OUR BABIES.

Manawatu Standard, Volume 9160, Issue 9160, 9 March 1910, Page 7

OUR BABIES.

23x Hysexa. Published under tho auspices of the Society for the Health of Women and I Children. "It is wiser to put up a fence at the top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom." PLUNKET NURSES' SERVICES FREE. ADDRESSES OF PLUNKET NURSES AND SECRETARIES. Dunedin. —Plunket Nurses Mre Matheson and Miss Ellis. Office of the Society, Health Department Rooms, Liverpool street, Dunedin. Office hours, Monday, Thursday and Saturday, from 2to 3 p.m. Tel. 1136. Hon. sec, Mrs Carr, 8 Heriot row, Tel. 1774. Christchurch. —Plunket Nurses Morgan and Macarthy. Office of the Society, 27 Durham street South. Tel. 940. Office hours, 2 to 3 p.m. daily, except Saturdays and Sundays. Hon. sec, Mrs F. H. Pyne, Bealey avenue. Tel. 285. Wellington. —Plunket Nurse M'Donald. 73 Aro street. Tel. 2425. Hon. Eec, Mrs M'Vicar, 45 Marjoribanks street, City. Tel. 2642. Auckland. —Plunket Nurse Chappell, Park street. Tel. 851. Office of the Society, 2 Chancery etreet. Tel. 829. Office hours, Tuesdays and Fridays, 2.20 to 4 p.m. Hon. sec, Mre W. H. Parkes, Marinoto, Symonds street. Tel. 240. Palmerston North.—Plunket Nurse Henderson, care of W. Park, bookseller, The Square. Tel. 20. Hours, 3 to 4 p.m. daily. Hon. sec, Mre Jas. Young, College street. Napier.—Plunket Nurse Donald, Masonic Hotel. Tel. 87. Hon. sec. Mrs E. A. W. Henley, P.O. Box 64. Tel. 147. New Plymouth. —Plunket Nurse Warnock, "Criterion Hot-el. Hon. sec, Mrs R. J. Matthews. Timaru.—Plunket Nurse Bowman. Office of the Society, Arcade Chambers. Tel. 314. Office hours, 3,30 to 4.30 and 6.30 to 7.30. Hon. sec, Mrs Smithson, Faillie, Sefton street. Tel. 230. Society's Baby Hospital, Karitane Home. Anderson'e Bay, Dunedin. Tel. 1985. Demonstrations on points of interest to mothers are given by the matron every Wednesday afternoon from 2.30 to 3.30. All mothers are invited. Messages may be left at any time at the Plunket Nurses' Offices or private addresses. The Society's official sheet of instructions, written by Dr. Truby King, price 3d (postage free), and all other information available from the hon. secretary of each branch.

HANDLING THE BABY. Natural Mothering and _ Moderate Handling Beneficial. Babies who are allowed to lie passively in cots and who do not get sufficient mothering tend to be pale, torpid, flabby, and inert, and they often develop rickets or waste away with marasmus. This has been a common fate of babies boarded in institutions or licensed homes, and physicians have remarked how much rarer aro such diseases where the baby, though placed under otherwise parallel conditions, gets a good deal of handling through the presence of older children. Tho stimulation afforded by simple natural handling is beneficial and necessary, but much harm is done by excessive and meddlesome inteference and stimulation. Injudicious or Excessive Handling or Stimulation Highly Injurious.

