How Many Remedies Can I Use at One Time?

Taking multiple homeopathic medicines in your daily schedule

This article is going to freak some of you out. And I totally understand why: The homeopathy ‘world’ has everyone so indoctrinated to believe that we should be just using ONE, maybe a few, homeopathic medicines at any given time. 

But please don’t stress out. This is not a prescription for you. It’s not what anyone SHOULD do. It’s just what is actually possible, in cases where it is needed. Homeopathy is so much more flexible than most of us ever imagined. And one of my self-appointed ‘jobs’ is to test the limits of homeopathy and discover what is myth and what is truth.

However, I also think a lot of readers will take comfort in this information. Most of us have used multiple remedies at one time or another, particularly when someone we love is acutely suffering. In those cases it is common for people ‘throw everything at it’, yet later feel hesitant about sharing that fact, since it’s looked down upon by the authors and teachers we have learned from, and the general homeopathy community at large.

Most of us learned that not only should we choose a remedy to cover every aspect of what the person is up against health-wise, but also that the remedies should be given infrequently (minimum dose and all of that), and with a little bit of constant worry. 

Okay I admit, I’m being a little facetious. (But only a little.) 

That was the overall concept that I absorbed when first trying to figure out this whole homeopathy thing. I remember literally losing sleep over the first remedies I gave my cat— only one at a time, and one dose a day, for maybe three days, watching and worrying the whole time. 

Oh my word. Deep breath. It’s so silly in retrospect. But I only learned that through years of experience.

And I know it’s not just me. So many of us feel the weight of the world when trying to find THE ‘RIGHT’ homeopathic remedy.

Thank goodness I found the Banerji Protocols, and Joette Calabrese, and discovered PROTOCOLS which break through so many paradigms. Multiple remedies, repeated regularly… AND we get to use more than one protocol at a time!

Which makes so much sense, of course. Most people have more than one thing going on. In fact, most people have a LOT of things going on. As I wrote in the post entitled Ms. G— we aren’t living in the 1800s anymore.

Homeopathy is ultimately COMMON SENSE. And it works with common sense in whatever era we live in, for whatever health challenges we are up against. These medicines are amazing, and gentle, and kind, and they tell you when they are the wrong ones or no longer needed (via aggravations, provings, or by not acting). It couldn’t be a more complete system. 

But we need to reconsider a bunch of the old myths, learn to observe closely and objectively, test the boundaries of what is possible, and really come to know and trust these medicines. Even the ‘wrong’ choice will lead you in the right direction. These medicines do not hurt us. Most of the time the wrong medicine just will not act. If there is a little aggravation or proving, we just stop the medicine and the issue is resolved. 

(How many pharmaceuticals tell you when you are done with them? Or that they are the wrong one?) 

I am continually amazed, and daily gain even more confidence in homeopathy, as I see people who have tried everything else (literally- from doctor-prescribed meds, to surgery, to strict diets, to energy healing devices) begin to actually heal with homeopathy. It’s how I came to it and why I have stayed with it!

But back to how many remedies we can use:

I get asked this all the time. Especially when someone is already taking homeopathy for a chronic condition and then needs something for an acute issue that arises. Depending on your training, you probably have some arbitrary number in mind. But, consider, where did you get that number from (and where did they get it from), and why is it a limit?

Believe me, this is something I have contemplated and tested a lot, first on my guinea pigs family and myself, then on extended family and friends, and now with clients day in and day out.

Consider the following case:

(This is actual, I just took this case and came up with his plan. This summary greatly oversimplifies all of the conditions and symptoms.)

Spinal stenosis and arthritis, bladder cancer, only able to urinate every 3 days or so, only defecates every 5-6 days or so, old foot injury that has led to near paralysis of the lower leg and which swells to 3 times it’s normal size which makes it so he can barely stand to work (he’s on disability and doctors told him he will end up in a wheelchair), a testicle that randomly swells and makes it so he can’t sit down from the pain, a ‘low testosterone’ diagnosis, Coronary Artery Disease, restless legs that prevent sleep, intense back pain up to a 10 out of 10 that can also lead to very high blood pressure and heart attack events, also depression, headaches, lack of appetite, and allergies.

That’s all in one person.

How many remedies will he have in his schedule? 

34

Yes, you read that correctly.

Two will be taken once a week.

Three will be taken once a day or every other day.

Four will be in an SOS mix for acute pain.

The rest will be twice a day and include protocols for the joint and bone issues, bladder, constipation, testicle/testosterone, CAD, depression, restless legs, etc.

And, yes, I did keep things pretty tight and excluded additional possible remedies that I may consider down the road as we observe his progress in the coming months. And, yes, there are remedies in the schedule that cover more than one thing. Every single remedy is in there for a good reason.  This is not a random shotgun approach. Not at all.

This is not the first time that I, or someone I have helped, has taken that many remedies in one schedule.

I wouldn’t say it is the norm. I am choosing an extreme example. But 10-20 is quite common. One Banerji Protocol can easily have 2-3 remedies in it. And one person can easily need 4-6 protocols.

