Epilepsy, Hysteria, and Neurasthenia Part 9

CHAPTER XIV

CONSTIPATION

"Causing a symptom to disappear is seldom the cure of any ill; the true course is to _prevent_ the symptom."

Rings of muscle cause wormlike movements of the bowels, and so propel forward food and waste. Weakening of these muscles or their nerve controls from any cause, results in a "condition of the bowels in which motions occur only when provoked by medicines or injections". In some cases though motions occur freely, food ingested is retained too long in the digestive tract.

The blood extracts what water it needs from the fluid waste in the large bowel, but when the weak muscles allow this to remain too long, an excess of moisture is removed, leaving hard, dry ma.s.ses, painful to pa.s.s.

When the faeces reach the a.n.u.s, they cause an uneasy feeling, which directs us to seek relief, but if we neglect this impulse the bowel may become so insensitive that it ceases to warn its owner of the need to evacuate.

Meantime, the muscles which expel the faeces get weak, so that every motion needs a strong effort of will, and much harmful straining.

Much misery is caused by false modesty in the presence of others. It can never be immodest to attend to the calls of Nature, and such hypersensitiveness is dangerous, for rupture, piles, fissure, prolapse, fistula, are often due to straining.

Lack of exercise weakens the intestinal and abdominal muscles. Unsuitable or imprudent foods or drinks, indigestion, excessive worry, and anything that lowers the general health tend to produce constipation.

Bacteria flourish freely in faeces, and though it is doubtful whether the "Auto-intoxication" so freely ascribed to them, is supported by facts, it cannot be doubted that, whatever the precise mechanism by which the effects are produced, constipation does result in a lowering of the resistance to disease. More frequent fits, colic, foul breath, headache right across the forehead, lost appet.i.te, drowsiness, skin eruptions, irritability, insomnia, melancholia and anaemia (especially the "green sickness" of women, usually connected with menstrual irregularities) are but a few of many ills partly or wholly due to or consequent upon constipation.

The symptoms of constipation of the small bowel are dry stools, usually light in colour.

To cure this type, more water should be drunk, so that the waste may pa.s.s to the large bowel in a fluid state. Drink freely between meals, especially in summer, when profuse perspiration often causes obstinate constipation.

The symptoms of constipation of the large bowel are furred tongue, foetid breath, sallow or jaundiced complexion, and mottled stools of round, hard b.a.l.l.s, the first portion being very firm, and the remainder nearly liquid.

There are occasional attacks of colic.

The first step towards cure is to form regular habits. At a suitable time, say shortly after breakfast, or after supper if you suffer from haemorrhoids, go to the lavatory, whether you feel uncomfortable or not.

Wait patiently, do not try to hasten matters by violent straining, and if for some weeks there is little improvement, do not despair, for the habits of a lifetime are not overcome in five minutes, just because you have decided to amend your careless ways. A short, brisk walk beforehand often helps.

If necessary, use a chamber and "squat" as savages do. In this position, the thighs support the abdomen, and force is exerted without straining.

Ma.s.saging the abdomen by firmly rubbing it round and round, clockwise, with the hand, often does good, as does pressure with a finger on the flesh between the end of the backbone and the a.n.u.s. Try every method before taking purgatives, for with patience and determination these are rarely necessary.

Carefully cooked and "concentrated", easily digested and "pre-digested"

foods contain little residue; every meal should contain some indigestible matter to stimulate the intestines. Brown bread, porridge, lettuce, cress, apples and coa.r.s.e vegetables are all good for this purpose, but if taken too freely may cause heartburn and flatulence. Meat, milk, fish, eggs and most patent foods have not enough waste. Boiled milk is very constipating.

Purgatives, injections and medicines, alone, are useless, for the bowel becomes still more insensitive to natural calls under the artificial stimulation of drugs, on which it becomes so entirely dependent that without their aid it will not act.

It may be necessary to clean out the bowel by an enema.

Make a lather with clean warm water and plain soap, and fill the enema syringe (a half-pint size is useful). Smear the nozzle with vaseline, lean forward and insert into the a.n.u.s, pointing a little to the left. Press the bulb, withdraw the nozzle, retain the liquid a few moments and a desire to go to stool will be felt.

A simpler plan is to buy glycerin suppositories. One is inserted into the a.n.u.s and acts like an injection. It must be clearly understood that these are emergency measures.

If internal piles come down at stool, do not allow them to remain and get engorged with blood. See that your hands are scrupulously clean, and your nails closely cut and free from dirt; then moisten the middle finger with a little vaseline taken to the lavatory for the purpose, and gently return the haemorrhoids, sitting down for a few minutes to retain them.

A mild purge may be taken once a week with advantage. Glauber's Salts (Sodium Sulphate), Cascara Sagrada, and liquid paraffin are all good, while Castor Oil Globules are suited for children.

For flatulence, take a 10-minim capsule of Terebine after meals, or charcoal, either as French Rusks ("Biscols Fraudin") or a teaspoonful of powdered charcoal between meals. One drop of creosote on a lump of sugar, peppermint water, and sal volatile may also be used. Sufferers should toast bread, and use sugar sparingly.