Where there are many callers, a first baby is apt to lead the life of an infant prodigy in a sideshow, decked out for exhibition half its time, and always at hand for special performances before special visitors. The putting-up-of-food or "regurgitation" by babies soon after feeding is generally attributed to the nature or quantity of the milk or the manner of feeding, but in reality there may be little or nothing wrong with the food or with the tirnee or system of feeding. Mother and nurse often bring on regurgitation by handling a newly-fed baby carelessly (fondling, rocking, jogging, or patting him) instead of gently putting him into his cradle. It is true that if an infant is subject to colic, he may benefit by being sat up for a few minutes just after feeding to enable the wind to come away, but he should not be jogged or patted after a meal. Indeed, habitual patting on the back, done at any time of day, is highly injurious. Many women thoughtlessly and almost mechanically pat a. baby to soothe him whenever he is uncomfortable or fretful, and in this way they may insidiuosly bring on serious indigestion, accompanied by inability to keep down a sufficiency of food. Considering how readily seasickness, train-sicknese, or swing-sickness is induced in adults by infinitely less disturbing movements, one cannot wonder that infants often become profoundly upset by injudicious handling. If a woman's whole aim were to induce vomiting, she could not set about it more scientifically than when, picking up her baby, and deftlv balancing it face downwards with the laelly and chest supported on her open palm, she proceeds to rapidly pat the back with the other hand, thus subjecting the stomach to a series of direct concussions and squeezings while the head dangles face downwards over her wri6t. Apart altogether from tho manifest absurdity of the particular practice referred to, every woman should realise that any form of jolting, swinging, rocking, or concussion may induce giddiness in babies just as it would in adults, and thus indirectly upset the stomach, through the nervous eystem. Babiee have been sent to the Karitane Hospital suffering from emaciation, vomiting , , and grave nervous debility, attributable almost solely to this one factor. The same mother has been known to encounter similar difficulty in rearing child after child, and has arrived at the conclueion that her progeny had some grave inborn tendency to vomit, until the contrary was proved by removing the latest arrival to the charge of a quiet, sensible, trained baby nurse.

TREATING BABIES AS PLAYTHINGS. The following quotations from loading authorities may be of some avail in preventing young mothers from treating their babies as mere interesting playthinge, or allowing others to do so. This does not mean that babies are not to be allowed to play or to be judiciously played with. Play is a natural, joyous, overHowing expression of child lite and activity, and as such should be encouraged, but the- earliest play should be mainly with its first playmate—itself—its own feet. N.B. —Never play with and excite a baby just before bedtime. Nervousness. What are the principal causes of excessive nervousness in infants and young children, and what can be done to prevent this? The most important cause is the delicate structure of the brain at this time, and its rapid growth. It grows as much during the first year as during all the rest of life. This requires quiet and peaceful surroundings. Infante who are naturally nervous should be left much alone, should see but few people, should be played with very little, and should never be quieted with soothing syrups or the "comforter - ' (the latter, of course, applies to all children). What harm is done by playing with very young babies? They are made nervous and irritable, sleep badly, and suffer from indigestion and in many other ways. Professor Holt, Of Columbia University, Chief "Physician Babies' Hospital, Now York" Rocking of infants should bo dis- ! couraged. This subject should not be dismissed without reference to a practice that is as pernicious as it is common —viz., the custom of regarding the i

baby as a plaything, an animated boy for the entertainment of the family, as well as of a large circle of admiring friends. Children are fond of babies, and never tire of stimulating their funny performances. The samo is unfortunately true of parents and friends. From a purely economic point of view, such amusement is exceedingly expensive, and the mortality is constantly increased for the amusement of the elders. Nervous and mental wrecke too frequently owe the origin of their disorders to want of repose in early infancy, due to injudicious stimulation. In this connection let it be understood that all evidences of mental precocity, called "Smartness," should bo regarded as clanger signals, and call for repression rather than encouragement. Professor Cotton, University of Chicago. Parents should never lose sight of tho fact that infinite harm is done by ignoring the delicate and highly-sensitive nervous organisation of infancy; that theirs is the most sacred trust and privilege in tho world—to mould the body and shapethe destiny of a, new human being intended for a century of health and happiness hero and eternity hereafter. Half the irritability and lack of moral control which spoil adult life originate in tho first year of existence The seeds 'if feebleness and instability sown in infancy bear bitter fruit afterwards. For the ordinary family ill-healrh and in stability mean unemployablcness ;' unemployableness moans morbid thought and foeling; and morbid thought and feeling mean loafing, vice and crime.