The Physical Life of Woman: Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother Part 9

The _temperaments_ exert over reproduction, as over all the other functions of the body, a powerful influence. Love is said to be the ruling pa.s.sion in the sanguine temperament, as ambition is in the bilious. There is also in some cases a peculiar condition of the nervous system which impels to, or diverts from, s.e.xual indulgence. In some women, even in moderation, it acts as a poison, being followed by headache and prostration, lasting for days.

With advancing years, the fading of s.e.xual desire calls attention to the general law, that animals and plants, when they become old, are dead to reproduction. What in early life is followed by temporary languor, in matured years is succeeded by a train of symptoms much graver and more durable.

Those who are in feeble health, and particularly those who have delicate chests, ought to be sober in the gratification of love. s.e.xual intercourse has proved mortal after severe haemorrhages.

All organized beings are powerfully affected by propagation. Animals become depressed and dejected after it. The flower which shines so brilliantly at the moment of its amours, after the consummation of that act, withers and falls. It is wise, therefore, in imparting life, to have a care not to shorten one's own existence. Nothing is more certain than that animals and plants lessen the duration of their lives by multiplied s.e.xual enjoyments. The abuse of these pleasures produces la.s.situde and weakness. Beauty of feature and grace of movement are sacrificed. When the excess is long continued, it occasions spasmodic and convulsive affections, enfeeblement of the senses, particularly that of sight, deprivation of the mental functions, loss of memory, pulmonary consumption and death. One of the most eminent of living physiologists has a.s.serted that 'development of the individual and the reproduction of the species stand in a reverse ratio to each other,' and that 'the highest degree of bodily rigor is inconsistent with more than a very modest indulgence in s.e.xual intercourse.'

The general principles we have just enunciated are of great importance in the regulation of the health. They are more suggestive and useful than the precise rules which have from time to time been laid down on this subject.

TIMES WHEN MARITAL RELATIONS SHOULD BE SUSPENDED.

There are times at which marital relations are eminently improper. We are told, I Cor. vii. 3, 4, that neither husband nor wife has the power to refuse the conjugal obligation when the debt is demanded. But there are certain legitimate causes for denial by the wife.

A condition of intoxication in the husband is a proper ground for refusal. Fecundation taking place while either parent has been in this state has produced idiots and epileptics. This has happened again and again. The cases on record are so numerous and well-authenticated, as to admit of no doubt in regard to the fatal effect upon the mind of the offspring of conception under such circ.u.mstances.

Physical degeneracy is also often a consequence of procreation during the alcoholic intoxication of one or both parents. A peculiar arrest of growth and development of body and mind takes place, and, in some instances, the unfortunate children, although living to years of manhood, remain permanent infants, just able to stand by the side of a chair, to utter a few simple sounds, and to be amused with childish toys.

During convalescence from a severe sickness, or when there is any local or const.i.tutional disease which would be aggravated by s.e.xual intercourse, it should be abstained from. There is reason for believing that a being procreated at a period of ill-humour, bodily indisposition, or nervous debility, may carry with it, during its whole existence, some small particles of these evils. When there exists any contagious disease, refusals are of course valid, and often a duty to the unborn.

Poverty, or the wish to have no more children, can only be exceptionally allowed as a reason for the denial of all conjugal privileges.

The opinion that s.e.xual relations practised during the time of the menses engender children liable to scrofulous disease, is a mere popular prejudice. But there are other and better-founded reasons for continence during these periods.

The question of intercourse during pregnancy and suckling will come up for consideration when speaking of these conditions hereafter.

CONDITIONS WHEN MARITAL RELATIONS ARE PAINFUL.

Nature has not designed that a function of great moment to the human race--one involving its very existence--should be attended with pain.

The presence of pleasure is indicative of health, its absence of disease. But to a woman who has systematically displaced her womb by years of imprudence in conduct or dress, this act, which should be a physiological one, and free from any hurtful tendencies becomes a source of distress and even of illness. The diseases of the womb which sometimes follow matrimony are not to be traced to excessive indulgence in many cases, but to indulgence _to any extent_ by those who have altered the natural relation of the parts before marriage. A prominent physician, Prof. T. Gaillard Thomas, of New York, has said that 'upon a woman who has enfeebled her system by habits of indulgence and luxury, pressed her uterus entirely out of its normal place, and who perhaps comes to the nuptial bed with some marked uterine disorder, the result of imprudence at menstrual epochs, s.e.xual intercourse has a _poisonous_ influence. The taking of food into the stomach exerts no hurtful influence on the digestive system; but the taking of food by a dyspeptic, who has abused and injured that organ, does so.'

When excessive pain exists, and every attempt occasions nervous trepidation and apprehension, it is absolutely certain that there is some diseased condition present, for which proper advice should be secured at once. Delay in doing so will not remove the necessity for medical interference in the end, while it will a.s.suredly aggravate the trouble. Prompt intelligent aid, on the contrary, is usually followed by the happiest results in such cases.

STERILITY.

