Werkboek Klassieke Homeopathie

By Valerie Sadovsky, RSHom(NA), CCH

Remedy chart

Cann-i is prepared from the tincture of Indian hemp. Hemp was and still used in many parts of the world as a medicine for easing pain and inducing sleep, and for a soothing influence in nervous disorders. It does not cause constipation nor affects the appetite like opium. Cann-i, Cann-s and Urt-u belong to the Urticaceae family. Cann-i has a strong affinity with the central nervous system, especially the higher psychic centers. It is characteristically pleomorphic in its effects, which may vary in type from abysmal gloom to celestial bliss, and which may switch with alarming suddenness from a state of peaceful contemplation to one of uncontrollable agitation, under the influence of which the subject may commit crimes of violence. The chronic hashish smoker is described as a tired, listless person with sunken eyes, which are always shining. He is usually morose, but will often react violently when suddenly aroused. In course of time the addict loses all power of thought or concentration, and he may end in becoming a psychotic.

ESSENCE

The personality of Cann-i can be either extremely sweet or desperate and suspicious. The sweet temperament corresponds with a type of Cann-i patient which is at times ecstatic and giddy. The closed and suspicious temperament corresponds to the patient who is severely anxious - generally about the health or about "losing control", which is to say losing his sanity. In both types there is often extreme confusion or periods of confusion with distortions of time and space, disorientation, and even delusions, paranoia, or hallucinations. Cann-i must usually be chosen on the basis of the mental state because typically there are few physical symptoms. The physical pathology is mainly limited to the urogenital system which emphasizes the strong relationship of this remedy to the sycotic miasm.

AFFINITIES

MIND … nervous system … GENITO-URINARY SYSTEM

MODALITIES

<: DARKNESS … exertion … coffee, liquor, tobacco … morning … HEAT

>: OPEN AIR (mental symptoms) … cold water … rest

SENSATIONS

As if vertex is opening and shutting ... of a BALL internally (as if sitting on a ball, Sep) … of levitation ... as if in a dream

PAINS

Burning … stitching … sharp

GENERAL SYMPTOMS

Excessive lassitude … overwhelming desire to lie down in the daytime and a complete disinclination for any kind of effort … extreme fatigue after even a short walk

PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS

Head: violent headaches and hallucinations ... involuntary shaking of the head … vertex seems to open and shut, < noise … head seems separated from the body … dull, heavy, throbbing pain with sensation as from a blow, on back of head and neck … migraines … hypersensitivity to noise … SEVERE VERTIGO … eyes: dilated pupils; fixed look … rushing, dizzy, lightheaded sensation … sensation as if all energy is in the head and none in the body

GI: ravenous hunger … craves sweets, crunchy ... increased appetite … very thirsty for cold drinks … extreme nausea, < motion

Uro-Genital: increased libido … violent, painful erections not caused by amorous thoughts … menses profuse, dark, painful … backache during menses ... spasmodic uterine pains returning like labor pains … burning, scalding or stinging in urethra before during and after urination … dull pain in region of right kidney … back pain (kidney pain) while laughing … burning, aching or sharp stitches in the kidneys … chronic urethritis ... prostatitis

Extremities: single limbs feel light or as if they will float

Sleep: sleepy but cannot sleep … chronic insomnia ... excessive sleepiness … CATALEPSY … dreams: of dead bodies; of danger; prophetic; of being beaten up and left by the side of the road … nightmares every night as soon as he falls asleep

PRIME INDICATIONS

1. Quick, wandering thoughts; loses the thread of the narrative. Mistakes. Confusion of mind. Exaggeration of the duration of time and extent of space.

2. Fear of losing self-control. Explanations and theorizing to stay in control and control fears (insanity, health). Fear of darkness, spirits. Excessive loquacity, immoderate laughing.

3. Urinary problems, similar to Cantharis.

4. Increased sexual desire; can lead to masturbation.

5. Backache worse laughing.

6. Better open air.

MENTAL SYMPTOMS

- Great FEELING OF FORSAKENNESS, aloneness, INABILITY TO CONNECT with other people, coupled with a feeling that something very bad is going to happen; sense of helplessness before danger (the response of Cann-i is to go into a spaced out, vegetative state)

- Vast CONFUSION OF THE MIND … confusion, hazy thinking, draws far-fetched connections … THEORIZING (often senseless, helps keep mind under control) …forgetful, cannot finish sentence … cannot follow his own thoughts … poor short term memory … poor concentration … foggy mind

- MENTAL EXCITEMENT … quick, wandering thoughts … rapid change of moods … EXALTATION SPIRIT with excessive loquacity … full of fun and mischief, uncontrollable laughter

- Clairvoyance … hallucinations and imaginations … out of the body experiences (the soul leaves, wonders and comes back; sensation of being in different places at the same time)

- MISPERCEPTIONS OF TIME, SPACE, sound (TIME PASSES TOO SLOWLY or too fast; few miles an immense distance; church bells sound like orchestra; construction noises sound like music; hear celestial music)

- High anxiety about health

- Anger and rage

- Fears: DARKNESS … LOSING SELF-CONTROL … INSENITY (usually expressed as fear of "losing control") … police … paranoia

- Behavior disorders in children - loquacious, spacey, annoying

- SRP: Symptoms begin when traveling or moving to new or foreign place

NOTES

- Compensated state of Cann-i may be confused with Ars, because they are organized around achieving and maintaining control (don’t drive on freeways; don’t like when other people drive; don’t like parties and may seem antisocial, etc.) and extremely anxious about health

- Some people who need Cann-i would never touch marijuana, because they know that smoking will put them way out of control. So there are people on both sides: the ones who gravitate towards it and the ones who stay away from it.

