The Physical Life of Woman
Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother written by Dr. George H. Napheys, A.M., M.D.
This book was located while cleaning out the attic in preparation for donating to a used book sale. The book was written about 1869 and published by The Hunter-Rose Company Limited of Toronto, Ontario. As it provides insight into the world in which our immigrant ancestors lived, a few excerpts are provided below.
Green Sickness - Page 32
When we speak of "green sickness," we mention perhaps the most common of all, and one of which every mother has heard. Doctors call it chlorosis, which also means greenness; for one of its most common and peculiar symptoms is a pale complexion with a greenish tinge.
It never occurs except at or near the age of puberty, and was long supposed to be merely an impoverishment of the blood. Now, however, we have learned that it is a disease of the nervous system, and one very often confounded by physicians with other complaints.
Its attack is insidious. A distaste for exertion and society, a fitful appetite, low spirits - these are all the symptoms noticed at first. Then, one by one, come palpitation of the heart, an unhealthy complexion, irregularity, dyspepsia, depraved tastes - such as a desire to eat slate-pencil dust, chalk, or clay - vague pains in body and limbs, a bad temper; until the girl, after several months, is a peevish, wretched, troublesome invalid.
The Wedding Tour - Page 69 - 70
The custom of our country prescribes a journey immediately after marriage, of a week or a month or two. It is an unwise provision. The event itself is disturbance enough for the system; and to be hurried hither and thither, stowed in berths and sleeping-cars, bothered with baggage, and annoyed with the importunities of cabmen, waiters, and hangers-on of every description, is enough, in ordinary times, to test the temper of a saint.
The foundation of many an unhappy future is laid on the wedding tour. Not only is the young wife tried beyond all her experience, and her nervous system harassed, but the husband, too, partakes of her weakness. Many men, who really love the woman they marry, are subject to a slight revulsion of feeling for a few days after marriage. "When the veil falls, and the girdle is loosed," says the German poet, Schiller, "the fair illusion vanishes." A half regret crosses their minds for the jolly bachelorhood they have renounced. The mysterious charms which gave their loved one the air of something more than human, disappear in the prosaic light of familiarity.
Let neither be alarmed or lose their self-control. Each requires indulgence, management, from the other; both should demand from themselves patience and self-command. A few weeks and this danger is over; but a mistake now is the mistake of a lifetime. More than one woman has confessed to us that her unhappiness commenced from her wedding-tour; and when we enquired more minutely, we have found that it arose from an ignorance and disregard of just such little precautions as we have been referring to.
Yet it is every way advisable that the young pair should escape the prying eyes of friends and relatives at such a moment. Let them choose some quiet resort, not too long a journey from home, where they can pass a few weeks in acquiring that more intimate knowledge of each other's character so essential to their future happiness.
What Kind of Rest is Most Healthful? - Page 75
Feather-beds are not conducive to the health of either sex. Mattresses made of wool, or of wool and horsehair, are much better. The bed should be opened, and its contents exposed to the air and sunlight, once every year. Beds long saturated with the night exhalations of their occupants are not wholesome. A number of ancient writers have alleged - and it has been reasserted by modern authorities - that sleeping on sponge is of service to those who desire to increase their families. The mattresses of compressed sponge recently introduced, therefore, commend themselves to married people thus situated. Hemlock boughs make a bed which has a well-established reputation for similiar virutes.
The odour of cone-bearing trees has a well-known influence upon the fruitfulness of wedlock. Those who live in pine forests have ordinarily large families of children.
Excessive clothing at night is highly injurious. So, also, is a fire in the bedroom, excepting in a case of sickness. If the body be too much heated during sleep, perspiration occurs, or the action of the heart is increased, and the whole economy becomes excited. Either condition prevents sound sleep and reinvigoration of the body. Wives in feeble health, and those liable to attacks of flooding, should, therefore, have a particular regard to the quantity of clothing on their beds.
Mothers' Marks - Page 145 - 146
There are numerous facts on record which prove that habitual, long continued mental conditions of the mother at an early period of pregnancy induce deformity or other abnormal development of the infant.
Professor William A. Hammond, of New York, relates the following striking case, which occurred in his own experience, and which scarcely admits of a doubt as to the influence of the maternal mind over the physical structure of the fetus.
A lady in the third month of her pregnancy was very much horrified by her husband being brought home one evening with a severe wound on the face, from which the blood was streaming. The shock to her was so great that she fainted, and subsequently had an hysterical attack, during which she was under Dr. Hammond's care. Soon after her recovery she told him that she was afraid her child would be affected in some way, and that even then she could not get rid of the impression the sight of her husband's bloody face had made upon her. In due time the child, a girl, was born. She had a dark red mark upon the face, corresponding in situation and extent with that which had been upon her father's face. She also proved to be idiotic.
Professor Dalton, of New York, states that the wife of the janitor of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of that city, during her pregnancy dreamed that she saw a man who had lost part of the ear. The dream made a great impression upon her mind, and she mentioned it to her husband. When her child was born, a portion of one ear was deficient, and the organ was exactly like the defective ear she had seen in her dream. When Professor Dalton was lecturing upon the development of the fetus as affected by the mind of the mother, the janitor called his attention to the foregoing instance. The ear looks exactly as if the portion had been cut off with a sharp knife.
Professor J. Lewis Smith, of Bellevue Hospital Medical College, New York, has met with the following cases: An Irish woman, of strong emotions and superstitions, was passing along a street, in the first months of her pregnancy, when she was accosted by a beggar, who raised her hand, destitute of thumb and fingers, and in "God's name" asked for alms. The woman passed on, but reflecting in whose name the money was asked, felt that she had committed a great sin in refusing assistance. She returned to the place where she had met the beggar, and on different days, but never afterwards saw her. Harassed by the thought of her imaginary sin, so that for weeks, according to her statement, she was distressed by it, she approached her confinement. A female infant was born, otherwise perfect but lacking the fingers and thumb on one hand. The deformed limb was on the same side, and it seemed to the mother to resemble precisely that of the beggar. In another case which Professor Smith met, a very similar malformation was attributed by the mother of her child to an accident occurring during the time of the pregnancy to a near relative, which necessitated amputation. He examined both of these children with defective limbs, and has no doubt of the truthfulness of the parents. In May, 1868, he removed a supernumerary thumb from an infant, whose mother, a baker's wife, gave the following history; - No one of the family, and no ancestor, to her knowledge, presented this deformity. In the early months of her pregnancy she sold bread from the counter, and nearly every day a child with a double thumb came in for a penny roll, presenting the penny between the thumb and the finger. After the third month she left the bakery, but the malformation was so impressed upon her mind that she was not surprised to see it reproduced in her infant.
To Have Labour Without Pain - Page 189
Is it possible to avoid the throes of labour and have children without suffering? This is a question which science answers in the affirmative. Medical art brings the water of Lethe to the bedside of woman in her hour of trial. Of late years chloroform and ether have been employed to lessen or annul the pains of childbirth, with the same success that has attended their use in surgery. Their administration is never pushed so as to produce complete consciousness, unless some operation is necessary, but merely so as to diminish sensibility and render the pains endurable. These agents are thus given without injury to the child, and without retarding the labour or exposing the mother to any danger. When properly employed they induce refreshing sleep, revive the drooping nervous system, and expedite the delivery.