Pans, Pandas And a Journey to Homeopathy

Erin R., CCHM Student

I grew up in a household that didn’t run to the doctors or reach for pills at the first sign of an ailment. We were taught to listen to our bodies and respond with what it needs. Diet and exercise were also a big part of our lifestyle along with knowing your limit. More isn’t always better. Becoming an RMT supported my natural lifestyle and gave me the opportunity to share it with others. Continuing this trend into parenthood everything was going great until my youngest son developed an illness that diet and exercise alone couldn’t help.

I remember being a young girl and overheating playing out in the hot sun but no one brought me a glass of ice water, instead my great grandmother sat me in the shade and had me sip on warm tea and room temperature water. I now recognize this to follow the law of similars and you know what? It worked, after a few minutes I was more comfortable and not as hot. If any of my family members felt a headache coming on we were asked how much water we drank that day, not given a Tylenol or advil. Eating a well balanced diet and keeping active were also just part of our daily lives. Being in elementary school I can recall asking my mom for junk food I would see in others lunches and she would simply say “you are what you eat and you don’t want to be junk”. This was just our way of life. Joining sports teams and concert bands, being a part of the community and eating well.

In college for massage therapy I was now surrounded by more like minded people. Friends who ate well and took care of themselves, we were active together and I started learning more naturalpathic remedies to support my system. My nickname in college was mom as I was always bringing soup broth and garlic for people to drink when they were under the weather or mustard compresses for coughs. When we started learning about essential oils there was more arsenal for my regime. For my third year research paper I was assigned Autoimmune diseases, and my professor suggested I looked into vaccines as well. After the mountain of information in American Medical Journals that I read through that year I started to question some allopathic medicine methods. When I entered the work force alongside a Chiropractor and ND I now had these more educated minds to feed my interests. It was a gift.

Becoming a mom was amazing. This little being and me just loving life. He was a good eater, good sleeper and happy child. Never sick and no need for medicine. The second child started out the same way. Good eater, good sleeper and happy baby. But at two and a half things changed. He was uncomfortable in his skin, easily irritated, developed bad seasonal allergies and sleep, well what sleep? My son had been on antibiotics twice by this point and was catching every illness out there. Over the next six months he steadily declined to the point of not being able to speak and being in constant pain. My first step was elimination diet while recording behaviours with some success, followed by lab work, EEG, MRI and lumbar puncture. All unremarkable.

I went on this long journey of trying to kill what might be harming my kid by also restoring his health. If I had followed only allopathic medicine there would be no restoration of my child's health at all. I spent the first few years using mostly naturopathic remedies, diet and herbs, travelled out of country for FMT which had a huge positive impact on his overall health. Only to be given a PANS diagnosis and five months of antibiotics. This sent my kid to an unmanageable place. The herxing was so bad I thought he might die. We were finally given a steroid taper to try, which eliminated many symptoms temporarily and then four seven hour IVIG treatments. These treatments returned him to where he was before the 5 months of antibiotics. And then that was that. We were no longer allowed to get IVIG and our Psychiatrist could only prescribe more antibiotics or antipsychotics etc.

Then I found homeopathy. We have been using homeopathic remedies for just over two years and have seen steady sustained progression in my sons health. He is able to be in school four hours a day, his allergy flares are less severe, he is able to self soothe his flares due to illness, his sleep and mood have greatly improved. All of our lives have greatly improved. Homeopathy has saved my sons life and has offered me mine back. I would love nothing more than to have the knowledge to help people get well and stay well. I understand just how precious health is.