate and the weather here has really taken a toll on me over the last almost two years. (My skin gets VERY dry). Also, feeling overly stressed with too much on my plate, or overly bored and lonely.

4. What creates some relief for the problem?
Warm, sunny weather, getting together by myself with a friend or couple of friends, solid deep sleep. Feeling like I am accomplishing something important, a good day with my son, where I have some hope for the future.

5. What triggers the problem into occuring?
Lack of finances, hormones before and after my period, shorter days during fall and winter, cold and rainy weather, spending too much time alone, and too much time reading about too many things on the computer, feeling not grown up and autonomous because we are living in my mom's house.

6. What time of the day or night does the problem occur?
Worse mid-late afternoon (2 - 5).

7. When did the problem start? What was happening in your life at that time? Did some specific event or treatment take place just before the problem started?
I would say I have felt this way most of my life. I don't know if this is true, but I may be able to trace it back to when my brother was born when I was just under 2? (I am the oldest.) I always got attention from my parents, but with the birth of my two brothers it was diverted, and I was always the one to get in trouble. My dad really took to my brothers and didn't seem to care as much for me. He had an anger problem and was very verbally abusive, as well as physically abusive until he died in a car accident when I was 14. (There are lots of other things, but I am trying to think of early ones...)

Move from one problem to the next, doing the same thing. IT IS VITAL THAT YOU GIVE A COMPLETE PICTURE OF YOUR HEALTH BY PROVIDING ALL PROBLEMS YOU HAVE, EVEN IF NOT CONNECTED TO THE MAIN ONE, AND EVEN IF YOU CONSIDER IT OF LESS IMPORTANCE.

I think the anxiety started from getting yelled at and punished when my dad would come home from work...I never knew when it was going to happen, but it could be over something as simple as there being lint on the carpet which enraged him. My mom would make me clean the whole bathroom over and over again if she found a speck of something on the mirror, which always made me feel like I could never do anything right, and just gave up and became an underachiever, which I still am today. I loved playing the piano as a child, but was a perfectionist, and enjoyed doing it for myself, but was very self-conscious. My parents, who were probably proud of me, would invite the neighbors over and force me to play for them, no matter how much I cried to them and told them I didn't want to. I once made a mistake and blew up at them in front of the neighbors and stormed upstairs.

You should address each problem separately using the above 7 questions as a guide. Do not put all your complaints into each of the 7 questions. Discuss one problem at a time. If you have, for example, a headache with nausea, do each component separately too (what makes the head pain worse or better, what makes the nausea worse or better).

As well as this, please describe any traumatic incidents that have taken place in your life. Discuss anything that has had a lasting impact on you mentally, emotionally or physically.

My father always paid more attention to my brothers than me, and at times seemed disgusted by me. I remember once I used my parents bathroom, and I must have had my period and there was a drop of blood by the toilet I hadn't noticed. My father lost it and started screaming at me to clean it up, telling me how disgusting I was. I felt humiliated, ashamed, and dirty. He would hit me with a belt at times, and he made fun of my butt and knees (which too this day I hate, and I will not wear shorts). He was doing this (as a joke, he said) on the day he died (was hit by a car during an early morning paper route - he had lost his job and was doing several small jobs), and I had told him, 'I hate you, I hope you die' and ran upstairs, the night he died. When the policeman and priest came to our door, I felt badly for my mom and brothers but this was overshadowed by my own relief at the fact that I was free from this man and would not need to eventually kill myself because of him.

I was very shy in school and had trouble making friends, I was often alone. We moved 4 times for my dads job and it was hard being the new kid. At the school we were in when he died, it was small and cliquish and the kids made fun of me (I also had very bad vision and wore thick glasses and was not very athletic). When my dad died I suppose they felt guilty and the teasing stopped, only to be replaced by superficially invites, and then being ignored for the rest of high school for the most part.

