# My mom wants me to start homeopathic treatment. How do I get her off my back? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 26, 2006, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135 "2006-07-26T18:56:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![OneCentStamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/13edae/32.png) [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/21 "2006-07-26T22:51:53Z")
[QUOTE=AskNott] I apologize for that. I’m pretty sure this isn’t an appropriate place for a joke. [/QUOTE] Actually, I thought the thread had turned into a stimulating blend of honest advice and non-mean-spirited humor. I laughed at the Homeopathic Martini joke. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![MsMitey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@MsMitey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsMitey)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/22 "2006-07-26T22:52:00Z")
I’m 25, and I’m paying for every dime of my insurance and medical bills. So of course it doesn’t really matter what her opinion is. But my mom & I are pretty close, talking on the phone a couple of times a week, and I know she’s worried about my health. So, as long as she’s worried, she’s going to try to do something about it, and this is her way of doing something. **AskNott** , how’d you know my martini recipe? Unfortunately, I can’t drink until this whole thing gets better, so maybe I’ll have to put a glass of icewater on a picture of a martini and drink that instead. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/23 "2006-07-26T23:06:51Z")
[QUOTE=MsMitey] So I could tell her I was following a precise regimen of very expensive herbs and tinctures of things and she’d never know the difference. But then I fear that, if (when?!) I get better, she’ll use me as a “case study” on the effectiveness of this crap. [/QUOTE] Well, you could tell her you followed her instructions To. The. Letter. but it made your skin turn blue and your fingernails fell out. Tell her your doctor is furious with you, and he made you sign an agreement not to try any more homeopathy. How is it made, by the way? ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/24 "2006-07-26T23:17:02Z")
Tell her that you’ve taken her advice and started sleeping with multiple women at once. When she acts shocked, say “Oooooh! You said _homeopathic_…” ---
**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/25 "2006-07-26T23:26:55Z")
[QUOTE=AskNott] I apologize for that. I’m pretty sure this isn’t an appropriate place for a joke. [/QUOTE] Humor is OK, but only in extremely low concentrations. ---
**Author:** ![MsMitey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@MsMitey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsMitey)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/26 "2006-07-26T23:41:31Z")
[QUOTE=Giraffe] Humor is OK, but only in extremely low concentrations. [/QUOTE] This made my day. What would this place be without humor that norms might find inappropriate? I really don’t even know what homeopathic remedies are indicated here; I don’t think my mom knows, either. I have a coworker who’s been convinced by a naturopath that she also has candida sensitivity, so I’m going by what she complains about. I believe I would have to give up bread, because, you know, there’s yeast in bread, or something, even if it’s dead and not the same kind of yeast to begin with. And stop eating all wheat, and sugar (including natural fruit sugars), and stop drinking, because yeast eats wheat and sugar. And take a bunch of expensive herbs. Which sounds completely looney. I’m already off the booze and refined sugar, because that’s standard advice for when one is fighting a bladder infection, but I expect I can go back to eating m&ms and drinking scotch eventually. If I go with this “diagnosis”, that diet is for life. I tried to go to a website I found by googling “candida”, but it crashed my browser. So right now this question is purely theoretical. ---
**Author:** ![ianzin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ed655f/32.png) [@ianzin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ianzin)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/27 "2006-07-26T23:42:01Z")
What you can _not_ do is try to argue it out rationally. This won’t work. If you and your mother agreed on what constitutes a valid argument, you wouldn’t be in this position in the first place. What you _can_ do is fight fire with fire, so to speak. Tell your mother that if she would simply take up [reiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reiki) then this whole dispute over homoepathy would simply disappear. This is because reiki practitioners believe they can ‘send’ healing energies (or something) over any distance, to any target. 1000 miles makes no difference. So your mother can send the healing energies to you. Or she can buy the homeopathic remedies, wave her hands over them and send whatever healing properties they may have to you using reiki. Or she can even take the remedies herself and, having ingested the healing properties, reiki them your way. All of this and more is deemed to be possible with the miracle of reiki (compared to which, homeopathy is a cogent body of empirically-validated scientific enquiry). ---
**Author:** ![MsMitey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@MsMitey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsMitey)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/28 "2006-07-26T23:50:00Z")
**Ianzin,** that reminds me of when my brother-in-law tried to tell my mother-in-law that she really didn’t need a hip replaced. According to Falun Gong, (and he was new to the faith and very evangelistic) all she needed to do was focus the vibrations in her body, and she’d be healed! That idea didn’t go over so well. She’s such a smart woman in all other respects - it just bugs me that she’s got this area of her brain where logic fears to tread. I do have hope for explaining things to her, but I don’t know if that’ll stick. ---
**Author:** ![NicePete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ee7513/32.png) [@NicePete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NicePete)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2006, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/29 "2006-07-27T01:55:36Z")
Tell her you’re being treated by the world famous Dr. Andretti. ---
**Author:** ![MsMitey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@MsMitey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsMitey)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2006, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135/30 "2006-07-27T02:00:15Z")
Naw, I’ll only call him if it’s black. Hasn’t come to that yet. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-mom-wants-me-to-start-homeopathic-treatment-how-do-i-get-her-off-my-back/366135.md?page=1)