Around 1950, Euphemia wrote Through the Wilderness, an account of life with her daughter. : I had two other children, a girl of 10 and a young son in his first year of high school. Both were healthy, normal children, who had progressed in step with companions of their own age in school.
I was equally healthy, and my physician, whom I had consulted early, gave me no hint anything unusual might be expected, but when the time for my delivery arrived, labor continued for five days, and finally, I was placed under complete anesthesia.
The difficulty had been caused by a breach presentation and other complications, but this was not explained to me immediately. However, I soon became aware of the apprehensions of the nurse, who remained with me for two weeks.
The baby was small and difficult to handle. When she was five days old, she weighed four and a half pounds and did not move, except as she was moved by the nurse. Her body heat was deficient, and she would not nurse or swallow any appreciable quantity of any liquid. The nurse was uneasy about bruises on the small body and, at her request on the seventh day, I asked the doctor to make a re-examination. He found the upper left arm had been fractured, and he set it with tiny splints and taped it to her body, explaining I should not be distressed at the idea of her suffering, because young babies nervous systems are not sufficiently developed to make them conscious of pain. He said the baby had been in a bad accident, and it would take a long time for her to recover, but gave me no information of what the complications might be. Neither did he suggest any kind of treatment.
Her condition had changed very little when I took charge of her, except she would nurse, and could swallow.
Großeltern
Eltern
Geschwister
Kinder
Ruth E Dimick | ||||||||||||||||||