A 59 year old woman called me early one morning as I was about to board a flight to Honduras. Though I had known her for over twenty years I could barely recognize her voice which sounded as though she was being strangled. She had woken at 5 a.m. with the room spinning. She got up, took a dose of Meclizine, a drug used to treat nausea, vomiting and dizziness of motion sickness. She went back to sleep only to wake forty-five minutes later from vertigo. “I felt the bed was spinning,” she said. She was unable to stand or lie down. She vomited which immediately triggered violent spasms in the throat interfering with her speech and breathing.
As I listened to her talking, I could tell she was having trouble speaking. There was an almost crowing sound as she breathed in. “When I inhale, I am straining to breathe,” she said. “It is as if someone is squeezing my throat.” The only position she could bear was sitting on the floor leaning against the bed. The vertigo was worse when she closed her eyes.
She was in a bad way suffering from what is known as “laryngospasm,” where the vocal cords involuntarily contract or spasm partially blocking the flow of air into the lungs. Laryngospasm can be caused by acid reflux. In her case, the vomitus irritated the vocal cords resulting in spasm. Laryngospasm typically subsides in a couple of minutes but her case was not typical as it was persisting.
I needed a homeopathic medicine that took into account both the vertigo and the laryngospasm. It had to act fast.
I consulted the repertory and chose the following rubrics (symptoms):
- VERTIGO – as if everything were turning in a circle
- VERTIGO – closing the eyes aggravates
- THROAT – spasms
The medicine selected was Belladonna which addressed all the symptoms. Belladonna is known for conditions which come on suddenly and violently. She took a dose (she had homeopathic medicines at home) at 7:30 a.m. Ten minutes later, she was already much better. By 10:30 a.m. she went to work.
Homeopathy: there is nothing like it in acute illness.