CONFESSIONS
OF A
NEURASTHENIC
BY
WILLIAM TAYLOR MARRS, M.D.
With Original Illustrations
PHILADELPHIA
F. A. DAVIS COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT 1908,
BY
F. A. DAVIS COMPANY.
[Registered at Stationers' Hall, London, Eng.]
Philadelphia, Pa., U. S. A.:
Press of F. A. Davis Company,
1916 Cherry Street.
AUTHOR'S APOLOGY.
The author's life-work having been such as to enable him to be especially
observant, he can vouch for nearly every incident and statement recorded
in this monograph as being based upon an actual experience, and therefore
not merely the creation of something out of the whole cloth. In this
instance, the neurasthenic is made to carry quite a heavy burden; thus, in
a measure, suffering vicariously for the whole class to which he belongs.
The author has used his best efforts to tell his story in a happy vein,
without padding and a multiplicity of words. The writing of it has been a
task well mixed with pleasure, the latter of which it is hoped the reader
may, in some small measure, share. The suggestions that are intended to be
conveyed project between the lines, and therefore need no pointing out.
The one apology which the author desires to offer is for the constant
repetition of the personal pronoun. This has been all along a matter of
sincere regret to the author, but he saw no way of obviating it. It is a
difficult matter to tell a story, when you are your own hero and villain,
and keep down to a modest limit the ever-recurring _I_.
WILLIAM TAYLOR MARRS.
Peoria, Illinois.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. The Neurasthenic during his Infancy 1
II. The Perversity of his Childhood 7
III. As a Shiftless and Purposeless Youth 16
IV. His Pursuit of an Education 20
V. Tries to Find an Occupation Conducive to Health 27
VI. New Symptoms and the Pursuit of Health 35
VII. The Neurasthenic Falls in Love 42
VIII. Morbid Fears and Fancies 50
IX. Germs and How he Avoided Them. Appendicitis 55
X. Dieting for Health's Sake 63
XI. Tells of a Few New Occupations and Ventures 71
XII. Tries a New Business; also Travels some for his Health 77
XIII. Tries a Retired Life; is also an Investigator of New
Thought, Christian Science, Hypnotic Suggestion 84
XIV. The Cultivation of a Few Vices and the Consequences 90
XV. Considers Politics and Religion. Consults Osteopathic
and Homeopathic Doctors 94
XVI. Takes a Course in a Medical College 101
XVII. Turns Cow-boy. Has Run the Gamut of Fads 108
XVIII. Gives up the Task of Writing Confessions 113
ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
Nursing the baby 9
I was weaker than I really looked to be 11
My bump of continuity was poorly developed 21
I read up in the almanacs 29
Looking for new symptoms 33
Informed me I had psychasthenia anorexia 39
The wind was blowing a hurricane through my room 57
Good-night and good-bye 115
CHAPTER I.
THE NEURASTHENIC DURING HIS INFANCY.
The neurasthenic is born and not made to order, but it is only by
assiduous cultivation that he can hope to become a finished product. To
elucidate the fact presented by the latter half of the preceding sentence
is the purpose of this little book.
In telling a story it is always best to begin at the beginning. I shall
start by saying that I was born poor and without any opportunities,
therefore I ought to have been able to accomplish almost anything. The
reader will readily agree that the best inheritance that the average
American boy can have is indigence and lack of opportunity. For getting on
in the world and for carving out one's own little niche, nothing beats
having poverty-stricken, but sensible and respectable parents. Many a
fellow has been heard to deplore the lack of opportunities in his early
youth when, in reality, nothing stood in his way, unless it may have been
the rather unhandy handicap of being poor. Money may sometimes enable one
to get recognition in the hall of fame, and sometimes it is instrumental
in getting one's picture in the rogues' gallery.
So I consider myself fortunate in having been born well, except that I
inherited a neurosis instead of an estate. "Neurosis" and "neurotic" are
docile terms after you once form their acquaintance. They broke into my
vocabulary while I was yet at a tender age, and during all the intervening
years I have learned more and more about them, both from literary and
experimental standpoints.
A neurosis is a nervous symptom of some sort, and if you have a sufficient
number and variety of them you are a neurasthenic. If you ever get so that
you can move in neurasthenic circles, you will always be foolish about
your health and your physical and mental well-being. It is quite common
for us to ascribe all our defects to heredity. Poor old, overworked
heredity is the dumping-ground for the most of our laziness, perversity
and shortcomings! If we have a bad temper, a penchant for whiskey, or a
wryneck, heredity has the brunt to bear. We can always give our
imperfections a little veneering by saying that they were an inheritance.
Granting the significance of heredity as a factor in causing suffering, I
wish to emphasize the fact that we can inherit only tendencies, or the raw
material, as it were. We do the rest ourselves, and work out our
respective salvations either with or without fear and trembling. Quite
often improper training and adverse environment at an impressionable age
start us on the wrong track. And that brings me to the point.
With this seeming digression in order to prepare the reader's mind for
what is to follow, I return to my infancy--_in fancy_. At the age of
twenty-four hours, so I am told, I considered it necessary to have a
lighted lamp in my room at night. Other habits affecting my special senses
followed in rapid succession. The visitors began pouring in to see me on
the second day, and I think it was a morbid interest that any one could
work up over such a red, speckled mite of humanity as I must have been.
They all insisted on digging me out of my nest, taking me up and rolling
me about, when it was my natural inclination to want to sleep nearly all
the time. From this procedure I soon grew restless and disturbed sleep
followed.
For the first two or three days I had no desire for nourishment, so far as
I can remember now, but a number of concoctions were put down my unwilling
little throat. As I have since learned, a babe, like a chick, is born with
sufficient nourishment in its stomach to tide it along a few days without
parental intervention. You might be able to convince a hen mother of this
fact, but a human mother--never! So when I cried, it was for two or three
reasons: My feelings were outraged, or the variety of teas had created a
gas on my stomach which made me feel very uncomfortable (the old ladies
called it "misery"). Then I cried because I thought, or rather felt, that
the air-cells of my lungs needed expansion, and the crying act assisted
materially in doing this. If I could have talked or sung, I should not
have cried. Crying was the easiest and most natural thing for me to do. It
was then that I was introduced to the paregoric bottle, and I very soon
began to form the habit. My dear, good mother would have been terribly
incensed had any one suggested that her darling was becoming a little dope
fiend.
Remedies soon lost their soporific effect on me, or I acquired tolerance
to the usual dosage, and the folks had to hunt up new things to give. I
took soothing syrups and "baby's friends" galore. The night and the day
were not rightly divided for me; when I slept, it was during the day when
others were awake, and _vice versa_. I became a spoiled, pampered child,
and gained a great deal of attention and sympathy, in consequence of which
I became a veritable little bundle of nerves. While yet in my mother's
arms, I manifested many of the whims and vagaries which were destined to
crop out more strenuously as I grew older.
Ah, mothers, why does that big, loving heart of yours never falter or grow
weary in the performance of what you think is your bounden duty toward
your attention-loving little one? If Willie is not sick--and perhaps even
if he is--he needs a great deal of letting alone. Why jeopardize your own
health in perpetuating these midnight seances with him, thus engendering
in him a habit that will grow into "nerves," and perhaps later into
shattered health or a weakened character? Better let him cry it out once
and for all! But you are mothers, and motherhood being a heaven-born
institution, there is supposed to be a maternal instinct that ever guides
you aright. This I have the hardihood to seriously question.