Dear Rapunzel, and everybody:

The idea that this 4 y.o. boy was “the picture of health” for his first three years is incorrect. Although he was vibrant and happy and has obviously suffered a severe setback in his well-being, nevertheless, many symptoms were present prior to the birth of his brother:

Crossing of eyes (once in a while)

Cried a fair amount as babe, seemed “high needs” then mellowed when I cut out dairy.

…we are very close, but in the past he used to push my buttons and I would lose it and yell at him…

…he was part of a playgroup of kids since birth, and although very well liked by other kids, often got the brunt of physical stuff, including severe bites from another boy…

…food allergies…

My guess is that more symptoms would be revealed by continued dialogue as mom has presented here in her excellent history, or by a detailed evaluation by a professional trained to observe behavioral, emotional, and—importantly—psychosomatic characteristics. Note that he pushed mom’s buttons and, apparently, also pushed the buttons of his peers, pointing to some social adjustment problems. I don’t mean to be alarmist in these statements, only to point to some areas of relative weakness in a strong-sounding personality. Questions of personality and emotional adjustment are especially sensitive topics, difficult to address in any case, but especially, I feel, in the so impersonal forum of the internet, but they bear examination as much as allergies and eyeglasses, and should be looked at with the same kind of “clinical” detachment, as much as possible.

This interpretation shifts the emphasis from the birth of a sibling toward evaluation of predisposing factors. The birth of the sibling may have been the straw that broke the camel’s back, but the real problem was that there were significant weaknesses in the camel’s back to begin with. This can be stated with great confidence, as we have benefit of hindsight here. Beforehand, this child’s numerous strengths would easily have masked his problems. My guess is that sooner or later, some problems would have emerged as new developmental challenges were faced, even had he not had such a reaction to the sibling birth.

As we are looking for correct “remedies,” I have to suggest that the first correct remedy in this case was the removal of dairy products during infancy. It is not unusual to see this pattern, that parents remove dairy products from their child’s diet, witness improvement, then later reintroduce the same products back into the child’s diet. Why would anyone do this? If we already know the substance was harmful to the child, that his adjustment and well-being improved when the substance was removed, why go back to it? The main reason, I think, is that it is a part of the “invisible” cultural set, the range of environmental artifacts the culture considers normal; to stick to a restricted diet like this is extremely difficult, requiring one to swim against the strong current of virtually unanimous popular and medical opinion.

Long and short: eliminate all dairy from his diet, meaning milk and eggs and everything made with them. At 4 years old, you will never have as easy a time accomplishing this feat, for when he’s older, he’ll resist and undermine. Beyond this, introduce fresh, uncooked, whole foods such as fruit, lots of it, and filtered water. A lot of people think of watermelon, for example, as a kind of dessert, to be indulged in only after the “heartier” fare. I’d drastically reverse this. Any time he wants it, give him whatever fruit he likes. Everything else, even a steak, is a processed food: cook it and it’s processed, bam.

Note that many symptoms pre- and post-sibling are of a psychosomatic nature, induced by stress, and related it seems to foods, mucousy (dairy) or otherwise: phlemmy during eating sometimes; poor digestion (is there something wrong with his body—disease?—or is his body trying to reject things that it finds noxious? I hold with the latter); poop after … painful episode; aggravated by eating, emotional upsets, riding in carseat (claustrophobia, feeling hemmed in or vulnerable or helpless?). Aggravated by eating allergic foods—again, why would you feed him foods to which you already know he’s allergic?

It is possible, perhaps even likely, that many of his problems will improve with the relatively simple modification of eliminating dairy products. Eliminate other allergic foods, and more progress will possibly follow. Then, eliminate sugar, food colorings, and the like, and start buying expensive organic foods, and still more progress will follow. Such is not always the case, but in your son’s situation, he seems already to be identified as someone who has reacted well to removal of a food group, so that suggests further efforts in that direction could be beneficial also. One can make a career of pursuing “healthful” alternatives in diet and lifestyle—do as much as is practically possible, or more than that if your child’s well-being demands it.

Remedy selection: Such changes have the added benefit of providing a cleaner field for the action of homeopathic remedies. I am not at a point of fully repertorizing homeopathic remedies, but I have to say that Arg Nit sounds good to me. I am guessing that his reaction to it in the first place was an aggravation of the similimum, and that the improvement that followed phos reflected the possibility that the phos antidoted the Arg N, bringing the aggravation to a close and leaving a healthy state, the amelioration produced by Arg n. The stress reactions, including the physical reactions of your son, point to Arg N, if I am reading the MM correctly.

Already I'm disagreeing with Snoopy. Suddenly my shirt collar feels like its tightening around my neck!

Bach

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"The need to perform adjustments for covariates...weakens the findings." BMJ Clinical Evidence: Mental Health, (No. 11), p. 95.... It's that simple, guys: bad numbers make bad science.