The psychology of marriage / by Walter M. Gallichan.

  • Walter M. Gallichan
Date:
[1917]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The psychology of marriage / by Walter M. Gallichan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    sexual desire is frequently increased by fatigue of the nerves. Every girl and every woman should rest during the menstrual period for at least one day, and the hours of work should be shortened for a week. A warm or tepid bath should be taken at least once a day, and scrupulous cleanli¬ ness observed. Women do not respire as freely as men, and much of the suffering of women is due to constricting clothing, and lack of exercise in the open air. No girls should wear corsets, and every girl will be better in health and more fitted for maternal duties if even loose stays are abandoned. Sibson, Massick, Hutchinson, among other medical writers, attribute the costal or chest-breathing of women to the use of corsets. Man’s breathing is chiefly abdominal, and women who do not wear stays breathe as freely as men. It has been noted that primitive women breathe abdominally, in the same manner as men. Indian and Chinese women breathewith the abdomen,and American- Indian women who have taken to stays develop costal respiration. The difference in woman’s breathing capacity, as contrasted with that of man, is the result of constricting feminine clothing (Ellis). The question of allowing free play and expansion of the female diaphragm is highly important. Much of woman’s fatiguability, shortness of breath, disinclination for physical exertion, muscular weakness, heart trouble, painful child¬ bearing, inability to suckle children, and nervousness and dyspepsia, may be traced to the habit of wearing corsets. The origin of the corset among the Greeks of the decadent period was sexual allurement, and the fashion was afterwards adopted by the Romans. By causing chest respiration the corset renders the breasts more prominent, and by compressing the waist it accentuates the hips. The whalebone bodice was first worn in the sixteenth century. Men who avow a preference for the corset waist to the natural development are the abettors in a custom which has distorted the female form, caused serious impairment of the health of women, and had some injurious results upon the race. Girls should play as freely, but less violently, than boys. Their clothing should be adapted to free movement. The high-heeled shoe is an abomination, and the invention of
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