This is a really interesting remedy. It is not real common but you will find it. It is a remedy that is characterized by vulnerability on all levels. Where the patient feels completely vulnerable and has the sensation that she can’t, mostly she, or he can’t be protected. As if there are no barriers, no resistance and the slightest stress, therefore, is felt as an unbearable pain or discomfort on any level. This vulnerability, then, leads to a great sense of insecurity. Insecurity with a constant need for protection or the feel that there is a constant need for protecting the self in some way. So, on the emotional level, what happens is that the patient is exquisitely sensitive to emotional stresses, and that comes out in a variety of ways. If they hear of a cruel incident, what is the main remedy aggravation from hearing of cruelties? Calcarea is the one that is listed, but you can also think of Hepar. You can add it for that. If they hear of a dog being beaten or injured, it’s as if they had been beaten or injured. It’s the very idea of the cruelty goes into them and they suffer from it. They even have a violent reaction from it with like vomiting, retching, when they hear such a story. So, there is no protection against pain or even the idea of pain. So, the idea of pain is really intolerable for them, and so even when they have a tiny little pain, it makes them complain in a totally exaggerated way. So, if you hear of the way they complain, you are going to be inclined to give a remedy for real strong pain. Like a neuralgic remedy, like Kalmia, or Colocynthis, or Belladonna or something like that. The way they are going to describe the pain is so vivid, you are going to think of one of these pain remedies, but in fact they are just so sensitive that they are describing it in much more intensity than the symptom is really felt.

They are very hard to interview because there is a real screwiness in the way the case comes out. They are very elusive kind of thing. With the pan, they will take anything, so they are going to be noncompliant patients. You say, "Just take aspirin." Forget it. They get the headache and it’s back to the Emergency Room for Demoral. Because of that, they are going to seem to have an anxiety about health, but it is not that exactly. They’re going to seem like they are one of the remedies with anxiety about health or hypochondriasis. But it is not really hypochondriasis, it’s extreme sensitivity. It’s not that they make up the symptoms, it’s that they are too vulnerable. Even though they seem to be pretending to be in so much pain, because you look at the joint and they say, "Oh, my thumb, my thumb." You look at it and it’s not red. It’s not swollen. They can move it and all that but it’s, "Oh, the pain, the pain." It is not really that he is afraid of the disease per se. He is afraid of the suffering that the disease is involved with the disease.

Now, in this kind of person, what happens is that they will make any kind of concession if it will bring about the sense of protection that they want. So, we would see women that marry for money, definitely. We would see women that marry somebody that can protect them, that can give them the comforts, that can screen them from the outside world, or people that will put up with their great aunt who is irritable in order to live in the house, so that they don’t have to go out and face the harsh realities of the world, that sort of thing. Security, money, position. Those are all things that they want because they want this protected feeling. Because of that, they have a tendency to want to stay inside the house where they feel more protected, feel safe and it gives you the idea of being agoraphobic because they want to be in the house where they feel that things are all safe. And they hate very much to be alone at night. They have a feeling that somebody is going to come in, that something is going to happen. It’s a vague feeling, an apprehensive feeling. They can’t really say it’s a fear of robbers or fear of ghosts, but they feel very vulnerable when they are alone at night. So, they want somebody there at their house. They don’t want to go to somebody else’s house, to their friend’s house. They want their friend to come into their house. It’s not good enough to be able to be just with company. So, in that sense it is different than like Phos would be. Wants all the comforts around him. Wants a guarantee that it is going to be just exactly the way that she or he wants it. It is definitely hysterical. But it is not made up. I mean it’s not hysterical complaints. The complaints come from something real, but it is hypersensitivity. Hyper-vulnerability.

