THERMAL

Question 2. We come to the next question whether the patient is
 hot  chilly

THERMAL AXIS — Hot or Chilly:

This is controversial. I’ve seen Homoeopaths not believing in Hot or Chilly. Excuses being given for not believing are: – a. Hot or Chilly recorded in books are by western standards, which may not be true by Indian standards.
b. If mentals or PQRS or all other symptoms are coinciding with a particular remedy, neglect the thermals.
c. Hot or Chilly are very difficult to derive, hence neglect it.
My answer to this:
a. If Hot or Chilly has been recorded in the western temperatures even 4-a.m. aggravation or mid-night aggravation is also by western standards. Should we then convert it to Indian standard time and take
mid-night aggravation as 7 p.m. or 8 p.m.? Then, arsenic will be given to Bryonia etc. If time is relative so also is temperature. Hot or Chilly is to be taken according to the Indian standards, which also varies according to altitudes.

A Chilly patient of Punjab may feel hot in Mumbai or Chennai. A Hot patient
of Mumbai may feel Chilly in Delhi.

Hot patient does not mean repertorily “Heated becoming aggravation” or
“Warmth aggravation” or “Sun aggravation”.
Similarly, Chilly patient does not mean “Cold aggravation” or “Cold air
aggravation” or “Cold becoming aggravation” as given in the repertory.

Hot or Cold aggravation makes it a particular. We are concerned with “GENERALS”. Now, we are concerned with the tolerance of that person to heat or cold as compared with others around him in the same environment.

a. Decreased tolerance to heat (as compared to others in the same climate) can safely be taken as HOT.

b. Decreased tolerance to cold (as compared to others in the same climate)
can safely be taken as CHILLY.

c. Increased tolerance to cold (as compared to others) can safely be taken
as HOT.

d. Increased tolerance to heat can be taken as Chilly.

Examples:
(i). People who cannot sit in a place without AC or fan even in winters or pleasant climate in which others are comfortable are distinctly HOT. People who need AC or Fan to be comfortable even in a pleasant climate are bound to be hot. People who rarely wear sweaters or are the last to wear sweaters
as compared to his friends or family members are apt to be HOT.

(ii). People who require double clothing or put-on a sweater easily on the slightest drop of mercury are mostly CHILLY. People who can sit comfortably with Tie and closed collars in a warm sultry room can be taken as CHILLY.

Many a times one finds the patient mentioning ” I feel heat as well as cold
very easily”.

There are patients who say, ” I cannot bear the extremes of both heat and cold”. These are Ambi-thermal drugs. e.g. : – Merc-sol, Antim-crud, Natrum-carb, Cinnabaris may be constantly sensitive to, intolerant to, and
aggravated by both heat and cold.

Mercury in acute diseases like cough, cold, coryza, fever or diarrhoea i.e. in PSORIC conditions presents itself as Hot. In chronic conditions like hypertension due to atherosclerosis, ulcerative colitis etc. i. e. when sycotic or syphilitic miasm prevails mercury presents itself as Chilly.

In demonstrating Chilly constitution please do not ask for warm bathing or cold bathing. I have students being misled by bathing water temperature. Bathing with warm or cold water is not reliable because it is more of a habit.

In cities and advanced urban areas where electricity is easily available and heaters and geysers are easily available there is tendency of bathing with warm water which ultimately becomes a habit. The more the sophistication
the more the people tend to incorporate geysers and heaters even in a warm climate as in Mumbai. In the rural areas or not so advanced areas where heating of water daily is impracticable one shall find people bathing with cold water even in coldest of winters, but it does not stamp them as hot. It is more
of habit.

Sitting and working daily in an airconditioned environment is also habit forming. One finds that chilly person working continuously in AC and that too chilled environment through the day but hates AC or even fan at night when
he is going to bed. He has a constant tussle with his wife or room partner who puts on the fan when he goes and switches it off again and again.

Talking of beds, one finds many patients saying, ” I have to have a thin or a thick covering on myself when I sleep at night”; again here it could be a habit. In such patients, one has to take the nature of the patient into consideration before stamping him as hot or chilly.

A timid constitution like Calcarea who prefers to retire into a shell finds blankets and covers simulating a shell and hence wants them for comforts irrespective of hot or chilly.

Another point to note in this hot or chilly section is, in most of the neurotic hysterical patients, one can safely neglect the importance of thermals. This sounds antagonistic.

The reason here being that hysterical patients as the word hysteria suggests have a tendency to react more than normal to natural-normal stimuli. Say for instance an ordinary tussle for fan at night between husband and wife is going to be exaggerated by one of them to lead to a divorce to suicide; one of them is positively reacting hysterically.

When ordinary contradiction by one sends the other into a rage the person is hysterical. In short, when any reaction to a situation is out of proportion to the action or stimulus the sensitivity of that person is increased bordering on hysteria.

Here in thermals too, same rule applies.

Heat or Cold is a stimulus. If a patient is already hypersensitive to all stimuli he/she is bound to react more to heat or cold as well. Hence, hysterical drugs cannot be confined to the mathematics of hot or chilly. They either react excessively to both or on the other hand you find them changing from hot to chilly at a drop of a hat with swings of the moods.

Pulsatilla, a definitely a hot remedy in acute illnesses with intolerance to heat and closed rooms with desire for cold open air is
known to be chilly at times albeit when hysterical symptoms predominate.

The changeability of Pulsatilla can also make it swing from hot to chilly or thirsty to thirstless with its famous now well-now ill constitution.

Ref : ToA