Patent medicines almost invariably contain a brisk aperient.

CHAPTER XV

GENERAL HYGIENE

"Better to hunt in fields for health unbought, Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught."

--Dryden.

If men but realized what complicated machines they were, they would use themselves better. In the body are 240 bones and hundreds of muscles. The heart, no bigger than the clenched fist, beats 100,000 times a day; the aerating surface of the lungs is equal in area to the floors of a six-roomed house, and by means of its minute blood-vessels which would stretch across the Atlantic, 500 gallons of blood are brought into contact with over 3,000 gallons of air every day.

Seven million sweat-glands, 30 miles long, get rid of a pint of liquid and an ounce of solid waste each day while it takes a tube 30 feet long, with millions of glands, to deal with a sip of milk.

Man's finest steam engine turns one-eighth of the energy supplied into work; nature's engine, muscle, turns one-third into work. The body contains 9 gallons of water, enough carbon to make 9,000 lead pencils, phosphorus for 8,000 boxes of matches, iron for 5 tacks, and salt enough to fill half a dozen salt-cellars.

Over 40 food-ferments have been found in the liver; there are 5,000,000 red and 30,000 white blood corpuscles in a s.p.a.ce as big as a pin's head, each one of which travels a mile a day and lives but a fortnight, millions of new ones being built up in the bone-marrow every second; a flash of light lasting only one eight-millionth of a second, will stimulate the eye, which can discriminate half a million tints. The ear can distinguish 11,000 tones, and is so sensitive that we hear waves of air less than one sixty-thousandth of an inch long; a ma.s.s of almost liquid jelly--for 81 per cent of the brain is water, and Aristotle thought it was a wet sponge to cool the hot heart--sends out impulses ordering our every thought and act, and stores up memory, we know not how or where.

There are 10,000,000,000 of cells in the brain cortex alone, and 560,000 fibres pa.s.s from the brain down the spinal cord.

A clear, watery cell, no larger than the dot on an "i" encloses factors causing genius or stupidity, honesty or roguery, pride or humility, patience or impulsiveness, coldness or ardour, tallness or shortness, form of head or hands, colour of eyes and hair, male or female s.e.x, and the thousand details that make a man.

Yet man uses this marvellous mechanism but carelessly, and the widespread poverty, the worry and discord in the lives of the happiest, our ignorance, the evil habits we contract, and the vice, miseries, diseases and labours to which most expectant mothers are too often exposed, explain why one baby in every eight never walks; why but four of them live to manhood; why less than 40 years is now man's average span; and why this brief s.p.a.ce is filled with suffering and misery, from which many escape by self-destruction.

Sound children do not come from unclean air, surroundings, habits, pursuits, pa.s.sions and parents. Children conceived in unsuitable surroundings by unsuitable parents, die; must die; ought to die. They are not built for the stern battle of life.

"Where the sun does not enter, the doctor does!"

--Italian proverb.

Plenty of fresh, clean air is essential to health.

In all rooms a block of wood nine inches high should be inserted beneath the whole length of the bottom sash of the window. This leaves a s.p.a.ce between the top and bottom sashes through which fresh air pa.s.ses freely, without draught, both night and day, for it should never be closed. A handy man will fit a simple device to prevent the windows being forced at night, but better let in a burglar than keep out air.

If it be cold or draughty in the bedroom, hang a sheet a foot from the window, put more blankets or an overcoat on the bed, or put layers of brown paper above the sheets, _but never close the window_.

You can take too much of many good things, but never too much pure air.

Cleanliness. Keep the body clean by taking at least one hot bath per week; per day if possible. Much filth is excreted by your sweat-pores; why let it cake on skin and underlinen, and silently silt up your thirty miles of skin ca.n.a.ls, thus overworking the other excretory organs, and gradually poisoning yourself?

Neuropaths always suffer from sluggish circulation of the extremities, and to improve this, hot and cold baths, spinal douches and ma.s.sage are excellent. A hot bath (98-110 F.) ensures a thorough cleansing, but it brings the blood to the surface, where its heat is quickly lost, enervating one, and causing a bout of s.h.i.+vering which increases the production of heat by stimulating the heat-regulating centre in the brain. Baths above 110 F.

induce faintness. To prevent s.h.i.+vering, take a cold douche after the hot bath, and have a brisk rub down with a coa.r.s.e towel, when a delightful, warm glow will result. Do not freeze yourself, or the reaction will not occur; what is wanted is a short, sharp shock, which sends the blood racing from the skin, to which it returns in tingling pulsations, which brace up the whole system. The douche is over in a few seconds, and may be enjoyed the year round, commencing in late Spring.

The cold bath must not be made a fetish. If the glow is not felt, give it up, and bathe in tepid (85-92 F.) or warm (93-98 F.) water. When started in the vigour of youth, the cold bath may often be continued through life, but it is unwise to commence in middle life. Parents should never force their children to take cold baths, to "harden them".

Other Hygienic Points. Tobacco is undesirable for neuropaths, save in moderation.