I remember feeling very depressed and anxious and crying out to be noticed and cared for, but my mom had adopted a stoicism and continued to tell me I was 'dramatic, paranoid, and my perception of things was all wrong'. Basically that I was all wrong. My family went to counseling a few times until I brought up Dad's treatment of me, and the entire family shunned me, they only wanted to talk about how wonderful he was. I have never been close to my brothers, and my mom didn't hug me for about 10 years. I had a couple boyfriends who were no good for me, one cheated on me a lot, and the next we were codependent on each other. I went to the out of state college I did because he was there. We broke up soon after, and ended up having the state put restraining orders against both of us because of a misunderstanding we had that turned physical.

Soon after that I met my now-husband and we were engaged after 6 weeks, married after 1.5 years. I was very scared about what I would end up doing after college (I earned a bachelors degree in psychology, but didn't know what I would do or feel in any way capable), and getting married gave me some relief, I thought I would be taken care of. My husband was used to not being accountable to anyone and would be out rising his motorcycle to 3am some nights, never calling, while I sat and cried and panicked, thinking he must be dead. Our communication was not good, and I felt unimportant.

I took various office jobs from this time until the time I had my son 5 years ago and left the workforce to stay home with him. 9 months after we were marries, we took a vacation to California and loved it so much we ended up moving there, and lived there for almost 9 years. Soon into it, we were still not communicating well, and my husband would reject all my advances. I felt awful, and threw myself into diet and excercise which spiraled into an eating disorder of anaorexia, and then bulemia, and then binge eating (which I had always done to some degree, but never like this). (I didn't get my period for 2.5 years during all this). I kept telling him I needed help, and he kept saying we couldnt afford it and was angry at me that I would do this to him and just couldnt stop. Finally, I was admitted to an inpatient rehab program for 6 weeks, and again another 6 weeks, when I relapsed again. It was one of the best things that ever happened to me - I learned to make a lot of peace with people in my past who couldnt give me what I had needed and I learned to like myself for the first time.

Our marriage was off and on ok, but communication was still off and there was a lot of stress with work and such on both our parts. Sex life was, and has been, almost nonexistent. I got pregnant unplanned, and my husband didn't seem to know how to take it at first, and loves our son, but he was a very difficult baby and he hasn't always been there for him, as he has been working a lot, and now trying to start his own business for over a year. Our son screamed constantly all the time and we could never go anywhere. I felt as though he hated me and it was very, very stressful. All the new moms I knew loved being a mom, and once again I felt like I had done something wrong to deserve this. He had continued to wake up through the night for 5 years, and I definitely had some PPD and PTSD for s while after he was born. I didn't sleep for more than 20 minutes at a time for the first year of his life. No one understood what I was going through, and I didn't know any other baby like this. I felt like it was all my fault.

A while after my husband was laid off, we ended up moving back to stay with my mom temporarily because of money, and had to sell almost everything we owned. We are still here with no clear idea of when we'll be able to leave, I so some work for husband's dad, but feel unmotivated by it. Before we left we ended up living with two friends, the first just said she was moving after 3 weeks and we had to get out, and then never talked to us again. Up to the point we moved out of our house, I had tried to make friendships for myself and my son, and was fairly happy with the way things were going. When our money troubles increased, I got a lot of criticism from a couple friends who told me I needed to leave my husband and then they told me to have a nice life, and they never talked to me again. This hurt me really badly and was a major blow to my efforts of trusting people.

It has been hard for me to make friendships here, but I have a few. I still don't feel like this is our home, even if we didn't live with my mom, and miss the area we used to live.

I spend a lot of time alone, distracting myself online. I have a hard time concentrating on anything important. In the past, I would use food to cope. I have never gone back to as bad as it was and I never want to, but I still do use food to deal with my boredom and loneliness and other emotions. I also try to pray, but usually this is a last resort.

Discuss any patterns you have noticed in your behavior especially concerning your disease.

Worse before/after period, I get really irritable and anxious for up to two weeks before my period, and then more depressed for about a week after. Eat more and am more tired and seriously depressed during the winter, start to lose hope.

