Reprinted with the permission of The Homeopathic Links Journal, Volume 22, Autumn 2009. Reviewed by Petra Wood, UK.
"Matridonal" is Latin for "gifts of, or from, the mother". The remedies are Lac humanum, Folliculinum, Placenta humanum, Vernix caseosa, Amniotic fluid and Umbilical cord. All these substances are present at one point or another in the foetal/human development and are discarded afterwards. Their sole purpose is to create human beings. Melissa's intuition and idea has been that these remedies can be of great benefit to anybody who struggles with their process of incarnation, of finding their own identity and purpose in life. In this book Melissa shares her journey with these remedies. She shares some cases too, which illustrate the potential of healing these remedies offer.
The book tells the story of mankind, of being truly human. Therefore one of the first chapters is dedicated to the characteristics of the humanum family. This makes a fascinating and moving read.
The remedies are presented in the order that Melissa encountered them on her own journey as a homeopath and healer over the past 20 years and more. Each remedy has its own chapter, starting with a table of key features and themes, which is a great and very accessible summary. The information is not restricted to a set format but is derived from a variety of sources, for example substance information, cases and quotes from provings. The chapters are intertwined with poetry that weaves a magic spell to give deep and insightful messages.
This book is so far the only printed source of information on Amniotic fluid, Umbilical cord and Vernix caseosa (with information about Vernix also being available on the internet).
Personally, I refer to this book in my practice at least once a week, as the issues of the humanum family come up for so many of my patients: lack of identity, of purpose, of connection, of meaning - typically resulting in depression. Melissa wrote this book from the position of deep intuitive understanding with the additional benefit of years of clinical experience. It has been long awaited, and is a real gift to our profession.
Reprinted with the permission of The Society of Homeopaths. From "The Homeopath" Journal, Winter 2009 edition. Review by Jo Cocker.
In this book Melissa Assilem tells the story of the homeopathic remedies of the human family - Lac humanum, Folliculinum, Placenta humana, Vernix caseosa, Amniota humana and Umbilicus humanus. The aim, writes Melissa, is to give us insights into how these remedies have shaped our lives, connecting us to our evolution, genesis, incarnation and how they are able to reconnect us to our life purpose. As she puts it: "The story told - through these remedies - of connecting with the earthly journey of our soul."
Melissa begins with an overview, drawing and connecting this group of remedies together under the classification 'The human family', and she tells us of the human story of evolution, which forms a broad signature of this group of remedies. There is a spiritual aspect to the book, each chapter beginning and ending with a poem which sets the scene of the remedy. There is also a summary of the remedy, and although some have a discussion on differentials and suggested rubrics, it would have been useful to have this for all the remedies.
The book then gives us an overview of each remedy and states to be treated. The chapter on Vernix also has remedy relationships, which would have been valuable for the other remedies. We are then presented with some cases in which patients have transformed their health and lives, but I would have liked to hear about their physical pathology. The chapters on Amniota humana and Umbilicus humanus were more fleshed out and I would have liked to have seen this treatment given to the other remedies, as, although they are better known, their use is still limited due to the little information known about them and proven cases.
Although it is clear that Melissa carried out in-depth research and immersed herself in these remedies, and much of the information presented is both useful and fascinating, I sometimes found it difficult to separate the language of the remedy from Melissa's own voice in the book. The referencing of literature about each remedy is of variable quality, there are spelling mistakes, the most persistent being proving and proofer for proving and proven This appears to be deliberate, the idiosyncratic reasons are explained in the foreword.
While the drawings of Debora Koff-Choplin were inspirational, and in tune with the book, I found the comic-book style illustrations a little off-key. But all in all this is a useful introduction.
