Читать книгу A Book of Medical Discourses, in Two Parts - Rebecca Lee Crumpler - Страница 4

Medical Discourses.

CHAPTER I.
HOW TO MARRY.

Table of Contents

At what age should a girl marry? is a question frequently asked by young girls of some confiding friend, and almost as frequently unsatisfactorily answered. Suppose the question be amended thus:—At what age and how should young girls marry? The answer to the last clause I would say, taking all things into consideration, with the consent of parents or guardians, it is best for a young woman to accept a suitor who is respectable, vigorous, industrious, and but a few years her senior, if not of an equal age. One who gives evidence, previous to wedlock, of being both capable and willing to take the entire responsibility of a wife upon himself. No objections, of course, to a union with wealth, all other things being equal. No sickly, sensitive young girl need expect to have it all sunshine, even with an industrious, well-meaning man for a husband, rich or poor. The age of a young woman should be about 19 or 20. It should be remembered that the union of persons of premature growth, that is before the body is well developed on either side, favors weakly children. And the same is true of the union of persons far advanced in years. Weakly mixtures also produce delicate children. A union of persons whose parents are of unmixed blood, and whose statures are nearly in proportion, usually turns out well. A man’s age should be between 22 and 25 when taking the responsibility of a family upon him. I will add just here that the way to be happy after marriage is to continue in the careful routine of the courting days, till it becomes a well understood thing between the two.

After marriage, if medical aid is required by the wife, let it be sought in a direction that there will never be cause to regret. Some women are over anxious for a family, and by their nervous whims make themselves and those around them unhappy. But it is to be deplored that there is a much larger class of young women whose minds are dark on the subject of preservation of health, and who soon forget, if they ever thought of the liabilities of a married life. On taking cold or feeling languid or nauseated a physician must at once be sent for. It should be borne in mind that many women begin to show signs of pregnancy by cold, severe pain in the head, back, stomach, or various parts of the body.

Numbers begin and continue for months with severe cramp colic, and if remedies of a powerful nature are applied, the mischief may be alarming. Many of the teas, sweats, baths, and potions that are effective in relieving a cold will be wholly ineffective when pregnancy is certain. Therefore repeated trials but disturbs the nervous system of the mother, through which all things are transmitted to the living germ. In all cases of suppression of the monthly flow after marriage, a careful physician should be at once consulted, if there is any reason to doubt that it is caused by pregnancy. Suffice it to say that too frequent physicking and over-indulgence in intoxicating liquors and tobacco, will cause sickly diminutive offspring, to say nothing of premature births.