The mother's hygienic hand-book; for the normal development and training of women and children, and the treatment of their diseases with hygienic agencies

Front matter

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! UNITED STATES OP AMERICA.

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Preface

It is natural for women to desire children. Every married woman, whose social relations and individual conditions are not abnormal, does desire them. But the artificial habits of society have so deteriorated the health of the majority of the women of all civilized countries that the idea of maternity is associated with many diseases and perils. The function of child-bearing is regarded almost everywhere in civilized society as necessarily attended with more or less of sickness, much suffering, and, possibly, death. And the impression is also very general among women that raising children is devitalizing and conducive to premature decrepitude and infirmity. It is for these reasons, more than because of pride, selfishness, or depravity, that so many women seek preventives of pregnancy, resort to abortion, or practice feticide or infanticide.

During a practice of more than thirty years I have noticed that the sufferings of child-birth, and the diseases incident to the periods of gestation and nursing, are, invariably, other circumstances being equal, in the direct ratio to the unhygienic habits of the mothers. Some women do, indeed, enjoy such favorable organizations and vigorous constitutions that they suffer little, comparatively, notwithstanding their habits of eating, drinking, dressing, exercise, &c, are in violation of almost every law of organic life ; while others, of feebler vitality and less fortunate development, may suffer much,

4 Preface.

despite the most careful attention to hygiene. Such cases, however, are rare and exceptional.

For more than twenty years, during which time I have had the professional care of one or more Health Institutions, I have been in the habit of receiving and treating women during confinement. Some of these were first cases ; others had suffered greatly in one or more previous labors \ but in no case did any one of my patients suffer severely. In most cases, although the labors were energetic, the pains were very slight and in all cases the sufferings were extremely trivial as compared with those of women generally. And when I add that the same results have attended all whom I have advised and attended in private practice, the reader may be prepared to appreciate the motives which have induced me to write this

book.

R. T. T.

Florence Heights, N. J.

Introduction

Motherhood ! There is no word, except God, of greater significance in human language. The function of maternity approximates creative power more nearly than any other known to human beings. The development of the primordial germ, the inception of life, the comminglement of the sperm and the germ cells producing an individual being, and the differentiation of cells into vessels, fibres, tissues, structures, and organs, ever have been and still are among the marvelous works which scientific minds admire and cannot solve. We know many of the processes or changes which organized matter undergoes in development and growth ; we understand many of the conditions which influence development and growth, and we are acquainted with a multitude of facts which relate to the neverceasing transformations of a living organism, from the moment of conception to its final dissolution. But the mystery of life still remains unfathomed. Perhaps it will never be revealed until " this mortal puts on immortality."

But for all practical purposes, so far as philosophy can comprehend, it is enough for us to know the laws of our being, the circumstances which affect us beneficially or injuriously, and to understand the great fundamental truth underlying all human conduct, — that all good is found in obedience to the laws of organic life, and that all evil results from disobedience.

Motherhood should be normal. But it never will be and never can be under the prevailing fashions of society. A man might as well drink intoxicating liquor and then endeavor

" To walk erect with face upturned to Heaven/' without gibbering or staggering, as a woman expect to eat, drink, dress, and dissipate in the fashionable ways, and be the mother of healthy offspring.

One of the pernicious errors abroad is that woman is the " weaker vessel " physically * thus accounting for, if not excusing, her manifold infirmities. Fashion is justified and nature blamed. This doctrine has its origin in viewing "woman as she is," and not " woman as she should be." The fact that woman in civilized life is, as a rule, feebler than man, is taken as the evidence of constitutional and natural infirmity.

There is no truth in this notion. Physically woman is man's equal. In bodily stamina, powers of endurance, vital resources and muscular strength, under the same circumstances of habit and education, she is in no sense his inferior ; on the contrary, if there is a difference, it is in her favor. This should be so ; and there is an anatomical and a physiological reason why it is so. The woman has not only to nourish herself but others. She must construct and replenish her own structures and those of the offspring. Hence she has the greater nutritive apparatus. It is because of this larger endowment of the nutritive system that her organization is more round and smooth, the organic nervous system more developed comparatively, and the glandular structures more prominent.