Sometimes a case is much more simple and we don’t need a lot of homeopathics. Another recent case I took only needed a total of five remedies. One once a day, and four twice a day.

We DO NOT use remedies that we don’t need ‘just in case’ or anything like that. Remember, these are not herbs or supplements. They are medicines and must be used accordingly, 

But there are plenty of cases where a lot IS needed. Today I’m sharing how many one might possibly use, not that you always should.

Again, I’m not telling you to do this. My main point is that the ‘rules’ about this are quite arbitrary. I’m interested in what is actually effective, and efficient— in practice, what works.

Take another case, where someone is already using, say, 15 remedies in their schedule for chronic conditions, and then they come down with something acute—  like a moderate injury or acute ear infection that requires some help. Obviously, if it’s life or death, we stop the main schedule and deal with the emergency. But many times it’s not that extreme. So they can keep their daily homeopathic schedule going and ADD what else they need for the new and acute issue.

The idea is NOT to throw everything at someone and see what sticks. One of my groups has a joke about inventing ‘Universalinum’—  the ultimate combination with ALL the remedies in it. Haha.

But that doesn’t actually make sense. Because each case does have specific needs. And the remedies are for certain conditions. The complex case above is quite different than a woman with food intolerances, hypothyroid, endometriosis, weight gain, and ovarian fibroids. There will be little to no overlap in the remedies they are taking, even with multiple protocols in their schedules.

Nowhere was I ever told, or shown, that using a bunch of remedies was okay. (Apart from some combinations, but they are often like a gentle shotgun approach. And I don’t know many who use those daily long term.) In my schooling I was taught to keep it ‘tight’, and to only give a maximum of a few protocols (or so) in one schedule.

But then the question becomes, why? 

And how does that serve the person who has so much going on. These protocols act for certain conditions. Yes, remedies cover many things, but in my experience, it is very rare that a protocol for one condition addresses a completely different condition in any way. 

Low testosterone, testicle pain and depression (above) may all be covered by Aurum Metallicum. But it is highly unlikely that Aurum will resolve the constipation, bladder issues, old foot injury that now feels like wood, intense back pain, coronary artery disease… and even if it lightly touched on some of those areas, we have other protocols that are actual powerhouses for those conditions. To withhold them feels, well, rather cruel, even more so because it’s unnecessary.

When faced with complex cases and people’s suffering, it’s like trying to use homeopathy with one arm tired behind your back.

So why NOT give multiple remedies at once? There must be some reason if everyone says not to, right?

And the only real answer I have— which does apply to many people— is that if you don’t know your homeopathic medicines really well, you may get confused.

[Also, if you want to be totally scientific about it, you would use one thing at a time— with NO other remedies or modalities— in order to really assess what that one thing did. However, in reality, most people do use a variety of other modalities, even in addition to homeopathy, and, for someone who has a lot of conditions, they are going to be taking a very slow train for the next 10 years using a method like this. I don’t know many that would be very impressed by, or stick with, that. I prefer the fast train, maximizing what we have learned from those who went before us, choosing to alleviate suffering over our own scientific rigidity, and bringing homeopathy to the masses once again.]

For me, IF something comes up in a complex case where a lot of remedies are being employed, like a possible or actual ‘proving’ (more on that in future posts), I KNOW these medicines and can usually quickly figure out what is the culprit. 

For instance a client of mine recently started to have nervous palpitations:

One look at her plan (which includes 22 homeopathic medicines taken from once a week to twice a day) and I saw that she had been on the blood pressure protocol for 14 months. Aconitum, which is part of that protocol, when no longer needed, could easily cause that. So we stopped just the Aconitum, kept the rest going, and within a day she felt fine. No antidoting needed.

But say you really have no idea what you are doing and give someone 30 different incorrect remedies, it will likely make a messy picture. Which is why I think no one who is teaching homeopathy is sharing what I am saying here. In this modern world, everyone is always covering their backsides, especially when talking to the public, so they tone it way down and get very conservative in their recommendations.

On the one hand I understand— and I do expect you all to use common sense or don’t use homeopathy— but on the other hand, how do we bring homeopathy back to the people if it’s too hard to get positive results because we are laboring under false restrictions. People either will decide it ‘doesn’t work’, because they are not taking full advantage of all homeopathy has to offer, or they will be too afraid to even try it.

Worst case, a case gets too confused— which happens to me from time to time too, usually when working without a clear diagnosis— one can always stop the whole plan, take a few days to assess, and if the issue remains, it’s not the homeopathy. (Because provings stop when the medicines are stopped.) 

And I want to make it clear that often this is the case, that something new is arising, yet we jump to blame homeopathy. (That’s okay, again, stop the remedy, that will tell you if it was the culprit or not. Simple!)

However; if the new issue DOES clear up after stopping the medicines, then we can take it step-by-step to edit and adjust the plan. That’s not so hard.