Wives who never become mothers are said to be sterile or barren. This condition is frequently a cause of much unhappiness. Fortune may favor the married couple in every other respect, yet if she refuse to accord the boon of even a single heir to heart and home, her smiles will bear the aspect of frowns. It is then of some interest to inquire into the causes of this condition, and how to prevent or remedy their operation.

Dr. Duncan, of Edinburgh, has shown, by elaborate research, that in those wives who are destined to have children, there intervenes, on the average, about seventeen months between the marriage ceremony and the birth of the first child, and that the question whether a woman will be sterile is decided in the first three years of married life. If she have no children in that time, the chances are thirteen to one against her ever having any. In those cases, therefore, in which the first three years of married life are fruitless, it is highly desirable for those wishing a family to ascertain whether or not the barrenness is dependent upon any defective condition capable of relief.

The age of a wife at the time of marriage has much to do with the expectation of children. As the age increases over twenty-five years, the interval between the marriage and the birth of the first child is lengthened. For it has been ascertained that not only are women most fecund from twenty to twenty-four, but that they begin their career of child-bearing sooner after marriage than their younger or elder sisters.

Early marriages (those before the age of twenty) are sometimes more fruitful than late ones (those after twenty-four). The interesting result has further been arrived at in England, that about one in fourteen of all marriages of women between fifteen and nineteen are without offspring; that wives married at ages from twenty to twenty-four inclusive, are almost all fertile; and that after that age the chances of having no children gradually increases with the greater age at the time of marriage.

There are two kinds of sterility which are physiological, natural to all women,--that of young girls before p.u.b.erty, and that of women who are past the epoch of the cessation of the menses. In some very rare cases, conception takes place after cessation. In one published case, it occurred nine months afterwards, and in another eighteen months. In some very rare cases, also, conception has taken place before the first menstruation.

The older a woman is at the time of her marriage, the longer deferred is the age at which she naturally becomes sterile. She bears children later in life, in order to compensate, as it were, for her late commencement.

But although she continues to have children until a more advanced age than the earlier married, yet her actual child-bearing period is shorter. Nature does not entirely make up at the end of life for the time lost from the duties of maternity in early womanhood; for the younger married have really a longer era of fertility than the older, though it terminates at an earlier age.

A wife who, having had children, has ceased for three years to conceive, will probably bear no more, and the probability increases as time elapses. After the first, births take place with an average interval, in those who continue to be fertile, of about twenty months.

Nursing women are generally sterile, above all, during the first months which follow accouchement, because the vital forces are then concentrated on the secretion of the milk. In a majority of instances, when suckling is prolonged to even nineteen or twenty months, pregnancy does not take place at all until after weaning.

Climate has also an influence upon the fertility of marriages. In southern regions more children are born, fewer in northern. The number of children is in inverse proportion to the amount of food in a country and in a season. In Belgium, the higher the price of bread the greater the number of children, and the greater the number of infant deaths.

The seasons exert a power over the increase of population. The spring of the year, as has already been stated, is the most favourable to fecundity. It is not known whether day and night have any effect upon conception.

The worldly condition seems to have much to do with the size of a family. Rich and fashionable women have fewer children than their poor and hard-worked neighbours. Wealth and pleasure seem to be often gladly exchanged for the t.i.tle of mother.

But it is our more particular object now to inquire into the _causes of absolute sterility_ in individual cases, rather than to discuss the operation of general laws upon the fertility of the community at large, however inviting such a discussion may be. When marriages are fruitless, the wife is almost always blamed. It is not to be supposed that she is always in fault. Many husbands are absolutely sterile; for it is a mistake to consider that every man must be prolific who is vigorous and enjoys good health. Neither does it follow, because a woman has never given birth to a living child, that she has not conceived. About one marriage in eight is unproductive of living children, and therefore fails to add to the population. The seeds of life have, however, been more extensively sown among women than these figures would seem to indicate. If the life of an infant for a long time after birth is a frail one, before birth its existence is precarious in the extreme. It often perishes soon after conception. A sickness, unusually long and profuse, occurring in a young married woman a few days beyond the regular time, is often the only evidence she will ever have that a life she has communicated has been ended almost as soon as begun. A tendency to miscarriage may therefore be all that stands in the way of a family.

This is generally remediable.

It is a well-known fact that frigidity is a frequent cause of barrenness, as well as a barrier to matrimonial happiness. Its removal, so desirable, is in many cases possible by detecting and doing away with the cause. The causes are so various, that their enumeration here would be tedious and unprofitable, for most of them can only be discovered and remedied by a practical physician who has studied the particular case under consideration. So also in regard to the various displacements and diseases of the womb preventing conception. Proper medical treatment is usually followed by the best results.

While the fact that pleasure is found in the marital relation is a favourable augury for impregnation, it has been long noticed that Messalinas are sterile. It was observed in Paris, that out of one thousand only six bore children in the course of a year, whereas the ordinary proportion in that city for that time is three and a half births for every one hundred of the population.

In some women, nothing seems amiss but too intense pa.s.sion. Such cases are much more rare than instances of the opposite extreme producing the same effect.

A condition of debility, or the presence of certain special poisons in the blood, may prevent conception, or, what is to all intents the same thing, cause miscarriage. Many apparently feeble women have large families. But in numerous instances a tonic and sometimes an alternative const.i.tutional treatment is required before pregnancy will take place.