That women can endure prolonged labor, privation of food and sleep, and unceasing care and watchfulness, better than men, has been noticed a thousand times by physicians in the sick chambers ; and, according to the opportunities, there are living to day quite as many aged and vigorous women, who have been active workers through life, as of men. I could name a hundred examples, but two or three of world-wide fame will illustrate the principle just as wrell as a thousand could. 'Mrs. Sarah J. Hale, now eighty-four years of age, has labored incessantly in the field of literature for three score and ten years, and is now as busily and actively employed as in the days of her youth. Lucretia Mott, now eighty years of age, whose life has been one of remarkable industry and usefulness, retains all the powers of her vigorous mind seemingly unimpaired, with extraordinary bodily power and activity. Mrs. Lydia Maria Child, after earnest and unresting labor for nearly half a century, during which time she has produced some of the ablest historical works ever written, — works requiring vast labor, the closest attention, and the most careful discrimination, with accurate analysis and profound reasoning, is still apparently in her prime, mentally and physically. And last, though not least, Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who has raised a family of fine healthy children, is now, at the age of sixty, a model woman, so far as mental power and bodily organs are concerned.

Perhaps no woman living is better qualified to give an opinion on the subject we are considering than Mrs. Stanton. In a recent lecture delivered in San Francisco, California, on the subject of "Marriage and Maternity," Mrs. Stanton said:

" The idea that woman is weak, inherently, is a grand mistake. She is physically weak because she neglects her baths — because she violates every law of her nature and her God — because she dresses in a way that would kill a man. I feel it to be my mission to arouse ever}7 woman to bring up her daughter without breaking her up in doing so. Our female idea of dress is all wrong. My girlhood was spent mostly in the open air. I early imbibed the idea that a girl was as good as a boy, and I carried it out. I would walk five miles before breakfast, or ride ten on horseback. After I was married I wore my clothing sensibly. The weight hung alone on my shoulders. I never compressed my body out of its natural shape. My first four children were born and I suffered little. I then made up my mind that it was totally unnecessary for me to suffer at all, so I dressed lightly, walked every day, lived as much as possible in the open air, ate no condiments or spices, kept quiet, listened to music, looked at pictures, read poetry. The night before the birth of the child I walked three miles. The child was born .without a pai'tide of pain. I bathed it and dressed it, and it weighed ten and a half pounds. The same clay I dined with the family. Everybody said I would surely die, but I never had a relapse or a moment's inconvenience from it.

" Another idea : It is of more importance what kind of a child we raise than how many. It is better to produce one lion than twelve donkeys. We have got donkeys enough ; let us go into the lion business. Suppose our great statesmen, Clay, Webster and others like them, had had only the society of refined and educated women, they would not have, as they did, looked upon women only in a physical light. If men have dolls for wives they will seek the society of intellectual courtesans. We must have a new type of womanhood. We need it more than gold. Courtesans ruled France and brought her to ruin. Courtesans will rule this country unless woman rises to her true dignity. The old idea of the oak and the vine is pretty, but it is mere poetry ; the emergencies of life prove its falsity — the lightning strikes them both alike."

In concluding this introduction, the following remarks from another thinking woman, Rev. Antoinette Browne Blackwell, are worth recording :

"Who are Healthy Women among us?

" As I write from a rural neighborhood, I may be competent to testify that there still are healthy women among us — rosycheeked maidens, with ample waists and well -expanded chests, who can walk a mile or two to school, and sometimes help milk cows ; middle-aged, unmarried women, with stout, well-knit physique, plenty to do and cheerful hearts, accepting and gloryfying the most menial duties ■ mothers, who can bear the reasonable number of six or eight children, and look as wholesome still, in the green country setting as well-ripened apples in Autumn, hanging up among their glossy dark leaves. These are our healthy women. They all have something to do ; and yet are not overburdened either with care or never-ending labor. Now, who are the healthy women of the great world? When I used to be among them, "taking notes," I was immensely impressed with the fact that it was invariably women who had something to do, and did it always with a vigorous and reasonable enjoyment in the occupation. In the field, in the factory, in the household, on the platform, in the study, in the studio, and in a hundred other places, I have seen such women ; but I never knew a thoroughly healthy woman who had nothing to do except to get other women to make her pretty little things to wear ; and to wear them herself, chiefly at midnight.

