ON BEING ILL.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXVI, Issue 17477, 23 January 1919, Page 7

ON BEING ILL.

("The Age.") Though modern custom does not produce very many peop'.e who affect ilihealth as th^eir vocation, still ono old tim e curious tradition persists. If 1*"" are laid prostrate :t must at icast be by a mone-ter. If w e are ill, wo nrass be very ;•!!. No digmtv would aUach iv our grapplings wi'-'i a mere cold, feo w e call it intiuenza and dwell on mournful ijossibiiities. Insinuate _a doubt about our commercial integrity, or openly accuse us of being the gayest or clogsj and free forgivene&s is yours 5 but fail to give shocked and Respectful attenition »to our conviction that never has temperature risen to the heights ■that our.s lias scaled; fail to believe in the depths of agony to which our pecu_ liarly sensitive nerved have caused n s to sink, and you are no longer a friend of ours.

If it is our lot. to submit 'to the surgeon's knife, we were longer under the anaesthetic than nnv one else has spent in that lone region for a similar operation, or we stood it better, or we stood it worse. Indeed, so far do we carry our determination to be unique tha^ there have even been claimants for tha distinction of havin.se been the most persistently and violently sick. But, above all ei-:e, we have been in greater peril than our rivals.: "The doctor said" (wise man) "that- I wa s the worst cas2 he hacl. ever seen, and it was only my spirk that pulled me through." What fate, one wonders, is reserved for doctors when the recording angel shall have consulted about their attitude towards the temporal verities. They are undoubtedly placed between the horns of a most distressing dilemma, since to tel! the truth is to court disaster i.n this world, while to smooth things over, even with kind, comforting and earnestly desired lies, is not recommended as a preparation for th c nex-t. Who can, blame them if they

Take the cash and Jet the credit go, Nor heed .tile rumble of a distant drum

Ther c is never, perhaps, a time when w e are so chockful of unvarnished human nature as when we are ill. } Ask a man who is recovering from a serious illness what sort of a doctor he had, and nine times out of ten you will be 'told "a very decent ch,at>, but it was nurse that pulled m e through.' Stuck t o me lik c a Briton. That woman is a positive wonder." This, incidentally, explains why we have heard so much of the very tine women who have nursed Billjim .through the vicissitudes of war and so littl-a of the equally fin e men who have doctored him. Ask, however, a fluttering fair one to whom she attributes her recovery. If her medical adviser has been one of her own sex, nurse and doctor would probab'y share the credit pretty equally. If however, a man has directed her on the road to health, .the chances are that the nurse will not be mentioned at all, or we may hear that "she was very good.. bttt so many of those, trained nurees don't get on with the maids/ Murmur her doctor's name' and rhapsody ensues, "Isn't h e a dear. He always seemed to know exactly how I felt, and when I was at my worst it was like new life just to see him come into 'the room.'" It is just as well that life has its compensations. Sometimes poor human nature gets a little out of hand. The present writer ha g a lively recollection of a piteous damsel of forty odd. who cherished a secret and devastating passion for her medical adviser, and consequently found herse!f quite unable to recover from an attack of neuritis. The innocent and entirely uninterested young man was at a loss *o accoant for her continued prostration until a gentle bint from a kecn-ev-ed nurse put him on the right track. The following conversation." took the. place of a prescription on his next visit: — • "Good morning, Miss Blank. Had a good night?" "Oh no, doctor. I always sleep so badly." " Anything worrying you ? "Oh, no, doctor ('threatened tears). I just don't seem to be able to sleep." "H'm, well, if it'« the loss of ypur looks that is troubling you it really needn't. When your health picks up you'll soon look fresh again." Recovery was almost instantaneous, a fine healthy rage being substituted for the usual convalescence. Men are not, as a rule, impatient pa,tknts, but it cannot be denied that they are very nervou s ones, filled always with a desolate certainty that for them health, if not life itself, is at ah end. They have, too, a feeling of the indignity of illness, a sense of outrage when their physical fitness is impaired, from which women are almost entirely free. A man fee's that "all's right with the world" when he can proclaim that he is "in the pink," but many women have n°t s^t freed themselves from the bondage of early Victorian tradition. The dear creatures nearly all prefer to be told that they "don't look at all strong." and they usually feel that there is something a little wrong with the sympathies and perceptions of persons who accuse them of appearing "the picture of health." There is no telling what kind of female being: may be evolved from the munition Workers, conductorette s and farm, erettes of to-day. The woman of 'he future may even be able to afford the inestimable privilege of being as bad tempered and domineering as the man she no longer calls her lord and master, but sh e has far to go befor e she can understand the feeling of bitter resentment that hits a man.when he is down. From the great one who said to allthe lesser ones who have only felt it, ifr is men who know that To be weak is miserable, Doing or puffer ing.