Firstborn

“ A WRONG TO THE MOTHER AND CHILD.—Sometimes the mother is diseased; the outlet from the womb, as a result of laceration by a previous child-birth, is frequently enlarged, thus allowing conception to take place very readily, and hence she has children in rapid succession. Besides the wrong to the mother in having children in such rapid succession, it is a great injustice to the babe in the womb and the one at the breast that they should follow each other so quickly that one is conceived while the other is nursing. ”

“ Young women of mature years should be made familiar with the physiological conditions which attend conception and maternity, and they need to know that from the [Pg 172] moment of conception life exists in the embryo, and that from the moment the spermatozoön enters and assimilates with the ovum a separate individual life is really begun, and that she is, at that very moment, the mother of this life within her as truly as when, in the later months, she feels the quickening within her, or after its birth experiences the joy of a mother who clasps her newborn infant in her arms. ”

“ The little child from three to six is interested in sun, moon, and stars, in day and darkness, in rain, snow, wind, in flowers and trees, as well as in animals and birds. Natural, spontaneous questions regarding the biological origin and development of life are asked between three and eight, and this is the period especially recommended for teaching the child of the mother’s part in his prenatal care, and the value of the father’s share, and thereby fostering his wholesome attitude of gratitude, and his respect for all motherhood and fatherhood. ”

“ But this notion is as destitute of support in fact as it is opposed to common sense, and the nearer any woman has approached the full term of forty weeks of pregnancy, the greater are the chances of her child being born alive and healthy.
The premature child is by no means necessarily still-born. It breathes, but does so imperfectly, so that air does not enter all the smaller air-cells; and its voice is a whimper rather than a cry. ”

“ There is some uncertainty respecting the exact length of the period of gestation, which grows out of the difficulty of determining, in many cases, the exact time when conception takes place.
Uterine Life.—The uterine life of the new individual begins with the impregnation of the ovum, which occurs the instant it is brought in contact with the zoösperms of the male. While in the uterus, the young life is supported wholly by the mother. She is obliged to provide not only for her own sustenance, but for the maintenance of her child. ”

“ The Crib.— The infant must have its own crib, without rockers, and it must on no account be put to sleep in the same bed with its mother. In its early life it should never be taken out of its crib except to be fed, to have its clothing changed, or to be bathed. There should be no holding on the lap, no dangling, no carrying or fussing over the new-born infant; and the more the baby is let alone, the better and healthier it will be. If baby cries, look at once to see if it needs a fresh napkin ”

“ Of course the father and the mother should be in the best possible physical and mental condition during the time of conception and even before conception, and the mother should take the very best care of herself—she should be in good health and as calm a spirit as possible during the entire period of gestation. For the general health and condition of the mother does influence the child. ”

“ You will explain that the baby comes in just the same way so far as its infant body is concerned, growing like the kitten from a tiny cell—borne by the mother till all the organs are formed which it needs for its earthly life, when it also is born and laid in its mother's arms, to be nourished and cared for by the love of both father and mother, not for a few weeks, as with animals, but through long years of helplessness. ”

“ In regard to cases where children are marked before birth, he says: “The effect must be produced upon the maternal blood, and transmitted through it to the fœtus, since there is no nervous communication between the parent and offspring.”
On every hand, life is full of facts illustrative of the influence of the mental and physical conditions of the mother on the organic structure and constitutional tendencies of the body and soul of her unborn child. ”

“ As used in this section, the term ``born alive ́ ́, with respect to a member of the species homo sapiens, means the complete expulsion or extraction from his or her mother of that member, at any stage of development, who after such expulsion or extraction breathes or has a beating heart, pulsation of the umbilical cord, or definite movement of voluntary muscles, regardless of whether the umbilical cord has been cut, and regardless of whether the expulsion or extraction occurs as a result of natural or induced labor, cesarean section, or induced abortion. ”

“ By the end of the third month, a definite enlargement of the mother’s body becomes visible, because not only the actual child within her has to be accounted for in the space among her organs, but all the accessory growth of the chamber which accommodates the child in the womb has to find its place, the womb growing rapidly and containing not only the child, but the large amount of fluid by which the child is surrounded, and in which it partly floats. ”

“ It lies in the choice of every expectant mother to journey through the months of pregnancy with dissatisfaction and resentment or with joy and serenity. "The child will be born and laid in your arms to be fed, cared for, and reared, whether you weep or smile through the months of waiting." ”

“ I will now show the several situations of the child in the mother’s womb, according to the 111different times of pregnancy, by which those that are contrary to nature, and are the chief cause of all ill labours, will be more easily conceived by the understanding midwife. It ought, therefore, in the first place, to be observed, that the infant, as well male as female, is generally situated in the midst of the womb ”

“ It is, nevertheless, worth while to note this tendency (see the analysis of Kleiner Hans, p. 5) .
The childbirth occurred early in the morning in the presence of a physician and a midwife. When all remnants of the birth, including some blood traces, were cleaned up, the father entered the room where the little one slept. She awoke as he entered. He imparted to her the news of the advent of a little brother which she took with surprise and strained facial expression. The father took her in his arms and carried her into the confinement chamber. ”