" I am prepared to make the broad assertion that the average health of the intellectually working women of the last twenty years, in this country, is quite on a par with that of a smaller class of men. I affirm, moreover, that the health of mindworkers among men is rather below than above the medium standard of health for men generally — reason obvious : they stimulate mind at the expense of body. On the contrary, the average health of the women who coin money with their brains is above the average health of women generally — reason obvious : they have gained an additional object in life ; have established a balance of harmony between mind and body — most of them still retaining a fair share of the ordinary duties and privileges of womanhood. It remains for the public to decide whether these assertions are correct or incorrect. If they are facts, here is one direct avenue to health for women already indicated. I believe, moreover, that the health of working women of all grades, throughout all the various occupations in which they are now engaged, is fairly equal — other things being exactly balanced — to the health of men in the same or similar vocations ! "

CHAPTER I. Ante-natal Influences

Every child that is born is entitled to the inheritance of a sound bodily organization. This implies health on the part of both parents, but more especially on the part of the maternal parent, because she is much more immediately associated with the vital conditions of the offspring than the father is.

The child is but the unfolding of the mingled germs. The fertilized ovum contains all the elements of the future being. These elements are unfolded, not created, in the processes we term development and growth. How* else can we account for the resemblance of children to parents ? This is the law of all vital organisms, otherwise there could be no transmission of organization, no continuous and distinct species of plants or animals. The stalwart oak is but the unfolding of the acorn. The plant has nothing that did not exist in the seed. Our farmers understand the importance of perfect seed in producing the best crops. And they are not ignorant of the fact that comely and profitable animals cannot be raised unless both parents are healthy when they are begotten. But how little these considerations are thought of, and how much less they are regarded, in relation to human beings !

All persons who expect to have children desire them to be beautiful and good. But the vast majority who do have children are wholly reckless of all conditions that ensure that result. They give being to immortal souls in diseased conditions of body and morbid states of mind, and then wonder that a " mysterious Providence " afflicts them with frail or depraved offspring. It would be a very mysterious Providence that would reverse the order of nature, stultify His own laws, and produce good consequences from bad causes.

When we say that parents owe the duty to children of being healthy when they beget them, we have not quite reached the root of the matter. The woman who develops the germ must be healthy while she is doing it, or the germ will be defective, and its future unfoldment produce an imperfect being. There is, therefore, no practical solution of the great problem in sociology — normal organizations — except in training the girls healthfully. Who does not know that the great majority of girls, in all civilized countries, are reared, trained, educated, as well as fed and clothed, in direct opposition to all conditions of health, and all laws of their being? The wonder is not that so many are frail, but that any one is otherwise.

" Ye cannot gather figs of thorns nor grapes from thistles." The child is fated, through its whole period of earthly existence, to endure or enjoy, as the case may be, the conditions which the good or bad qualities of its parents have forced upon it. That this subject is, more than ever before, attracting the attention of writers and lecturers, is a hopeful sign. The New York Tribune, not long since, asserted that the cause of half the vice among us is the ignorance of parents of the fact that certain nervous and cerebral diseases transmitted from themselves tend to make criminals and drunkards of their children.

A man may drink moderately but steadily all his life, with no apparent harm to himself, but his daughters become nervous wrecks, his sons epileptics, libertines or incurable drunkards, the hereditary tendency to crime having its pathology and unvaried laws, precisely as scrofula, consumption or any other purely physical disease. These are stale truths to medical men, but the majority of parents, even those of average intelligence, are either ignorant or wickedly regardless of them. There will be a chance of ridding our jails and almshouses of half their tenants when our people are taught to treat drunkenness as a disease of the stomach and blood as well as of the soul, to meet it with common sense and a physician, as well as with threats of eternal damnation, and to remove gin-shops and gin-sellers for the same reason that they would stagnant ponds or unclean sewers. Another fatal mistake is in the training of children — the system of cramming, hot-house forcing of their brains, induced partly by the unhealthy, feverish ambition and struggle that mark every phase of our society, and partly for the short time allowed for education. The simplest physical laws that regulate the use and abuse of the brain are utterly disregarded by educated parents. To gratify a mother's silly vanity during a boy's school days, many a man is made incompetent and useless. If the °boy show any sign of unnatural ambition and power, instead of regarding it as a symptom of an unhealthy condition of the blood-vessels or other cerebral disease, and treating it accordingly, it is accepted as an evidence of genius, and the inflamed brain is taxed to the uttermost, until it gives way exhausted.

An eloquent writer says : " Women by nature are appointed to the holy mission of motherhood, and by this mission are directly charged with the care of the embryotic life, upon which so much of future good or ill depends. It is during this brief period that the initials of character are stamped upon the receptive incipient mentality which, expanding first into childhood and on to manhood or womanhood, reveals the true secrets of its nature."

