Here I am presenting a story of my friend Mrs. Natrum mur., who fell  in love with a person of highly educational qualification and of higher status as compare to her during doing graduation in B.Sc. from Ewing Christian College, Allahabad. My friend (Natrum mur) knew that her love could never mature. It is in fact one sided love which never live long.

About 2 years later after graduation she got  married  another person. She become pregnant after few months of marriage, but due to th failure of her first  love, she was quite, melancholic, depressed and she wanted to be alone cry. She used to laugh at serious matters. Milk causes dysenteric stools. Perspiration with attack of asthma. Very loquacious. She becomes irritable when spoken to kindly and worse from consolation like her niece Lilium Tigrinum.

At the terminal stage of pregnancy, a another accidental history done with her (Natrum mur.), when she lost her elder brother she did not weep. Due to the result of all these mental troubles during pregnancy, when the child was born, he too did not cry for a long time. Now her child is suffering from many sycotic complaints.

Are you interested to know much more about my friend (Natrum mur.) . YES !! OK. So please continue……

Natrum mur have a nick name – common salt (Nacl). Common salt is found widely distributed in nature. Knowledge of the source and origin of substance helps much. Natrum mur. being salt produces a lot of thirst. It is an important constituent of all fluids and tissue of the body. Common salt or sodium chloride, has long been a highly prized mineral resource.

The word salary comes from the Latin “salarium”, which refers to the payment of salt to soldiers. Sodium & chlorine are essential trace elements; most people get more than enough from the salt in their diet. In Orthodox medicine, salt is only used in saline solution, but in homoeopathy, the Natrum mur remedy has a wide range of uses.

Common salt is a regulator of osmosis. Without its presence in the fluids of the body there would be no absorption of nutritive matter & no elimination of waste. And yet a large number of people are steadily poisoning themselves by taking too much salt with their food. Dr.P. Sankaran says- “When a patient has a craving for a substance which aggravates him I consider this is a very good symptom. Eg. Nat-m has craving & agg. from salt, Arg-n. from sweets, Nitric acid from fatty acid, Ant-c. from sour foods and soon”. Its excessive use dries up the secretion, inhibits assimilation improverishes the food, weakens, idiopathic oedema.

Samual Hahnemann demonstrated its marvelous power & efficacy in the cure of disease by potentizing & proving sodium chloride. Farrington says- “Natrum mur is slow of pace and seldom indicated in acute diseases, but rather in deep-seated, chronic ailments which have progressed over a period of years.”

Last month, I meet with my friend (Nat-m) in Big Bazaar at Allahabad. She requested me, came to her residence & to have morning tea with her. I agreed. Her husband is a businessman. I saw her husband, has anxienty & sadness well marked in his face. His lips & corners of the mouth was dry, ulcerated & cracked. ( also in Nitric acid ) [ while going through Hering Guiding Symptom, Nat-m has got a crack on both the upper & lower lips, whereas all the materia medica people only emphasize the crack in the middle of the lower lip ].

His health has broken by failure in business, & becomes, gloomy, irritable, dull, confused, emaciated & weak. He constantly dwells past unpleasant occurrences. He become sullen & irritable. He dislikes consolation, hates fuss & avoids company. Hopeless, thin  & thirsty. His complaints much aggravated by heat especially at the SUN and often has a craving for salt. Map tongue.He passed involuntary urine when walking, coughing, laughing, & has to wait a long while for urine to pass, if others are pesent.

His younger bother Mercury has thirst with moist mouth, but there is swollen tongue, or flabby tongue, with indentation or prints of teeth upon it, and very offensive breath. I knew his younger sister Pulsatilla, has exact opposite as regards to her brother (Nat-m) viz- dry mouth with no thirst, furnishing a very marked contrast where a choice a necessary. Both Nat-m & Pulsatilla has similarity in that has bitter taste and loss of taste.

SOME OTHER IMPORTANT NOTES ABOUT NATRUM MURIATICUM ;-

Nat-m is also used to treat headaches that come on after menstruation ( also china ), & cold sores. Migraines with zig -zag lines in front of the eyes, eyestrain with aching eyes. Headache of school girls beginning at 10 am – 11 am. lasting until 3 pm o evening ( also in calc-phos). Hammering or throbbing, pain like little hammers on the head on walking in morning.

Skin complaints – warts, dry cuticles, hangnails, boils and painful spots. Blisters like peals around the mouth are found, especially in intermittent. Moist eczema with much itching especially seen on the margins of hair, scalp and behind the ears, look raw, red, inflamed & ulcerated. Herpes especially about the lips, mouth & nose as ordinary cold sores, or as an accompaniment of fevers, on the scrotum & thighs, about the anus & in the bends of the elbows & knees.

