1.1.3 Muriaticum acidum, Case 1
A three year old girl is brought in by her mother because of recurrent colds. She hasn’t been well for a while, she has a very snotty nose, her mouth hangs open and suffers from earache on the right side. She coughs a lot, eats little, has a slight fever and is generally miserable, clinging and irritable, with black circles under the eyes. She has had several courses of antibiotics but the troubles keep coming back.
She has pain in the hollow of the knees, particularly around 11 pm, when she wakes up groaning with pain. Her knees have also given way once when she was walking. She didn't learn to walk until she was 17 months old. She has always suffered from profuse lachrymation.
The pregnancy was normal, the mother felt slightly sick during the first few months and had a desire for sour apples, crispy ones like Jonagolds.
The little girl is quite ‘catty’, she grabs things back when they are being taken from her or from her older brothers. On the whole she is quite happy and open, not at all shy unless she gets criticised, then she creep deep into her mothers lap. She likes having stories read to her and she can spend hours playing with her dolls. She clings to her mother and follows her around the house all the time. When her mother takes her to the nursery she’ll cry and cling to her mother, especially the first few times after the holidays. She is afraid of being alone in the passage after dark.
Generals
Perspiration: < summer, on the head.
Time: < 3 pm, < winter.
Desire: sweets, meat.
Aversion: sour, sauerkraut, citrus fruit, egg yolks, warm food.
Analysis and reaction
This story might initially remind us of Calcium carbonicum, the most frequently prescribed remedy for children. She does have the snotty nose, the aversion to egg yolk, the feeling of insecurity after criticism.
What doesn’t fit so well is the combination of being open and outgoing on the one hand and the dependency on her mother on the other hand.
I gave Calcium carbonicum 1M at first and she got a cold that lasted 2 weeks and a week later she got a high fever. She was weak and lay on her mothers lap. She had thrush in her mouth, blisters on her tongue and lips and she couldn’t eat for a week. She also has stomach pains and diarrhoea < during meals. With these added symptoms it wasn’t very hard to find the remedy: Muriatic acid hangs on mothers lap, has aphthae and diarrhoea. The picture of the rest of the case suddenly fits too: the close tie with her mother, the desire to be around her mother all the time, cannot bear to be separated from her mother. The playing with dolls is a sign of that same intense mother-child relationship.
Some Acidum symptoms: -> sour, crisp apples, <- sour, being stingy, being open and outgoing, aphthae, diarrhoea.
And Muriaticum symptoms: < 11 pm
After Muriatic acid 1M she quickly felt better. Also mentally much better, much less dependent on her mother. The diarrhoea stayed for about 3 weeks. She had a cold for a few days as soon as she had taken the remedy.