On the contrary, there are well-authenticated cases of women who were stout and barren in opulence becoming thin and prolific in poverty.

The stimulus of novelty to matrimonial intercourse imparted by a short separation of husband and wife, is often salutary in its influence upon fertility.

To show upon what slight const.i.tutional differences infertility often depends, it is merely necessary to allude to the fact, known to every one, that women who have not had children with one husband often have them with another. This condition of physiological incompatibility is evidently not altogether one of the emotional nature, for it is observed in animals, among whom it is by no means rare to find certain males and females who will not breed together, although both are known to be perfectly fruitful with other females and males. The ancients, believing that sterility was more common with couples of the same temperament and condition, advised, with Hippocrates, that blonde women should unite with dark men, thin women with stout men, and _vice versa._

Barren women should not despair. They sometimes become fecund after a long lapse of years. In other words, they are sterile only during a certain period of their lives, and then, a change occurring in their temperament with age, they become fruitful. History affords a striking example of this eccentricity of generation, in the birth of Louis XIV., whom Anne of Austria, Queen of France brought into the world after a sterility of twenty-two years. Catherine de Medicis, wife of Henry II., became the mother of ten children after a sterility of ten years. Dr.

Tilt, of London, mentions the case of a woman who was married at eighteen, but although both herself and her husband enjoyed habitual good health, conception did not take place until she was forty-eight, when she bore a child. Another case is reported where a well-formed female married at nineteen, and did not bear a child until she had reached her fiftieth year.

Families often suffer from the effects of sterility. Civilised nations never do. Recent researches have been carefully inst.i.tuted in several countries to determine the exact power of the human race to preserve its numbers against the ravages of death. It has been ascertained that during periods of peace the population can be maintained to the same point by the additions made to it through the procreating capacity of only one-half of the women in the community. Nature, therefore, has made ample provision for preventing a decrease of population through failure of reproduction.

She has also inst.i.tuted laws to prevent its undue increase. It would seem as if the extension of material mental and social comfort and culture has a tendency to render marriage less prolific, and population stationary or nearly so. So evident is this tendency, that it has been laid down as a maxim in sociology by Sismondi, that 'where the number of marriages is proportionally the greatest, where the greatest number of persons partic.i.p.ate in the duties and the virtues and the happiness of marriage, the smaller number of children does each marriage produce.'

Thus, to a certain extent, does nature endorse the opinions of those political economists who a.s.sert that increase of population beyond certain limits is an evil happily averted by wars, famines, and pestilences, which hence become national blessings in disguise. She, however, points to the extension of mental and moral education and refinement as gentler and surer means of reducing plethoric population than those suggested by Malthus and Mill.

Many causes of sterility, it will therefore be seen, are beyond the power of man to control. They operate on a large scale for the good of the whole. With these we have little concern. But there are others which may be influenced by intelligent endeavor. Some have been already alluded to, and the remedy suggested; but we will proceed to give more specific

ADVICE TO WIVES WHO DESIRE TO HAVE CHILDREN.

It has long been known that menstruation presents a group of phenomena closely allied to fecundity. The first eruption of the menses is an unequivocal sign of the awakening of the faculty of reproduction. The cessation of the menstrual epochs is a sign equally certain of the loss of the faculty of reproduction. When conception has taken place, the periodical flow is interrupted. Labor occurs at about the time in which the menses would have appeared. In short, it is a fact, now completely established, that the time immediately before, and particularly that after the monthly sickness, is the period the most favorable to fecundation. It is said that, by following the counsel to this effect given him by the celebrated Fernel, Henry II., the King of France, secured to himself offspring after the long sterility of his wife before referred to. Professor Bedford, of New York, says that he can point to more than one instance in which, by this advice, he has succeeded in adding to the happiness of parties who for years had been vainly hoping for the accomplishment of their wishes.

Repose of the woman, and, above all, sojourn on the bed after the act of generation, also facilitates conception. Hippocrates, the great father of medicine, was aware of this, and laid stress upon it in his advice to sterile wives.

The womb and the b.r.e.a.s.t.s are bound together by very strong sympathies: that which excites the one will stimulate the other. Dr. Charles Loudon mentions that four out of seven patients, by acting on this hint, became mothers. A similar idea occurred to the ill.u.s.trious Marshall Hall, who advised the application of a strong infant to the breast. Fomentations of warm milk to the b.r.e.a.s.t.s and the corresponding portion of the spinal column, and the use of the breast-pump two or three times a day, just before the menstrual period, have also been recommended by good medical authorities. Horseback exercise, carried to fatigue, seems occasionally to have conduced to pregnancy.

The greatest hope of success against sterility is to change the dominant state of the const.i.tution. But this can only be effected under suitable medical advice. The treatment of sterility--thanks to the recent researches of Dr. Marion Sims--is much more certain than formerly; and the intelligent physician is now able to ascertain the cause, and point out the remedy, where before all was conjecture and experiment. The sterile wife should, herefore, be slow in abandoning all hope of ever becoming a mother.

ON THE LIMITATION OF OFFSPRING.