Discuss any part of your life where you feel stuck or unable to change and grow, especially where this occurred around the beginning of your disease, or as the disease evolved.

I feel unable to move beyond obsessing about the fact that my son has an autism spectrum disorder and feeling guilty because I married the man I did, so he got those genes, plus I took Prozac during the first trimester with him. I want more than anything for our whole family to be healed and am afraid to believe it is possible. I feel fatigued and lazy a lot, unable to focus on what I really need to focus on, or to concentrate. I want a loving family and I am learning about boundaries because I want to have them and teach appropriate boundaries to my child(ren). I feel like I am growing in that area.

Describe your childhood and the kind of environment you grew up in, with reference to your relationships with your family, your school experiences, and any serious childhood diseases.
Other than what I mentioned above about my parents and kids at school, I don't remember a lot of my childhood and have blocked most of it out. This has happened beyond childhood too - I have a lot of parts of my life that I should have memories of but don't.

I discussed most of this above, but I didn't have any serious childhood diseases.

If your earlier discussions have not mentioned these already, please describe:

1. The specific foods that you crave (not just like) or hate
-Used to be sugar, now sometimes I crave salt. There is not a lot I really hate.

2. The specific drinks that you crave or hate
-Don't really crave or hate many drinks, I usually try to drink water.

3. What your sleep is like
I am tired a lot during the day and often feel like napping, sometimes it takes me a long time to fall asleep as my mind will not shut off and I feel worried. Sleep is not usually restful, and often interrupted by my son's night terrors or hand/foot cramps. He also gets up pretty early so I don't usually get to sleep in, although I would every day if I could. I tend to be more of a night owl.

4. How the weather and the temperature affects you
I feel the best in a climate that is warm but not too humid, cold and damp climates and weather really bother me, and the winter really affects me negatively. My face gets really dry and patchy, and my depression goes through the roof. I have the worst time during seasonal changes.

5. What kinds of things in the environment you are particularly sensitive to
Noise (I like peacefulness and relative quiet, although this has gotten better), emotions (I respond well to warm positive emotions, but if the emotional temperature is negative, it greatly affects me and I take it on), music (music can bring me to tears or it can make me want to dance).

6. What your general level of energy is like
Very low, I try to exercise 30 minutes most days during the week, but a lot of times this seems like an enormous effort and I have been slacking. I spend a lot of time sitting or lying down.

7. What your level of sexual energy or desire is like
I have a pretty low libido. There might be one or two days during the months where it is up a little bit. I don't really feel attracted to my husband.

8. Describe your menstrual cycle
Usually every 28 days or so, lasting 4-5 days. Heaviest on 2nd day then tapers off.

9. Also give these details

a) Body type and build
Average I would say, I am 5 feet 7 inches tall and around 140 pounds. I have short wide feet, and a very curved lower back (goes in a lot from the side). My shoulders are proportionate to my hips in width, my waist is narrower. My thighs are somewhat large, my calves are small proportionate to the rest of my body.

b) Skin colour and texture
Medium-fair - always acne on my face and sometimes neck, chest, and upper back. Large pores on my hands and feet. I have a lot of cellulite (and large areas of it) on my butt and thighs, some on my stomach as well.

c) Areas of the body tends to perspire on
Lower back mostly, and armpits.

d) Odour of sweat, body, stool, flatus, urine
Not sure what my sweat smells like...I used to smell like rising bread in the spring and the winter (during seasonal changes, I thought I was overrun by yeast!), my stool and flatus smell bad, but different depending on whether I am constipated or have diarrhea. My urine doesn't smell like anything.

e) Colour of stool, urine, sweat
Stool can range from dark brown to orange, I have also seen in light tan or green depending on what I have eaten. My urine is usually light yellow unless I am dehydrated.

10) Reaction to drugs or vaccines

None that I know of.
[message edited by allicando on Fri, 23 Mar 2012 01:50:10 GMT]