The Hygiene of the Change in Women
- Author:
Isabel Emslie Hutton, M.D. Heinemann, 5/-.
This is a most useful little book. On the dustcover it is described as having as its object ” to put before women a short resume of the whole subject of the change of life, and to give them directions for looking after their health so that they may continue to lead a normal and efficient life during this phase.” This resume is most suitably introduced by a clear account of the physiology of menstruation, and thus strikes at once a note of common-sense and reassurance; for many women throughout their lives have no understanding of the true nature of this process, but regard it always as something mysterious and ominous in its fluctuations.
Next comes an account of the menopause? the actual cessation of the menses?and of the physiological changes of the climacteric, in which the menopause is but one phenomenon. Disorders of the climacteric, emotional as well as physical, are then reviewed with frankness and sympathy, and with a reiteration of that note of reassurance which is so valuable in a work dealing with this subject and intended for the lay reader. The severer disorders, including mental breakdown, are not overlooked, but are dealt with sensibly and given , their rightful place as exceptional and not inevitable, as some women fear.
Several chapters are then devoted to the practical management of this phase of life, including advice as to the control of the obesity, which frequently develops at this age, by diet and exercises?these latter being described in detail. The book ends with some chapters full of hope and sympathy on the general mental attitude to be adopted towards ” The Change,” by women themselves, and by their husbands.
Those whose work brings them into contact with mental and neurotic sufferers will be aware how many of these sufferers are middle-aged women, in whom one vaguely feels that ” The Change ” is playing some part in their illness.
Sometimes the sufferer realises this, and her anxiety revolves round the fear of losing her reason, a catastrophe she associates with ” The Change.” Sometimes all she is aware of is a multitude of physical symptoms and discomforts which suggest to her all kinds of dreadful diseases, particularly heart trouble and cancer. The psychiatric or mental welfare worker who is primed with the information, and imbued with the spirit of Dr Emslie Hutton’s book will be in a position to give reassurance and sometimes advice to such troubled folk. Moreover the book is one which may be put into the hands of any reasonably intelligent woman (my daily woman read it with great interest and satisfaction), and anyone reading it must be left with a sense of reassurance as to the actual process of ” The Change,” and the prospects of life afterwards. The book should be in every Women’s Institute and Townwomen’s Guild library. L.H.
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