- Cann-i inhibits the higher faculties and stimulates the imagination to a remarkable degree. A condition of intense exaltation in which all perceptions and conceptions, all sensations and emotions are exaggerated to the utmost degree.

- "The effects of Cann-i on the brain may be advantageously compared with those of Agaricus, Belladonna, Camphor, Crocus, Hyoscyamus, Opium and Stramonium. In its power of causing catalepsy its only rival is the chloride of tin."

SOURCES

Gibson, Studies of Remedies

Morrison, Desktop Guide

Murphy, Homeopathic Remedy Guide

Tyler, Homeopathic Drug Pictures

Vermeulen, Synoptic

Roger notes

Cannabis Indica

I think it is pretty much one that everyone knows. There is a spaciness. There is a loss of contact with reality, that kind of thing and it goes the other way. There are different experiences. You go towards the bliss side or you get really paranoid and you get really fearful. So, it goes to those two extremes. Now, spaciness and haziness of the mind is an aspect that I don’t think George has mentioned in other lectures he has given on it. But it is very prominent in most of the cases of Cannabis. Spaciness is very, very prominent in most of the cases. Great spaciness, great haziness where they really don’t know what they are doing. They can be really confused, but it is more in a practical way, the cases I have seen where they do like what other remedy? They get lost in the street or they can’t follow directions and that kind of spacy, hazy, and they may describe that it is a vertigo, a floating sensation. They are the type that goes into real out of the body experiences. They can go into ecstatic states. Lots of delusions. I counted through the repertory one time. I think there were 167 delusions for Cannabis and that was more than three times what any other remedy had.

Exaggeration in time, of course. You all know clairvoyance theorizing, tremendous theorizing and hilarious laughter, just all the standards.

Proving symptoms of the drug. Everything seems unreal. You can also think if you hear that expression, "everything seems unreal," you can think of Alumina or Medorrhinum also for that. On the other hand, you get people that get very uptight when they have that kind of tendency to go out of the body. These are the type that will go into great anxiety about health. It is fear of insanity.

But they mostly won’t say it that way, especially those types. They will refuse actually if you sort of press them to say, "I think I’m going crazy." It’s like to utter the words is too much to admit. Especially if you hear this keynote symptom that an arm or leg is rising up by itself, or the feeling that it wants to rise up and you have to hold it down to the side. That’s mostly Cannabis. It can be Nux Moschata as well, and if it is just the legs, it is Sticta. If it is both legs, one will rise up. That’s a keynote for Sticta.

Now, that usually causes great fear and anxiety about their health. They make a million theories about their health; why their health is in bad shape, and they can be loquacious about it and go on and on telling you about things. But they are very difficult patients because the symptoms evaporate. What I mean by that is that you go back to confirm the symptom, and it starts to evaporate before your very ears. Another remedy that does that very prominently, but is slightly different and you may confuse it, is Natrum Mur. They are people who will give you the symptom and then you say, "Now, you are very much worse in the sunlight?" They gave it to you and you underlined it three times. "Well, not very much worse." "But, you said very much worse before." "Well, I’m worse, but you know, I have to sit for a long time." At first it was 15 minutes and now, "Well, sometimes I can sit for 30 minutes." It’s like they don’t want to admit to things, so they back away from everything.

Cannabis is the opposite thing. It’s the delusional thing. So, you take the case one time and you try and confirm it. Not that day, because if you try to confirm it that day, it will still be there. But the next time they come into the appointment, you try and confirm it, "never said that. I never had such thing." "I have it written down here — underlined 4 times. I don’t underline 4 times very often, so I know you had it." "Well, maybe I had it just that day, or maybe I said I was so thirsty because I ate a lot of popcorn the night before I came in." Or, something like that. So, the symptoms evaporate for a different reason.

Cannabis has high sexual desire and it is one of our main remedies for gonorrhea, acute gonorrhea, which none of us probably treats. Other ones that you can think of in that situation, if you so dare, are Cantharis and Petroselinum. Petroselinum is a remedy with discharges, either acutes or chronics, with tremendous burning and pain in the bladder and in the urethra. With the characteristic of the children or adults sudden urging, sudden painful urging. A child jumps up, it’s like sudden and it comes on in a painful way. They dance around with it or the adults are very painful, or there can be itching in the urethra, so much itching that they say they want to get a coat hanger or something and put it inside the urethra and scratch it. It’s that kind of feeling.

Q. What remedy gets sick on hearing such a thing? A disgust? What are the remedies for that? Sulphur. Mercury and Phosphorus. Phosphorus more because they can imagine it. "Oh, my God." They can feel it going in immediately.

Also the ravenous appetite. You know, the munchies.