The rights of children, then, as individuals, begin while yet they are in fcetal life. Children do not come into existence by any will or consent of their own. With their origin they have nothing to do, but in after life they become liable for action which perhaps was predetermined long prior to their assuming persona] responsibility. In youth, children are virtually the dependencies of their parents, subject to their government which may be either wise or mischievous, and is as often the latter as the former. But, having arrived at the proper age, they step into the world upon an equality with others previously there. At this time they are the result of the care which has been bestowed upon them from the time of conception, and whether they are delivered over to the world so as to be useful members of society, or whether they go into it to prove a constant annoyance and curse, seems to be a matter which cannot be made into such personal responsibility as to make it a subject of their own determining. At this period they find themselves possessed of a body and a partially developed mind, in the union of which, a harmonious disposition and character may have resulted. Respectively, they are possessed of all shades of disposition and character, from the angelic down to the most demoniacal ; but all these are held accountable to the same laws ; are expected to govern themselves by the same formula of associative justice, and are compelled by the power of public opinion to subscribe to the same general customs.

All people are obliged to meet the world with the characteristics with which they have been clothed, and which they had no choice in selecting. When all things which go to make up society are analyzed and formulated, it comes out that society holds its individual members responsible for deeds of which it is itself indirectly the cause, and therefore responsible for.

Another writer on this subject remarks : " It is scientifically true that the life which develops into the individual life never begins. That is to say, there is no time in which it can be said life begins where there was no life. The structural unit of nucleated protoplasm, which forms the centre around which aggregation proceeds, contains a pulsating life before it takes up this process. The character of the nerve stimula of which this is possessed, and which sustains this evidence of life, must depend upon the source from which it proceeds. In other words, and plainly, the condition of the parents at the time of the conception is a matter of prime importance, since the life principle with which the new organism is to begin its growth should be of the highest order.

" Cases of partial and total idiocy have been traced to the beastly inebriation of the parents at and previous to conception. On the other extreme, some of the highest intellects and the most noble and loveable characters the world ever produced, owed their condition to the peculiarly happy circumstances under which they began life, much of the after portion of the growing process having been under unfavorable circumstances. Many mothers can trace the irritable and nervously disagreeable condition of their children to their own condition at this time."

The pernicious fashions of society which are demoralizing woman mentally and physically, as well as unfitting them to be mothers of anything but monstrosities, are forcibly stated but not exaggerated by Mrs. Henry Ward Beecher in the Christian Union of a late date ; under the heading of

" What has become of all the Little Girls ?

" We look in vain into many pleasant homes ; or into the streets, cars, or steamers, for what was once a common sight, — ■ and was then, and ever must be, the sweetest object in nature, — a simple, artless, little girl, with all the pretty, unaffected ways and manners of unsophisticated childhood, fresh and beautiful, about her. There is no lack of small beings, dressed in such a marvelous style that Darwin himself would be puzzled to make out the class to which they belong • but we find nothing to remind us of the little girls we used to know, either in dress or manners.

" In former times a pretty muslin bonnet, or a 'simple closefitting cottage straw, was thought the most appropriate covering for a little head — protecting the bright eyes from too intense light, and shielding the rosy cheeks from the sun's too fervid kisses. But now we see something, placed on the sunny curls — leaving eyes and cheeks entirely unprotected — which is elaborately trimmed with bows, feathers, a flower-garden, or perhaps a mingling of both • for, although it is too small for even a goodsized doll, the milliner, with an ingenuity which would have been praiseworthy if exercised in a more sensible manner, has contrived to pile up trimming enough to hide even the faintest suspicion of a bonnet. But, what is sadder than the lack of true taste and good common sense in this stylish affair, we see no semblance of child-like simplicity in the wearer. And the bonnet is but the beginning of this unfortunate change which we mourn. The pretty lbaby waist] the plain white dress, the neat muslin or merino, so appropriate, which little girls used to wear, are supplanted by incomprehensible garments — the fac-simile of the grand dame's attire — flounces, fringes, bows, and double-skirts looped and festooned in an astounding manner, the child's — no, we mean the young lady's height, there are no children in these days — is less than her circumference. This dress is put on over a hoop, and the 'mite' who is made to carry such an incongruous burden, totters about on highheeled boots. This tiny specimen of womanhood, hardly weaned from her mother's breast — or more probably, a wetnuise's — shakes out her redundant robes, bending and twisting her small body in grotesque imitation of the woman spoken of by the prophet Isaiah, 'with haughty mien; walking and mincing as they go? See how the little ape looks over her shoulders, as she tottles about, to be sure that her hoops give her dress and figure the correct wiggle her sharp eyes have observed in the stylish mother and her fashionable friends. It is lamentable that all the simplicity and beauty of babyhood and childhood should be destroyed by fashion.

