Note 38 — Chapter IV · CONSTIPATION.

The very common practice of administering purgatives or injections a few days after confinement is not only unnecessary—it is fraught with mischief and often with disaster. I have known of instances where robust women were kept sick, and dangerously so, in bed for weeks in consequence of the free use of oil administered by the physician (according to his invariable practice) on the third and succeeding days. At her next confinement, one lady who had suffered as above, having lived hygienically during the gestation period, suffered very little pain, was on her feet, washed and dressed her baby, and had a natural movement on the second day. In another case purgation was attempted on the third day and, oil not acting promptly, the total results of profuse injections at intervals for the next three days, was, on the sixth day, to bring away about a teaspoonful of strawberry seeds, the residue of berries eaten on the previous day. It is evident that the food was well digested and absorbed into the circulation, and that no fecal matters were secreted; hence no occasion for the bowels to “move,” in the common understanding of the term. In cases where women approaching confinement are troubled with constipation (entirely unnecessary if they will live properly), the lower bowel should be evacuated by the aid of free injections prior to delivery; but succeeding that event nature may well be left to herself for a time. Nature, however, does not have a fair chance where patients of this class are overfed; hence, and hence only, the necessity for “aiding” her in moving the bowels.