So THAT is the main reason to keep it simple, at least more so, especially if this is new to you. Choose the most problematic conditions, just a few, and start there. Then you can really learn the medicines and practice them on yourself and loved ones. And as you gain confidence, you can add more to the mix, because you will know and trust the remedies, as I do.

Now, I’m sure someone is wondering about remedies that conflict with each other. How do we manage that, they ask?

It is very rare that remedies conflict with each other.

You know all that stuff in the textbooks about remedies antidoting one another, or about using them in sequence? (If not, wonderful; one less thing for you to unlearn.) I didn’t discuss this in my recent article about the Materia Medica, since that post was plenty long already.

So here’s that final section in the Murphy’s Materia Medica entries called RELATIONS that you may wonder about. This is under Arsenicum Album:

The main reason I didn’t talk about this section in the article is because I basically ignore all of this now.

And I didn’t come up with that. The Banerjis demonstrated in their clinics over and over again that these remedies (that everyone was trying to avoid using together or in sequence) work just fine together. Like Nux Vomica and Arsenicum in the same plan. Yes, they still both act. And I daily use remedies that supposedly ‘antidote’ each other yet do not.

[Why? I suspect because no one has ever done it the way the Banerjis did, taking remedies repeatedly day in and day out. The old way, with just a few doses, you had to be on the alert for every possible ‘antidoting’. However, in actual practice, you will see how difficult it can be to ascertain in a short period what actually was antidoted or not. I have also noted in a bunch of the old literature, that many times it appears what was being said was something like this: In a case of actual, say, Arsenic poisoning, the person was given Nux Vomica, which helped antidote the effects of the Arsenic poisoning. So Nux Vomica was noted down as ‘antidote’ to Arsenicum (poisoning). Which makes total sense, if you know these remedies. But that doesn’t translate into not using them both homeopathically.] 

My understanding and experience has shown me that almost all of the homeopathic medicines are acting on their own levels, so to speak. I have seen small instances where there is a conflict, such as someone took both Lachesis and Sepia one day and had a little night sweat that night. These two remedies do have a lot of crossover. And, as I have said, I don’t throw every possible remedy at one person, the idea is to include the protocols and remedies that are actually called for, selectively, not to just take all the options and give them to someone.

It is also important to remember that these are not pharmaceuticals, which work completely differently than our homeopathic medicines. A lot of times I think the fearfulness we experience comes from being used to medicines from the doctor, which can absolutely cause issues separately and when taken together, including issues that can come back to haunt us down the road. Homeopathy doesn’t work like that.

In summary

Really this is about what works. And you don’t actually know until you try. Once my mind was opened by the Banerji Protocols, I started to experiment and discover firsthand, and I continue to find that most of the things people believe related to using homeopathy are myths. So, I continue to test the so-called ‘rules’ to discover what is actually Law and what isn’t. 

The good news is that homeopathy is so much easier and more flexible than most people think. Including the number of medicines that can be taken at one time. (Even literally at one time— but more on that another day.)

This article isn’t to convince you to go crazy; only to, hopefully, give you a little more confidence.

Many people, if their child is suffering, probably give them some combination medicines to start, plus some other protocols, or remedies they got from the Materia Medica, and a little of this or that that someone recommended based on what their child had, and by the time their kid is well again they have taken 10 or more different homeopathic remedies.

As far as I can tell, nearly everyone does this. And everyone (as far as I know) is okay. So wouldn’t it be nice to stop worrying about it?

When you are learning homeopathy it is going to look messy like that. And even when you are pretty experienced and you are sick and trying to navigate a tough cold or flu, it can still look messy like that! Yet, I believe we benefit from these remedies we take, even when not perfectly chosen. There are people who have specialized in doing ‘provings’ (taking homeopathic medicines when in a healthy state to discover what they cause) and these people report that in the long run they have been strengthened by this process. (Even though it’s not necessarily fun to get sick temporarily in order to contribute to the Materia Medica!)

One last note— 

Often, I find, one remedy just will not solve the problem.

My menstrual cramp mix consists of six homeopathic medicines. It takes all six to be pain-free, each playing its part. Maybe there is a remedy I have yet to try that could ‘do it all’ (there are always more options, though I have tried a whole heck of a bunch of them over the years)— but in the meantime should I just choose one or two and suffer… just because? That’s not common sense.

If I was taking six and it still wasn’t helping, that would be a different story. But if I get clear and positive results, well that’s the evidence right there.

When you are sick or suffering the last thing you need is to worry about the number of medicines.

Maybe you remember the parable about cooking the turkey? There are multiple variations like this one. So much of what the homeopathy world uses as ‘rules’ seems to be just because ‘that’s what we’ve always done’, without asking why or testing to see if it’s true.

So how many remedies can you use at one time? 

However many you actually need. 

According to my experience, that’s the number.

Thank you for reading and subscribing! As always, I am not offering medical advice, and I fully expect you to use your own common sense when helping yourself and others with medical conditions.