" Added to the absurdity of the dress, these little women attempt to discourse on the ' latest style.' With their companions or dolls you will hear them imitating the discussions on this subject, that they daily hear in the parlor or nursery, from their mother ; or, still imitating, with a contemptuous toss of their little heads, they will inform their listeners that they i couldn't think of 'sociating with those girls, because they are not stylish! '

"A few days since, as we passed out of a store on Broadway, our attention was arrested by the conversation of two little figures seated in a fine carriage, waiting, doubtless, for mamma to finish her shopping. They were dressed in a style positively overwhelming. Their hats were wonders of skill, their gloves had the orthodox number of buttons with bracelets over them, a dainty handkerchief suspended from a ring attached by a chain to another ring on the little doll-like fingers. The dress was simply indescribable. The elder was speaking to the younger, who, scarcely more than a baby, sat demurely by her side. ■ Oh, mercy ! just look at that horrid little girl who is crossing the street ! She has no hoops on, and not a single flounce — no trimming at all on her dress ! And, oh ! see her gloves ! — why, she has only one button ! Pshaw ! she's nobody — not a bit of style ! '

" The youngest lisped a reply, which we lost as we passed on ; but it was painful to think of the training they must have received which enabled them at that early age to judge a child of their own years so quickly by the rules of fashionable dress, and because her attire was not in exact accordance with that week's style, turn from her with contempt as something too low for their notice.

" Then, again, how soon a child taught by daily precept and example, learns to watch her little companions with envious or exultant feeling, as the case may be. How quickly she begins to grow hollow-hearted and deceitful ; receiving, as she sees her elders do, a companion with open arms, or a welcoming smile ; expressing the greatest affection, but the moment she leaves begin to criticise or make unkind remarks.

" i I don't like Nelly one bit, mamma ; she's such a proud, stuck-up thing ! I suppose she thought I should feel Bad 'cause her dress had more trimming and was a little newer style than mine. I didn't let her know that I noticed it. But I do think it real mean, mamma, that she should have nicer things than mine. Papa is twice as rich as her father. It made me mad to see her show off her dress ; and she kept looking at mine and sister's in such a way.'

" ' I hope, my dear, you were polite to Nellie.'

" ' Oh, yes ! But, mamma, I was awful glad when she left — though I was just as smiling and pleasant as could be to her face.'

" ' That's a good girl. You must always be very polite and cordial to your companions, you know. But I must say I think Nellie was quite vain ; and you must never show that you are proud of your clothes. I shall go out to-morrow and get that pretty dress you teased so for, I think."

" ' Oh, mamma ! I am so glad ! And as soon as it is made I'll go right over and call on Nellie. Won't she feel bad when she sees my new dress ! It will be ever so much prettier than hers.'

" And the mother smiled complacently, with never a thought of the improper and wicked feelings she was cultivating. Oh mothers ! How can you be so blind ! Both by precept and example you are teaching your children to make dress their idol ; and to know very little of anything but that which pertains to fashion ; to be envious or contemptuous of their little friends and companions, according as they are dressed better or worse than themselves. Can you ever reflect that God did not commit such treasures to your keeping without meaning some day to call upon you to render up the account of your stewardship? What can you say, when asked how you have trained the young souls given to your care ? Can you reply, We have been instant in season and out of season in teaching them — wThat ? To wrork for the good of others ■ to learn to do right ; in all simplicity to love and obey the Saviour, who, taking a little child in his arms, said, " of such is the kingdom of heaven.' ' Of such ? Ah, no ! Not of those children that you are training to avoid — not evil communications, but unfashionable companions ; to look on the outward adorning, and not on the heart.

" But it is not alone the wealthy, indeed, who make no pretence to any higher law than their own selfish gratification, who bow the knee to fashion. Christian mothers, are you guiltless? Think of the time, the health and strength, given to dress — the bondage which compels you to pervert all real taste, to do violence to your own natural instincts of neatness and true elegance, and accept the absurdities of fashion, simply because the ruling style requires it. If you are thus influenced and beguiled, do you flatter yourselves that your children will not, from their earliest years, regard such homage as important?