ABOUT ME

If anybody had suggested 15 years ago that I would become a full-time practicing homeopath I would have been mystified and astonished! As a graduate of Yale University's Family Nurse Practitioner program in 1987 I was fully committed to the medical model of health and disease upon which my training was based.

After more than a decade of prescribing pharmaceutical drugs, however, I developed a strong gut feeling that there must be something "more". Intuitively I sensed that there was a connection between physical problems and the state of mind that mainstream medicine had not grasped. I began an intensive search for this missing link, never suspecting that the answer lay in a forgotten, 200 year old medical tradition called "homeopathy".

While I was taking workshops on hypnosis, guided imagery, and other mind-body therapies my two year old son became ill with an ear infection. After two courses of antibiotics failed to resolve his high fever and pain I became desperate, and brought him to a homeopath. Not having much faith in the little sugar pellets I was told to dissolve on his tongue, the rapid cure I then observed amazed me. Like most people, I tried to dismiss what I couldn't understand. But a repeat experience several months later forced me to take a closer look at this obscure medical art and science.

Within a year I had enrolled in the Hahnemann College of Homeopathy, widely considered the best and most thorough program in North America. Taught by Roger Morrison, Jonathan Shore, and Nancy Herrick, and other dedicated homeopaths, this four year program gave me a deep grounding in homeopathic philosophy, materia medica (the study of the sphere of action of different homeopathic remedies), case analysis, and management. After one year of study I was so persuaded of the superior efficacy and deeper healing provided by homeopathy that I opened up my own homeopathic practice in downtown Portland, and resigned my positions in mainstream medical settings. I had educated myself out of my jobs!

Since graduation as valedictorian of my class in 2001 I have continued my post-graduate studies with the best homeopaths in the world. Of these, the teachers who have influenced my practice the most are Divya Chabbra and Rajan Sankaran of Mumbai, India. In January-February of 2004 I spent one month in India studying with them and other great Indian homeopaths. I have also served as newsletter editor for the North American Society of Homeopaths, and opened up a second office in Walla Walla, Washington.

I take great joy in my practice of homeopathic medicine. It allows me to become both an instrument in, and a witness to, a healing process which points to a deep compassion and impulse towards wholeness built into the structure of our universe.

What do the initials 'CCH' and 'RSHom(NA)' stand for?

CCH means 'Certified in Classical Homeopathy'. This certification is increasingly recognized as the standard which guarantees professional competency in a field which still has very varied educational requirements from school to school, and includes practitioners from a variety of licensed and unlicensed backgrounds.

RSHom(NA) indicates a registered member with the North American Society of Homeopaths in North America, a professional organization establishing high standards of competency and ethics among homeopaths.

MY PHILOSOPHY

I am deeply committed to the principles of classical homeopathy, not as a matter of dogma, but as a matter of efficacy. The methods of classical homeopathy provide the deepest healing possible.

One of the most important principles of classical homeopathy is that a single remedy is prescribed at a time. This makes sense because everything is connected. All of our symptoms express a totality, a single state, a unique way in which we become limited in our freedom, trapped in a consciousness and physical disease which has its own coherent meaning. My job is to perceive it accurately and deeply, in order to match it with the most similar homeopathic remedy. Once this remedy is taken healing takes place from within. The patient's organism and vital force receives both the energy and information it needs to heal itself. The process of healing, unfolding from within, is a beautiful one to witness and to experience. The culmination of a good prescription is not only the resolution of physical and emotional symptoms, but an increased sense of freedom, joy, and well-being.