Page 5 - Winter 16

was locked in the laundry at night, but he jumped at the doorknob until it opened and then would run around like a greyhound on the track. He would vocalise and sound distressed almost like he was looking for you: “where are you?”. He once worked himself up to vomiting.
When I first saw him, the owner was forced to sleep in a separate room from her husband, so her husband could sleep. Stirling would come in and out of the cat flap about 20 times per night rarely sleeping – wanting to be in and then out again. He cannot come through the flap quietly like his brother. He doesn’t seem to know, what he wants. They could not lock the cat flap – he needed to know, he had free access to everywhere. He would jump on the bed and sit on their face and drool, keeping them awake. He can be very affectionate, when he wants to be. Sometimes when he was looking out into the dark, the owners described him as looking stoned.
He would wreck things – claw things. When he had a skin eruption, he would also claw at himself around the neck, until it was ripped open and red and raw (steroid and antibiotics given). They thought he had a flea allergy, but spot on treatments used to affect him and he would go crazy and fly around into the bushes. He is now on oral tablet flea treatments and seems fine. Sometimes he didn’t seem to recognise his owners. He would slink around the house and startle, backing off petrified. His symptoms came and went, sometimes loving and cuddly, curling into a ball on your lap and wanting his tummy rubbed, then sometimes seeing the owner as a threat. He would make himself scarce around strangers – they would never see him.
He was very sensitive to noises especially plastic bags and strange cars coming up the drive, even the creak of a floorboard at the other end of the house. He can be asleep and then leap out of his skin and is off at 100 miles/hr. Thunder also bothered but he coped by hiding.
He went through a phase of eating everything including his brother’s food. He gobbles his biscuits without coming up for breath, then pushes Alfie away and eats his too. He has no desire for human food but will hunt. He is never seen to drink.
The final straw was last week, when Alfie was sleeping on the bed. Stirling launched at him and had him pinned down biting at him. There was fur everywhere, leaving Alfie sore but no obvious puncture wounds. He sometimes also jumped on Alfie biting his neck as if to mate. Alfie has had treatment with Feliway, Calmex and also Prozac, which made him sleep for a few days. They didn’t want him on this drug for the rest of his life.
Analysis
I felt the key unusual factors to be:
• Panic and fear reaction, which is acute,
sudden and unexpected.
• Violence, which is also sudden and unexpected with tearing and ripping (to himself and to others).
• Fear to be left alone, noises and enclosed spaces.
• Changeable states – cuddy vs fearful and panicked. It’s almost like panic attacks or a delusional state.
Kingdom – Plant: there is a lot of sensitivity here and felt I couldn’t rule out a plant. There was no specific mention of being territorial, just very reactive.
Miasm – Acute: although tubercular miasm is strong, the sudden unexpected panic seemed more acute.
Family – the combination of rage with panic and flight made me think of the solanaceae family.
I needed to choose between Belladonna, Stramonium and Hyoscyamus.
Stramonium has often been described as like a child alone, lost in the wilderness, therefore seeking company and light. The separation anxiety in this case and aggravation at night in the dark seemed to fit the case.
Atjo Westerhuis describes issues around familiarity and non-familiarity. Familiar things seem strange, and taking 2-3 minutes before recognising their owner, or does not recognise his relatives. This fits the case nicely.
Stramonium 200c was given, split single dose.
Follow up one month later
“Since your follow up phone call Sterling has improved more. He behaviour is more like a normal cat now – sleeps more, is more relaxed even in the way he walks (no mad dashing about like its the end of the world!). Also, we have noticed that he will come close to some strangers – the neighbour and my brother just for a quick pat or sniff. Noise issues are still there but not so bad. We can step over him without him freaking out. He is still cautious sometimes but generally much improved.
At night he is slightly quieter coming in the cat door (still makes more noise than Alfie). He has stopped that terrible high-pitched whinge (like “help I need you – where are you”– sort of thing). He sleeps beside me on the bed some of the night (quietly, just a normal purr before he shuts up and goes to sleep). Has only annoyed G a couple of times during the night, but none of the in your face stuff. When he’s not sleeping at night he’s out hunting – evident by the critters he brings into the bedroom!
He doesn’t always finish his meal in one go without lifting his head anymore. Sometimes the food is still there when we go to bed at night. No evidence of bullying.
In summary – he sleeps a lot – in the garden during the day and inside. He is asleep,
when we get home from work and waits patiently for dinner and then goes outside. Often out at night until about 2 am and then comes in and sleeps. If I get up to Alfie during the night, Sterling gets up, follows me to the kitchen and drops on the floor and goes back to sleep in the kitchen (normally he would run, push Alfie out of the way looking for food)”.
10 months later Sterling has moved up to Stramonium 10M given approximately every 2 weeks. I received an e-mail recently saying that the family had enjoyed a lovely relaxed Christmas, joined by their now relaxed cat Sterling. It will be interesting to see, whether he needs less repetition over time and finally comes off the remedy at some stage. I have also not forgotten that maybe there is some detoxing that needs to be done in this case, with a very early anaesthetic for neutering before 8 weeks of age. Ketamine came to mind but I do not believe that this would have been used as part of his anaesthetic protocol based on enquiries I’ve made. I would be interested to know what others think, however, about the effect of early neutering on cats. as it is a common trend in rescue centres here.
This case also reminded me of another case that responded well to Belladonna, this time a dog – also with a strong noise phobia and sudden panic reaction with violence (trying to bite out of the enclosure and destroying it in the process). This case did not have the clinging and attention seeking, however, hence Belladonna was chosen over Stramonium to very good effect (interestingly Stram was given to this case earlier with very little response).
So just a small summary from ‘down under’ in New Zealand with a new years resolution to contribute to the magazine and focus more on developing the homeopathic side of my practice this year.
Happy New Year to all my friends around the world in the veterinary homeopathic community.
Sipping Creation
Stillness, and a world apart at the edge of the lambing shed. Time narrowing to an opening, an urgent involution.
Then the shudder and slap of landing, a gasp that drives water from the lungs and replaces it with a nothingness that cannot be grasped or weighed.
A moment’s recollection and she turns, with a delicate snicker of recognition her lips sip creation.
Ilse Pedler has just won an international poetry competition and will be having a poetry pamphlet published in March 2016 – https:// mslexia.co.uk/competition_winner/ilse-pedler
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