Auto-stereotypes: Die Schweizermacher

SPONGIA TOSTA – roasted sponge

Have you ever indulged yourself by bathing with one of those fabulous sea sponges – not sure it is politically or ecologically correct to buy into that arena, but they are lovely to use. It is hard to imagine that such a wonderful natural substance, that was once a living creature, can develop a feeling of disgust that pertains to this particular rubric. But Spongia to-sta is disgusted with pretty much everything.

Maybe it is to do with being a salt water creature, forever being cleansed by the lapping tides; maybe it is to do with being wrenched from its natu-ral sea environment and gasping for air as it lands on terra firma, utterly lost with the knowledge of near death; maybe it’s to do with its after-life use as a cleansing aid; or maybe it is to with the toasting it gets to make this remedy.

Whatever the reasons, Spongia is a remedy of terrors. There are delusions of fire and feelings of desperation if they become heated (the toasting procedure!); visions of frightful images including ghosts; fear of evil and death; intense fear of suffocation; they become over cheerful and start singing as a distraction from the terror. they fear for the future, especially on waking, maybe showing surprise at still being alive; this fear develops during sleep – maybe there is a long lost memory link of sponges being used in the 13th century, dipped in a dilution of narcotic plant juices and placed over the person’s face to act as a primitive anaesthesia (spongia somnifera); sleep walking is common and when thoroughly weakened and wearied by all this terror they resolve to being timid, tearful, weary of life to the point of becoming suicidal.

Sponges like to cling to something and being full of holes (pores) they are amazing water pumps and although some might say it is shaky ground talking about remedies from the point of view of their signature, it won’t escape many that Spongia, the pump, is a truly wonderful heart remedy – the heart being a pump of life. Specifically, Spongia has an affinity to the heart valves and their possible dysfunction as in mitral or tri-cuspid valve regurgitation (usually right side of the heart is affected most).

As with nearly all the heart remedies there is an intense fear of suffoca-tion that can bring on the throes of near death – the fear and anxiety itself can bring on these paroxysms – breathing becomes laboured and asth-matic; the larynx feels as if it has been grasped (often the person will do that themselves as if to grasp the throat and open it for extra air). Some-times the larynx feels stopped because a goitre is present – Spongia, being a sea creature has plenty of iodine present and hence the affinity to thy-roid problems as well. There is a sensation as if air is passing up and down the thyroid and cervical glands.

Spongia belongs in the sea and thus on land it cannot breathe, it suffo-cates with the dryness, every organ becomes dry, there is excessive thirst to compensate. But Spongia can never truly compensate for its loss, its total dislocation and so the feelings of disgust are really more about abso-lute dissatisfaction with everything.

One extra point, although possibly insignificant to the symptom picture of this remedy, is that there is a compound present in sponges called Vid-abarine and the allopaths use this in antiviral drugs especially for Herpes and even more important for the so called AIDS virus.

Apparently this compound interferes with enzymes that are special to these diseased states – feel free to make any links you want to with this.

MAGNETIS POLUS AUSTRALIAS – south pole of the magnet

and a long way from anywhere with a deep sense of dislocation and of be-ing forsaken. Those who travel there suffer endurance beyond belief but the pull of the magnet is very strong, too strong to be ignored, it is an en-durance that has to be accomplished despite the pain.

And the pain is severe, usually in the joints of limbs or involving the ex-tremities of limbs and mimics that of frost bite, not surprisingly. But even a slight chill will bring about pains.

This magnet is unstable and this is one reason why the slightest ‘tip of the scales’ brings about such a powerful need for survival, seeking that bal-ance that lies somewhere between the push and pull of the magnet.

They do not like to be in company because it draws on their reserves too much and they develop a distinct dislike to social events that involve some kind of fun, they are real party poopers, they are disgusted at the thought of having a good time. The specific rubric regarding ‘disgust’

with Mag aust is ‘disgust at the exhilaration of others’ – this is why they are party poopers, they just cannot connect with others and have a good time at the same time.

Other examples of the disparity is the slightest chill will make them feel unbalanced and being out of doors brings total dread – it is as though they have a dysfunctional thermostat; there is a strong sense of levitation as if the body is so light it can be easily pulled towards the magnet without any will power to resist; there is instability of ideas that shows itself in pro-nounced mood swings – from passion to rage, from excitement to disgust.

There is often a problem with food that can border on an eating disorder such a bulimia – again another representation of a lack of balance, either hoarding and gorging food or refusing to eat and forcible vomiting.

The heart palpitates violently and this can also cause the sense of light-ness with a great rush of blood to the head causing vertigo with staggering back and forth, pulling in both directions, not knowing which is best or where the balance is. Similarly sleep patterns are disturbed – profoundly sleepy with an inability to sleep and when sleep does come the dreams are frightful, sometimes about fire, as if to melt the ice caps conveying a sen-sation as if hot water were pouring down.

I don’t think these feelings stem from any obvious emotional aetiology but merely (!) reflect a deep sensitivity to all surroundings with a percep-tion of dislocapercep-tion and abandonment (being forsaken).

It is an abandonment that comes not from a lack of nurture but from the imbalance of the natural senses deep within. Even writing this it is hard to decide which it is – the push or the pull, the chicken or the egg that is re-sponsible – that is the force of the magnet.

The main arena of the feelings of disgust are focussed on the eating disor-ders but can easily be replicated to any terrain that involves this push and pull – they just do not want to go there, they cannot endure the end result of the push and pull, it is just too disgustingly unstable. They cannot en-dure the extremes and become disgusted when others feel a sense of ex-hilaration.