So, they are hypersensitive patients like I say and they are worse from any kind of stimulus. That is why they are so much worse from a draft or from cold and you know that Hepar is the one that is so cold or so affected by the cold that if they are under the covers, they just put their hand out, they get a general aggravation from it. They touch a cold bottle in the refrigerator and they start sneezing from it or something like that, where the cold is so much that it causes, or the sensitivity on one single part is so much that it causes a general aggravation. Especially, it produces a type of coryza or rhinitis. It’s like they always have a cold that is just barely perceptible. You look at the person. You look at the nose and it’s not really runny. It’s just a little bit of irritation in the nose and yet they are complaining. And complaining in a very intense way, and they are so sensitive so they will come in complaining of lots of different things so you can’t pin them down to what it is exactly that is bothering them. But they come in complaining of all these things in a very intense way. They try to transmit the idea that they are having terrible suffering. That’s going to be the way you feel when they come in. They’re going to give you this idea that they are having something terrible, terrible suffering that they are going through. Either psychological or physical. So, they may give you sort of a suicidal story as well. The idea behind it is "I’m suffering. I’m suffering so much that it is better if I die." That sort of case. That kind of suicidal thought. Almost because they come in with all of these symptoms, you can’t quite take the suicidal things seriously. It is really probably not all that serious. Now, there are two other remedies that have this same sensitivity to the cold, to touching and cold with the hand or the foot. Rhus Tox and Silica. Nux Vomica doesn’t want to be uncovered but just for one part to touch and for a general aggravation to come from it is Hepar, Silica and Rhus Tox. Great sensitivity to pain and fainting from the pain, which is like what other remedy we said? Carbo Veg, but that is fainting from everything. Especially from gastric disorders. Fainting from belching and fainting from over fullness or dietary indiscretions. They start getting weak from it. That’s mostly Carbo Veg.

Now, they have splinter like pains especially, in the throat or under the nails or in the abscesses. It is one of the big abscess remedies. If you see boils and craving fat, what is the remedy? Sulphur or Hepar. Hepar especially in crops of small boils and if you see crops of small boils, and especially if they have splinter like pains in them. Splinter pains are very prominent for Hepar. What is the other remedies that have throat, sore throat pains like splinters? Kali Carb, Argentum Nitricum. The food craving is for fat and for spicy and you may think of Nux here, especially because Hepar can become tremendously irritable. The main remedies for craving fat are what? Sulphur, Tuberculinum, Medorrhinum, Phosphorus, Nitric Acid, and Nux Vomica. If it is tremendous craving for fat, where they are taking it off other people’s plates and so forth, that’s just Nitric Acid mainly, or it can be Sulphur. Also Arsenicum, Tuberculinum, What is the remedy that is craving fat, but specifically ham fat? Mezereum. Also, anything with strong taste, Hepar seems to go in for pungent tastes, like pickles. Spicy things.

Irritability of Hepar comes out in a specific way. They have dreams of fire and pyromania. Seems to be something to do with fire. Kleptomaniacs — what are the main remedies for that? Lycopodium, Nux, Calcarea steal money.

1. Scrofulous subjects, leuco-phlegmatic, inactive, slow; systems injured by mercury (first remedy).

2. Intense mental and physical hypersensitiveness; trifles make him angry; intolerance of pain, touch and even a draught of air.

3. General sourness and fetidness of all excretions, especially in children.

4. Profuse and easy sweating especially about the chest; day and night without relief.

5. Throbbing and sticking pains; sensation of splinter especially in throat.

6. Suppurative conditions when pus is about to form or is formed; hastens suppuration (low potencies); staphylococcal infections (Silica - streptococcal); unhealthy skin, every injury suppurates; ulcers with fetid discharge, bleed easily, extremely sensitive.

7. Respiratory complaints, especially from exposure to dry, cold air; croupous conditions with great hoarseness, whistling respiration, hard barking cough, or when cough becomes loose and rattling; cough < uncovering any part of body.

8. Atonic alimentary disorders; desire for vinegar and sour, pungent things and fat.

9. Atonic condition of rectum and bladder; (a) difficult defecation, clay-colored stools; (b) difficult micturition, slow, without force, urine drops vertically; bladder never thoroughly emptied.

10. Patient chilly, < slightest draught, > mild wet weather (Caust. Nux v.); < night.

Note: Often indicated in slow, chronic conditions as well as acute states, especially when complaints show no sign of clearing up.