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Animal Homeopathy

Homeopathy is an alternative therapy treating the whole animal on physical, emotional and mental levels. It seeks to address the root of the disease rather than suppressing symptoms.

From the homeopath’s perspective, every animal is a living, energetic being which reacts to external influences while maintaining an internal state of equilibrium called homeostasis. For an individual to remain healthy, this balance must be maintained on the physical, emotional and mental planes. 

The Vital Force

The vital force is the energy that animates a body. This energy is what makes all of us more than just our physical components and biochemical reactions. It controls and directs all processes of life within the organism and it determines how one responds to disturbances. If the vital force is in a state of order, health results. If it is in a state of disorder, illness results. 

All diseases affect the vital force prior to being manifested as physical, mental and/or emotional symptoms. When the vital force is adversely affected by disease, it creates symptoms in the patient. Symptoms are signs that the body is trying to defend against a disturbance of the vital force and heal itself. 

Symptoms are unique to an individual vital force as it responds to a particular disturbance. They represent the best efforts the organism to adapt to stress and defend itself. The collections of mental, emotional, and physical symptoms exhibited by an animal are necessary to fight off the underlying process. 

Symptoms disappear when the disease is eliminated. True health in homeopathic terms is present when all those levels of the animal-body, mind and emotions complete freedom of being, freedom from any sort of restriction, freedom from ailments.

Homeopathic Remedies 

During disease it is the animal’s vital force that can cause the return to health. Homeopathy uses remedies to aid this process. Remedies are extremely diluted, natural substances (animal, plant, and mineral) that stimulate an animal’s vital force to function to its full capacity. Then thus eliminate disease and the potential for disease. 

Remedies work through the “Law of Similars”, which can be stated “like cures like”. What this means is that a substance which reproduces the symptoms of the illness in an individual stimulates the body’s own defense mechanisms to eliminate the illness. Whatever substances produce symptoms in a healthy animal will cure those same symptoms in a sick animal.

Remedy Preparation 

When a substance is given in a crude form it produces specific symptom patterns. When the same substance is taken  in a minute form, its medicinal activity is released. (This principle can be seen in the use of digitalis among human heart disease patients. In a crude form it can be deadly. In a dilute form it can alleviate certain symptoms of heart disease.) 

Homeopathic remedies are prepared through potentization. This consists of a series of dilutions and succussion (shaking) until no original substance is left. Extreme dilution enhances a remedy’s therapeutic properties while eliminating toxic side effects. Shaking of the remedy adds kinetic energy to each dilution. The process of potentization leaves behind an essence of the diseased state of the patient. This substance is extremely powerful and can revive the body’s vital force. 

Through their special preparation, homeopathic remedies are rendered nontoxic while their potency is actually increased. Thus, inert crude substances can become powerful medicines, and toxic ones can become safe and curative. Homeopathy therefore has the advantage of avoiding the side effects seen with conventional drugs that only suppress disease.

How Do Homeopathic Remedies Work?

Homeopathic remedies stimulate the vital force, enabling it to throw off disease influences and restore health. 

A remedy has a symptom picture or “personality”. This remedy is matched to the symptom picture and personality of the patient. Any remedy may be used for any condition as long as the remedy’s symptoms match the patient’s symptoms. 

According to homeopathy, the body cannot have two similar disturbances within it at the same time. By introducing into the body a disturbance similar to but stronger than the disease present, this new disturbance in the form of a homeopathic remedy overwhelms and displaces the disease. This new disturbance caused by the remedy stimulates the vital force more strongly, causing it to react and eliminate the natural disease. The vital force of the body later rids itself of the artificial disease created by the homeopathy remedy. In this way the body heals itself. 

Once the vital force is stimulated, the body continues the healing process itself. So homeopathy neither covers up nor destroys disease, but rather stimulates the body to restore health and homeostasis to the optimal level possible for each individual.

Homeopathy Treatment

A homeopathic remedy will work only if it is homeopathic or produces symptoms similar to the symptoms presented by the patient. There are over 1,000 homeopathic remedies and only one is the simillimum (the remedy most similar to the Disease State of the patient).  

To find the correct one, all aspects of the patient, no matter how insignificant they seem, need to be identified. This is more difficult in animals since they can’t tell us subjective information that is extremely important in the selection process. 

In order to be certain we have found the simillimum, it’s necessary for us to receive accurate reports from the client about the effect of the remedy prescribed. So clients should keep a record of what they observe beginning on the day remedy is given. Changes will occur which can be physical, emotional, and behavioral. These changes, whether improvements or not, are very important for us to know. 

Many cases require more than one remedy over a period of time, depending on the age and vitality of the pet, the nature of the disease, and the quality of nutrition. 

Relief can occur in a time frame similar to the onset of the disease. In acute diseases, relief can occur within a few hours to a day or two. In chronic diseases, improvement is slow and gradual, often taking several months to two years or more depending on the severity and duration of the disease and previous use of conventional treatments. 

Health problems become chronic if the underlying disturbance of the vital force is not treated. Chronic diseases usually recur with the same symptoms, but occasionally recur in different, even more serious forms as the vital force erodes. These underlying chronic diseases can be passed form generation to generation. Some conditions are incurable and can only be alleviated. In very old or severely diseased animals, it is necessary to continue treatment indefinitely. 

In addition to homeopathy, we use diet, nutritional supplements, flower remedies, glandular therapy, and sometimes chiropractic. Chances of success are much increased if nutrition is optimized. The progress is slower and less satisfactory if poor quality foods are fed. If prepared diets need to be used, we recommend Flint River Ranch diets supplemented with raw meat and other raw food derivatives. 

Miasms and Other Interferences

The vital force of an ill individual is delicately balanced and can be easily disturbed, causing disruption of the healing process which can delay or even prevent a cure by a well-chosen remedy. 

This can result, for example, from the presence of what homeopathy calls miasms. Miasms are underlying predispositions to disease. Miasms can result form disease itself. Though the inciting disease may no longer be present in the body, a weakness in the body’s natural defense mechanisms can persist, causing a tendency to be ill in particular ways. Miasms can also result from exposure to noxious influences in the environment. They may also be inherited. 

Sometimes during homeopathy treatment, a healing crisis occurs when the patient experiences a temporary worsening of their symptoms as the body’s defenses are being stimulated. This can be necessary to achieve healing. Most crises last only a day or two as the healing action of the body is strengthened. It occurs because the remedy has stimulated the vital force’s defense system making it better able to cope with the disease. This must be distinguished from a true worsening of the patient’s condition, which would indicate a different remedy is needed. 

Medicines may be antidoted (cancelled out) either partially or completely by various substances, treatments, or environmental influences. Symptoms may be suppressed by various treatments that weaken the vital force of the patient. These things can make it extremely difficult to identify the correct remedy. In order to achieve the most benefit from homeopathy, we recommend giving the remedy along (not with food), giving only the prescribed remedy, and avoiding such things as other treatments, surgeries, vaccination, emotional stress, electric blankets, and pungent odors such as mothballs, incense, and perfumes. 

Homeopathy Indications 

Homeopathy examines individuals, not diseases. It attempts to stimulate the body to recover itself. Our goal is a complete cure of the problems and conditions affecting your pet. Some animals are too old, have been ill too long, or have other complications so this might not always be possible. But by working together, we can greatly improve the health of your pet through homeopathy. 

Even when homeopathy is indicated, it will be considered in context with alternatives, both conventional and holistic. Various treatment options will be discussed and offered if possible. Your objectives, preferences, and personal values will be carefully considered.