The Prospective Mother | Page 3

be
expected without its aid. They should remember also that whenever they take such a
well-known drug as ergot for the control of bleeding, or make use of many other
apparently simple measures, they are unconsciously rendering tribute to this type of
investigation.
J. WHITRIDGE WILLIAMS.
Johns Hopkins University, September, 1912.
* * * * *
CONTENTS
I. THE SIGNS OF PREGNANCY AND THE DATE OF CONFINEMENT II. THE
DEVELOPMENT OF THE OVUM III. THE EMBRYO IV. THE FOOD
REQUIREMENTS DURING PREGNANCY V. THE CARE OF THE BODY VI.
GENERAL HYGIENIC MEASURES VII. THE AILMENTS OF PREGNANCY VIII.
MISCARRIAGE IX. THE PREPARATIONS FOR CONFINEMENT X. THE BIRTH
OF THE CHILD XI. THE LYING-IN PERIOD XII. THE NURSING MOTHER
GLOSSARY
* * * * *
The Prospective Mother


CHAPTER I
THE SIGNS OF PREGNANCY AND THE DATE OF CONFINEMENT
The Positive Signs--The Probable Signs--The Presumptive Signs: The Cessation of
Menstruation; Changes in the Breasts; Morning Sickness; Disturbances in Urination--The
Duration of Pregnancy--The Estimation of the Date of Confinement--Prolonged

Pregnancy.
Many puzzling questions occur to the woman who is about to become a mother. Most of
these questions are reasonable and natural, and should be frankly answered; but a false
conventionality has--until recently, at least--forbidden any open discussion of facts
connected with childbirth. The inevitable result has been that, without experience of their
own to guide them, prospective mothers have sought advice from older women, whose
experience was at best very narrow, and whose views were often biased by tradition. Or,
distrusting such sources of information, they have consulted technical medical works
which they could not understand. Either of these methods is very likely to result in
misinformation and to cause unnecessary anxiety. Yet no one need be alarmed by a plain,
accurate account of Nature's plan to provide successive generations of human beings.
Some trustworthy knowledge of a process so fundamental should be part of every
person's education; it is especially helpful to women who are pregnant because it affords
a rational basis for hygienic measures which they should adopt. A popular work, however,
no matter how frank and helpful it may be, will not enable one to dispense with
professional advice. For the prospective mother no counsel is more important than this:
Put yourself at once under the care of a physician.
Insistence on the importance of medical advice should not be taken to imply that
pregnancy is to be regarded as other than a normal process. Its dangers are comparatively
slight, as we should expect, since the property of all living matter to reproduce its kind is
both fundamental and essential; the continuance of living creatures in this world, plants
as well as animals, depends upon the Reproductive Process. And yet, natural as it is,
pregnancy may be attended by complications. Such complications, though happily rare,
are to be guarded against in every case, and that may be most effectually done if patients
are taught to remain under competent medical supervision from the time of conception
until several weeks after the child is born. This precaution greatly reduces the frequency
of annoyances during pregnancy and also assists materially toward conducting a birth to a
safe conclusion. Moreover, if this advice is followed, when complications do arise they
will be recognized and dealt with promptly; they will not be permitted to grow more
serious until, perhaps, they may jeopardize the life of the mother or the child or both.
The initial symptoms of pregnancy are so widely known that in most instances the
prospective mother herself makes the diagnosis shortly after conception has taken place;
but now and then pregnancy advances for several months unrecognized and is then
detected by a physician who has been consulted on account of symptoms which the
patient has incorrectly attributed to some other condition. On the other hand, women
sometimes suspect that they are pregnant when they are not; and such mistakes occur
because certain symptoms which are implicitly trusted by the laity as manifestations of
pregnancy are occasionally associated with conditions quite foreign to it. It is clear that
one interested in the matter must know not only what the manifestations of pregnancy are
and when they appear, but also how far the evidence that they give is reliable.
The signs of pregnancy may be classified, according to their reliability, as presumptive,
probable, and positive. The doubtful evidence appears first and the infallible proof last.
No one need be surprised, therefore, if, when her suspicion is first aroused, she is unable

to decide positively whether she is pregnant. Physicians of broad experience, possessed
of facilities for observation which their patients cannot employ, may find it necessary to
make more than one examination before they commit themselves to a definite opinion; in
some cases, though very rarely, they must wait for two or three