  It is adapted to all types of malaria. Although the chill begin at any time between the hours of 3 and 9 am, like that of Nux-v, the characteristic paroxysm is in the forenoon & most typically at 10 or 11 am. It is preceded by thirst & the characteristic Nat-m headache. The chill commences in the distal extremities or the lumber region; the lips and finger nails are blue. It is accompanied by chattering of the teeth, bursting headache, thirst for large quantities of water, nausea, vomiting, tearing pains in the bones, & sometimes complete unconsciousness. The sweat is profuse & gradually relieves all symptoms. Sadness persists throughout the paroxysm.

Dr. Boericke says, Nat-m -30 or higher is a preventive medicine in case of malaria, & take, once a week for 4-5 weeks before entering malaria area.

Grimmer writes, “Against the ravages of malaria, both prophylactic & curative, we will require the study & use of a larger group of remedies; yet a sufficiently narrow group of the most often indicated will enable the prescriber readily to cure 95% of his cases. Starting with Nat-m, Ars second, Chin-s third, these remedies…..will afford certain protection against the disease “.

Dr. Hering says Nat-m is predisposition to worms. In Boericke’s materia medica under Am-m found that the patient is sad but does not weep. For this symptom, Kent has given only two remedies, Gels & Nat-m. So you have to add Am-m under this rubric.

Nat-m is often indicated in nervous, emaciated children who, after a fright, wakes screaming at night because they have dreamt that the house was being robbed.(Fear of robber). In women, Nat-m is given for absent menstruation induced by shock or grief, irregular menstruation, and a general feeling of being unwell about both before & after menstruation. It is also good for a dry or sore vagina, thin vaginal discharge, and vaginismus (vaginal pain during sexual intercourse).

Dr.S.C.Mishra (Jabalpur) writes in Medicina futura Homoeopathy, April-2000 page-162;”From the physical & mental General point of view Nat-m is the indicated remedy for the patient but regarding his particular concomitant symptom i.e vertigo with urge to urinate, Nat-m has not been indicated in any repertory. Nat-m being basically an introvert person does not want to share his feeling, with others. He suffers from silent grief. ‘They can weep, but they prefer to suffer alone or deep down.They will not express their sorrow unless they are consolated or talked to’ [ Kent’s comparative Repertory-Dock & Kokelenberg ].He suffers silently and goes on brooding & at the same time doing his own job & this brooding makes himself insecure and fearfull which in turn causes vertigo with loss of bladder muscle- control resulting in urge for urination.

Sepia & Nat-m are allied not only as to symptomatology but are also complementary. They agree in weeping mood, depression of spirits, persistent recalling of unpleasant past occurrences, irritability, hasty manner, indifference, loss of memory, confusion, faintness and sensitiveness. Both also are worse from consolation and in the morning, and suffer unduly from the effects of grief, anger or disappointment. With Nat-m …indifference is born of hopelessness towards satiety of life; in Sepia it includes loss of interest or even aversion to those nearest & naturally dearest. The penchant for trotting out old grievances is more characteristic of Nat-m.

The prolapses of uterus in Nat-m is worse on first rising in the morning, while that of Sepia continues throughout the day or is more pronounced in the afternoon. Painful coition in the Nat-m patient is more the result of dryness; in the Sepia, of sensitive mucous surface; & aggravation of mental & physical states is more marked during & agter the menstrual flow.

Pulsatilla may be readily distinguished from Nat-m. by its absence of thirst & lack of irritability; by its desire fore sympathy; by evening aggravation & relief from gentle motion; by its thick, yellow mucous discharges & intolerance of warm room.

Ignatia is the “acute” of Nat-m & closely allied, especially in the mental & nervous spheres. Ignatia is a vegetable remedy, acts more quickly but less deeply than the mineral & in consequence, may be the first remedy in a case for which ultimately Nat-m. will be required. Ignatia patient is less irritable, more introspective, much more liable to nervous twitching & spasmodic jerking of muscles. However, if after it has benefited the patient, but the sadness, aversion to company & consolation, headache, indigestion, faintness & menstrual disturbances are only partially by it, then Nat-m. should be given careful consideration.

 CASE- Recently, Dr.S.C. Mishra treating a child for some complaints. A female child ( case no. 4405);- Pain before stool from childhood. Rectum fissure; bleeding during stool; started after she left mother’s feed & given Cerelac & milk. Likes salts. The parents had given the history that when the child was born she had not cried. Caesarean delivery. F/H – Father ok, Mother had 2 abortion during initial days of pregnancy. She had lost her sister before one month of her caesarean delivery.

26-05-08 = On this indication Dr.S,C.Mishra prescribed Nat-m 200 / 4 od & SL -1D TDS.

She started improving on infrequent doses on Nat-m, given upto 10 M and completely relieved by 24-01-09.