The deficiency must be made up by artificial food, which must be
of a kind generally employed before the sixth month, and given through
the bottle. If, however, this plan of dieting should disagree, the
child must, even at this period, have a wet-nurse.
Women who marry comparatively late in life, and bear children,
generally have a deficiency of milk after the second or third month:
artificial feeding must in part be here resorted to.
THE INJURIOUS EFFECTS TO THE MOTHER AND INFANT OF UNDUE AND PROTRACTED
SUCKLING.
UPON THE MOTHER.--The period of suckling is generally one of the most
healthy of a woman's life. But there are exceptions to this as a
general rule; and nursing, instead of being accompanied by health, may
be the cause of its being materially, and even fatally, impaired. This
may arise out of one of two causes, either, a parent continuing to
suckle too long; or, from the original powers or strength not being
equal to the continued drain on the system.
Examples of the first class I am meeting with daily. I refer to poor
married women, who, having nursed their infants eighteen months, two
years, or even longer than this, from the belief that by so doing they
will prevent pregnancy, call to consult me with an exhausted frame and
disordered general health, arising solely from protracted nursing,
pursued from the above mistaken notion.
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