“ It is quite possible to become pregnant and yet it may be wholly impossible to give birth to a child. It is necessary to be constructed normally, or as near what is regarded as normal as is possible, in order safely to assume the responsibility of carrying a pregnancy to a successful completion. No one but a physician, who is skilled and familiar in the knowledge of what constitutes the proper size, and shape, and quality, and relations, one with another, of [69] your bones, and ligaments, and muscles, can tell whether you can safely be permitted to carry a pregnancy to term or not. ”

“ The greatest difficulty in the mind of the medical man, with regard to the possibility of maternal impression being communicated in any way to the foetus, is, as we have said, his knowledge of the anatomy of mother and foetus. While it is {67} generally supposed that the mother is very intimately connected with her child in utero, the actual connection is by no means so direct as might be expected from the popular impression. It is usually considered that the mother's blood flows in the child's veins ”

“ You came to know that papa and mamma are Santa Claus and that Santa Claus is a fairy story—and so you have probably already learned how the baby came. The baby really grows in the mother's body—did you know that? Do you know how long it takes for it to grow there? No? It takes nine months. Before you were born, you were growing inside of your mother's body. [129] The blood from your mother's body flowed into your body; in this way your body grew. When the baby comes out of its mother's body, it does not hurt the baby, but it hurts the mother. ”

“ From the time of conception until the birth of her child, the mother is carefully taken care of by our medical authorities. She must lead a quiet secluded life without any excitement and must take special treatments and foods so as to build up in herself and her unborn child good health and a balanced nervous system. ”

“ For the celestials of the inmost heaven love infants much more than parents, — even than mothers ; yea they are present with infants, and have care of them.^ It was told me, indeed, that they are present and are watchful over them, that they may be nourished, in the maternal womb. They therefore preside over the womb during gestation. ”

“ It is true that the legal denotation of the term infancy is "the period front a person's birth to the attainment of the age of twenty-one years," but in common speech an infant is "a child during the first two or three years of life," whilst writers on infant mortality restrict the term to the sense employed in the text. ”

“ Although the childbearing function is the origin and source of the human race, existing throughout the ages, the processes connected with it have only in recent years been clearly understood.
Our present-day knowledge of the processes connected with childbirth makes it easy to understand how, in the early ages of the human race, the function was a normal function, with little or no danger to mother or child. ”

“ Moreover, it is found that premature birth, one of the commonest accidents of modern life, tends to be prevented by such rest. The children of mothers who rest enjoy on the average three weeks longer development in the womb than the children of the mothers who do not rest, and this prolonged ante-natal development cannot fail to be a benefit for the whole of the [9] child's subsequent life. ”

“ But, however the child may be situated in the womb, or in whatever posture it presents itself at the time of birth, if it be not with its head forwards, as I have before described, it is always against nature, and the delivery will occasion the more pain and danger, and require greater care and skill from the midwife, than when the labour is more natural. ”

“ If the baby is normally healthy and has been made comfortable, it now falls sound asleep. This is nature’s way of permitting the mother to recuperate before nursing the baby for the first time. When the baby wakens, the mother will have regained her strength in that amazing way which is appreciated only by those who have watched her pass from the ordeal of labor into the joys of maternity as through a miracle. The baby should be given the breast when it awakens from its first sleep, and if there is any flow of milk whatever, no artificial food should be supplied. ”

“ As used in this section, the term "unborn children" or "unborn child" shall include all unborn child [sic] or children or the offspring of human beings from the moment of conception until birth at every stage of biological development. ”

“ Perhaps the root of the difficulty lies in the fact that childbirth, as well as the attendant suffering and death, are so familiar that they are regarded as being normal incidents in the ordinary course of affairs.
One of the most dramatic of all human events, the birth of a new being, is accepted casually, almost without concern, because it is so frequent—so commonplace. ”

“ The popular belief that prenatal influences on the mother affect the offspring physically, producing moles and other birth-marks, and even malformations of a more or less serious character, is said to be entirely unsupported by any trustworthy facts, and it is also rejected by physiologists on theoretical grounds. ”

“ In a more technical sense, however, the use of the term embryo is limited to the first six weeks of pregnancy and designates the condition of the young creature before it has acquired the form and the organs of the infant; after that time the unborn child is called a fetus. Embryonic development, therefore, in the strictest sense of the term, chiefly involves the shifting of various groups of cells and the bestowal upon them of different kinds of activity. ”

“ TAKING CARE OF THE BABY BEFORE HE COMES We shall see that taking care of your baby before he is born means taking such care of yourself throughout pregnancy, that you not only keep your own body in its usual good running order, but in addition, so effectively promote the activities of your various organs that you also keep the baby’s body going, his body that is growing all the time. ”

“ In the case of exposed infants it is important to ascertain the real mother. As such exposure usually takes place soon after birth, comparison of the age of the infant with the signs of recent delivery in the suspected mother is the best method of proving the relation. ”

“ The idea of prenatal culture as commonly taught is a delusion; the only method that the mother can employ to control the growth of her unborn child is to live a wholesome, normal life, [1298] physically and mentally, and thus supply her own body and that of the child with perfect material for the building of living cells. ”

“ Many claims are made that a child is seven months at birth which are based on the mis-counting of the date of conception or a desire to conceal a pre-marital conception. When one is shown, as one sometimes is, a bouncing, healthy, ordinary baby, and told that it was “a very forward seven months child,” those who know can only smile or sigh, according to the circumstances, for an ordinary, healthy, bouncing baby with nails and well formed skin has never yet been generated in seven months. ”