Case #2:
An Adolescent Achieves Academic
and Social Success

Client : A 15-year-old teenager, quite tall for his age, with much difficulty and lack of interest in school work, who failed his end-of-term tests twice. In his sixth grade classroom, there are only small boys.  He is taller and older, but a slow student who lags academically.

In the interview with his parents,  they also noted his aggressiveness, saying he had bursts of anger, is anxious and insecure, bites his fingernails, and didn't have initiative for sports or other physical activities. His parents spoke about how much he was influenced by the group of friends in the neighborhood, saying the group was everything to him.

I felt this young man was insecure, fearful, shy, with a deep sensation of  being "lesser," in a body of a man five feet, eleven inches tall.

One of the great highlights of this case is the participation of his parents, always present in the sessions. His mother owns a children's school and his father is an electrical engineer. After talking to his parents and interviewing them, I saw the teenager and checked some factors with him, as described below:

• What was taking his interest away from studies?
• What method did he use to deal with homework?
• What were his  interests in life?
• What role did his friends and the neighborhood group play in his life?

I realized that the boy's parents also needed to change.  Despite their devotion, they were doing too much for him,  thus atrophying his ability to act in life, to develop independently.  I asked his parents to do a daily meditation, considering the spiritual identity of their son and saying,  "I trust you are able to hold the reins of your own life." I suggested they stopped picking him up at school, that they let him go back home by bus.  Overall, they needed to treat him as an individual who was fifteen years old.

In the interview that I had with the teenager, I treated him on a man-to-man basis. I noticed that at first he wanted to use regressive mechanisms, but from the middle of that session on, I reinforced his identity as a fifteen-year-old. I also noticed something very common in adolescence — the disconnection with his own values in favor of the group values.

First Formula:

Goldenrod + Wedding Bush + Madia + Fuchsia + Fairy Lantern + Sunflower + Manzanita + Larch + Mimulus + Wild Oat

I suggested he take 4 drops, 4 times a day, until his following visit.

Goldenrod this is an excellent remedy for preventing the loss of one's identity in moments in which the group pushes us to be something other than ourselves.

Wedding Bush is the flower essence of commitment. It was meant to help him to have a goal and to bring this goal to him every day, with clear and correct attitudes.

Madia focuses centering and is excellent for students whose energy has become dispersed, blocking their ability to concentrate or pay attention. Madia has the signature of a centripetal mandala: the petals converge to a single focus.

Bush Fuchsia is the flower essence of communication between the right and left hemispheres, between the rational and the intuitive sides of the brain. It is excellent for students with difficulty in mathematics (logical reasoning) as well as in composition, reading,  interpretation of texts, etc. (abstract reasoning).

Fairy Lantern : This flower addresses impediments in the developmental states. Being a child is wonderful, but being infantile and regressive is an obstacle. The soul becomes healthy by accepting its true developmental cycle.

Sunflower helps the individual recognize his own light, the power of his own attitudes and manhood. I am!

Manzanita helps the spirit make a healthy partnership with the body. It is excellent in adolescence where, for example, a young man can grow up to 7 inches in two years.  In such cases, the body changes so fast that the spirit can disassociate.

Larch : (Affirmation) I am able to do it! I can! I have my own values and I acknowledge them!

Mimulus : (Affirmation) I have the courage to face things!

Wild Oat : (Affirmation) I am not a drifting boat. I hold my rudder and I know where I am going to dock. I know where I am going.

Second Session:

At the interview with his parents, they marveled at how well he had done in terms of overcoming his former aggression, and about how secure he was.  He wanted to pass his exams and start going to an advanced school that allows students to take on more academic challenges.

During our subsequent interview, this young man showed  more awareness and constructive indignation regarding his powerlessness and insecurity. When a patient transforms anger and aggressiveness into indignation, it is a favorable sign, and evidence of renewed self-esteem.

Second Formula:

Clematis + Bush Fuchsia + Golden Rod + Madia + Mountain Pride + Larch + Gentian + Wild Oat + Rabbitbrush + Wedding Bush

I stressed with his parents the exercises to foster confidence and he and I did our own practical projects to develop his adult consciousness. In our conversations, I continued to treat him, not as a boy, but as a 15-year-old man.

Third Session:

He passed his fourth term tests with good grades and was able to register at the new school where his peers would be in his own age group. In our talk we also discussed methods of study: Which would be the best way for him to study? What time? Listening to music or not? Where in the house? How could he become interested in a school-specified subject that he didn't personally choose to study? What is it going to be like, now, to study at a school  that requires more from the student? And I would always repeat: "You are up to it! I trust you!" And I also gave him daily confidence exercises as homework.

Third Formula:

Elm + White Chestnut + Larch + Gentian + Clematis + Mountain Pride + Rabbitbrush + Buttercup + Madia

Fourth Session:

His parents showed great joy witnessing their son's development. Although the school was more demanding, he did not lose any ground and passed his thesis for the eighth grade. He is now only six months behind his friends in the neighborhood (he was formerly two years behind), and this, for a teenager, is most important. His parents still note a tendency to be lazy, but do not invalidate his enormous efforts and commitment.

Fourth Formula:

Hornbeam + Wedding Bush + Rosemary  + Black Spruce + Wild Oat + Trumpet Vine + Mountain Pride

In this formula I included Black Spruce . According to my research regarding the overcoming of "school problems," (I see many patients with this type of problem), Black Spruce is a very good essence for students with difficulty in History. I notice that students with difficulty in History are, in fact, saying something about their own difficulty in positioning themselves historically. Many of them ask: "Why study History if it is all gone by?" They just do not know that we study the past exactly to learn from what we did right and not repeat what we did wrong.

One could sense that the patient was more contented, more secure and more mature. He held good expectations about his upcoming sixteenth birthday, feeling more comfortable with his physical size.

Fifth Session:

At ages 16, the patient is in a classroom with boys and girls of his own age. He was starting to become interested in the girls, though he still felt very insecure in that area. He was very handsome and has grown even taller.

Fifth formula:

Sweet Pea + Clematis + Fairy Lantern + Goldenrod + Madia + California Wild Rose + Jacaranda + Unlocking Sexual Grace

Sixth Session:

He continues to do very well at school, is more adapted, and happier. He thinks he doesn't need more sessions. I supported his opinion, and he asked me for a maintenance formula.

Maintenance Formula:

Fairy Lantern + Sunflower + Madia + Mountain Pride + Milkweed + Clematis + Wild Oat + Rabbitbrush

I had several contacts with the patient and with his parents by phone over the course of the next year. During that time he took his maintenance formula faithfully.

Seventh Session:

The patient had turned 18 and was going to be in his last year in high school. He was taking driving lessons to get his license. He was more masculine and had become even taller (he is six feet, one inch now). He expressed a desire to become a dentist. I asked him to interview dentists and to visit a school of dentistry. He had also been practicing sports.

Final Formula:

Wild Oat + Madia + Manzanita + Rabbitbrush + Agave + Chestnut Bud + Clematis + Spanish Yucca .

Follow-up : His mother reported to me by telephone: "He is doing very well at school and has not been below the necessary average mark. Girls are very much after him as  he is tall and handsome. He is very loving and helpful with everyone in the family. He feels he is manlier. After considering a dental career, he decided to study Physical Education at the University. Next year he will go to College. I feel he is happy with himself."

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