Families are thrown into
disorder and distress; friends suffer untold pains of anxiety and
sympathy; doctors are summoned from far and near; and all this while the
vertebra, or the membrane, or the muscle, as it may be, which is so
honestly believed to be diseased, and which shows every symptom of
diseased action or inaction, is sound and strong, and as well able as ever
it was to perform its function.
The common symptoms of hysteria everybody is familiar with,--the crying
and laughing in inappropriate places, the fancied impossibility of
breathing, and so forth,--which make such trouble and mortification for
the embarrassed companions of hysterical persons; and which, moreover, can
be very easily suppressed by a little wholesome severity, accompanied by
judicious threats or sudden use of cold water. But few people know or
suspect the number of diseases and conditions, supposed to be real,
serious, often incurable, which are simply and solely, or in a great part,
undetected hysteria. This very ignorance on the part of friends and
relatives makes it almost impossible for surgeons and physicians to treat
such cases properly.
Pages:
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220