-SANKARAN R.,
Hippomanes is an animal remedy. It is made out of a placental secretion or allantois membrane which is found in the mouth of a newly born foal or calf. It is syco-syphilitic.
The following is the case of one patient who did very well on this remedy.
The patient was a 65 year old man who had among other problems, glaucoma. Ever since, he had become suicidal and could not “concentrate on anything but suicide”. His hobbies included reading “sex books”, and he had a history of having indulged a lot in sex in the past; he was quite shameless in the way he spoke about this.
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As a child he would find any excuse to pick up a fight and would fight physically with many of his schoolmates. He used the word “fight” many times during the consultation. He had also fought for the employees where he was working. When he was fourteen years old, an elder member of his family saw him fighting with his schoolmate and punished him by beating him black and blue. The patient said that from that day he altogether stopped getting into physical fights.
His wife was quarrelsome and he could not oppose her nor fight back though he wanted to. This made him very sad and withdrawn and he sat for hours doing nothing.
The rubrics of the case are:
– Suicidal disposition.
– Fight, wants to.
– Fancies, lascivious.
– Sexual desire increased.
All these rubrics are covered by Hippomanes. It also has the single symptom:
– Sadness, despondency: sits in the corner and does not want to have anything to do with the world.
What I understood from this case is that Hippomanes has two qualities common to remedies of the animal kingdom: sexuality and aggressiveness. but if this aggressiveness is not expressed, or it is very strongly suppressed, it creates an intense suicidal depression. The same is the case with sexuality. Even though it is an animal remedy, the animal side can’t be expressed. This is perhaps the fate of fully domesticated animals like the horse and the cow.
The patient improved vastly on Hippomanes.
Rubrics
Other important rubrics are:
– Company, aversion to; presence of other people aggravates symptoms; desire for solitude.
– Sits still, wrapped in deep, sad thoughts and notices nothing, as if.