MATERNAL IMPRESSIONS--HEREDITY
Every child has a right to be born well. An undesired child never should
be brought into the world. An undesired child or a child of parents who
are not in good bodily or mental condition comes into the world with an
inheritance that perhaps never is overcome. How can we expect children
of parents with criminal tendencies to become good citizens?
Children born in circumstances under which the expectant mother has been
subjected to fright or to cruel treatment are handicapped in the very
beginning of life's race. Maternal impressions from fright or physical
violence undoubtedly are followed by the birth of individuals malformed
and in many respects with altered minds. Although some biologists try to
deny this, the coincidence is too widely observed to admit of doubt,
although the precise manner in which the effect is produced has not
been clearly demonstrated. Sufficient is known to make it of the utmost
importance that, in the interest of her offspring, the expectant mother
be not subjected to sudden or violent mechanical force or to any great
nervous shock. Equally important is it that she should be surrounded by
a harmonious environment in order to give the unborn child all possible
benefit of such surroundings.
By many it is claimed that the mother's mental condition during this
period will be reflected in the child both mentally and physically. For
instance if the mother be calm, free from worry and happy in
anticipation of the coming event, her offspring will have a sound
nervous system, shown by a perfect digestion and an excellent
disposition: while if the mother be irritable and unhappy her child is
inclined to have various digestive ills, as well as to be cross and
restless.
Great disturbances in the expectant mother's health also have their
effect upon the child. The erroneous idea that there is no life before
the third or fifth month allows many conscientious women to attempt
measures that will cause the discharge of the products of conception.
These measures not only are dangerous to the health or the life of the
woman but, in the event of their proving unsuccessful, may result in the
birth of a deformed or a mentally defective child.
Parents who have become degenerate from the immoderate use of alcohol or
other stimulants or those who are afflicted with one of the black
plagues furnish further examples of the birth of deficient offspring.
The question of heredity has received considerable attention during
recent years. As a result, many of our pet theories have undergone a
decided change. Many of the diseases which formerly were thought to be
acquired through inheritance we now know to be contracted through lack
of care or through association. The only inheritance is possibly a
tendency to the disease or a decrease in the power of resistance. It is
a law of pathology that the diseases of parents who suffer from certain
serious chronic maladies create in the offspring a condition of
defective life shown in malformations or in altered nutrition. The
hereditary influence of most diseases is shown in the transmission to
the child of a defective body shown by feebleness or a diminished power
of resisting disease.
In tuberculosis and other diseases that once were considered hereditary,
this influence is shown probably only in a predisposition to the disease
which under favorable circumstances finds an easy condition of growth.
The child does not actually inherit the disease and if placed in
favorable surroundings will outgrow the tendency, will overcome the
feeble vitality. But such a child if allowed to remain with its parent,
to breathe the germs of disease cast off by the parent, readily
contracts the disease. For the sake of the child it must be separated
from its tubercular parent. It must be given fresh air and nourishing
food.
There is one disease, though, that seems to be truly inherited: the
worst of the black plagues, syphilis. This may be inherited from either
parent, it frequently is inherited from the father even though the
mother does not contract the disease. This inheritance seems to manifest
itself chiefly in a disordered nutrition. Even during the first few
months of development, this may be so effective as to destroy life. You
remember, I mentioned this when I talked about abortions. If life is not
destroyed, the nutritional processes may be so affected that the
pregnancy will result in the birth of a defective child. These children,
perhaps fortunately, usually die during the first few months of their
lives. Seldom do they live to maturity. Many children who seem to have
escaped this inherited trait really have not done so, but their
inheritance is not recognized. Some people with defective generative
organs owe this to a diseased parent. Others suffering from a chronic
skin disorder, and many afflicted with epilepsy or some brain
malformation could trace their inheritance to the same source. This
disease seems truly to be an instance of "visiting the sins of the
fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation."
There is no doubt that the general health of the child is affected by
the health of the mother especially during the period when the child is
nourished from the mother's blood. Attention to such matters as diet,
sleep and exercise certainly has a great influence upon the constitution
of the unborn child. The best heritage a mother can give her child is a
strong constitution, and in order to do this she must make motherhood a
science.