an end to old ways? 

    as we leave the year 2012 , and head into 2013, we leave  behind some terrible events as we look forward to a  way to prevent them from happening again, and to mend ourselves from the shock of how man  himself can be his biggest enemy. guns made by our own hands and used against our own. where will it end and when is man ever going to learn to get along with himself? some things we can not change and others we can. we can learn from our past and should always look back when we need answers to life's problems. old time remedies are an answer that is becoming more prevalent in today's societies as we constantly search for alternative medicines and natural remedies to today's complex medicines designed to specifically treat one disease . a chance to look out side the box  was afforded to me by my grandma when talking one day. 

    grandma had discussed at length to me what living at her home place in monroe county just outside of graysville,ohio was like for her as a child during the depression. it seemed as if even for the children their life involved a lot of work to just make ends meet. wood had to be cut, ashes to be hauled out , wash day meant dragging the clothes to the creek and heating water in a tub to stir in some lye soap , and wash the clothes on a laundry board . hang them to dry and in the end fold and take back to the house and put away. the garden needed hoed and although grandma knew how to read and write quite proficiently , never heard talk much of going to school when she was a kid,  leaving me to believe that she was more needed at home. 

     from what grandma had told me i believe that school was something you attended when all the chores were done. during the depression in grandmas house i would say that was hardly ever as grandma and her sisters were to watch her mom as she had spells as they called them and you never knew when it was going to happen. these spells were actually epileptic seizures, but i doubt if they were was a lot known about them in those days. 

      they never knew when the seizures were going to happen but my great grandfather, insisted that the kids never leave her alone. that someone always be at her side. my great grandma wasn't helpless but she was frail and she would keep the girls busy doing normal household chores. one chore that required her to be outside was gardening and grandma a young girl of maybe 9 was helping her mom and sisters in the garden on the steep slopes of monroe county when one of these attacks occurred. apparently her mom went down in a heap on the ground and rolled to the bottom of the hill by the door to the house before she stopped rolling. this startled the helpless girls as they watched her rolling uncontrolled while in the throes of a fit. grandma and her sisters helped their mom into the house and grabbed cold wet rags to apply to her face in an attempt to clean her up. one child was sent to the neighbors house where the doctor had just been visiting as they still did in those days. he hurried back to their house to see what he could do to help. 

     he checked her out and at that time there was really no treatment one could expect for epilepsy , except to prevent the patient from swallowing her tongue. but the doctor offered up a rather peculiar treatment but refused to describe what it was until after he administered it. he asked the daughters for permission as it was experimental and their dad was not there to approve. they said yes even before hearing what it was he planned to do. they trusted the doctor and knew he had only the best intentions. he went on to tell them he tried this once before but almost lost the patient and again he asked permission and again the girls agreed. they only wanted for their mom to be free of these episodes if possible. the doctor again went on to say that the guy he treated never had an episode after that with the fits. this only prompted the girls to encourage him to move on with the treatment. he warned them that she may become violent and it will almost kill her but she will get better. again the girls egged him on. 

      out of his bag , he produced a vial of white powder and with a needle head he administered just a drop under her tongue and immediately her body went stiff. she arched back and forth and writhed on the floor at times frothing at the mouth . and eventually she relaxed and went into a deep slumber as it appeared. occasionally she would writhe in pain then slip into what appeared to be conscious and then back into unconscious moments where she was incoherent. she vomited at times and lost bodily functions but within an hour she was resting quietly , and while the doctor stayed at her side during that time he went on to finish his story. he said that he read that epilepsy was a wiring problem in the brain. lately we have learned that the left side and the right side of the brain short circuits and this causes the convulsions associated with the epileptic attacks.

      he went on to say that if strychnine a poison was administered at the proper moment , that  moment being immediately close to the end of an attack it creates pathways for those nerves to be aligned as the poison would attack the central nervous system creating a need for  the bodies fight or flight mechanisms to take over and make the body respond to the poison as it should. although the amount of poison wasn't enough to kill it was enough to stir the bodies defenses up. he stayed with her until he was sure she was ok and left her care to the daughters. grandma said to me she never had another epileptic attack after that. she did have other problems , but as far as the him administering the poison to help her , it seemed to have done what it was supposed to do. 

       the doctor later told the family that he would never do that again to another patient as both times he tried it he was in fear of losing both patients. i did some studying of strychnine after starting this blog to see just exactly what i was writing about . i found that strychnine poisoning can be overcome in the human body in short time . in as little as 10 hours the harmful affects of strychnine can be eliminated from the body. also that strychnine affects the neurotransmitters of the brain effectively blocking neural pathways causing normal simple functions to spasm with groups of muscles convulsing , and what usually happens in strychnine death is a shutdown of the respiratory system suffocating the victim. small doses are lethal with no known amount being safe as there are no studies. 

       to me there seems be some validity to using strychnine as treatment for epilepsy. current treatment for repeated episodes actually involves surgery as they split the two lobes of the brain surgically. other minor treatment includes medicating the brain . studies have been attempted at determining if light or other factors bring on seizures with no real definitive conclusion. 

      do not by any means attempt this procedure as it can kill you. this is only being wrote for entertainment purposes and should not be used as a basis for anything except for entertainment purposes to show how far we have come in modern science , yet at the same time old cures and procedures may still have merit in today's modern science. this was told to me by my grandma and is retold to the best of my recollection. this is an example of  stories my grandma would relay to me as we would sit and talk and reminisce about old times.