THE SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS OF LABOR.
1. Although the majority of patients, a day or two before the labor comes on, are more bright and cheerful, some few are more anxious, fanciful, fidgety and reckless.
2. A few days, sometimes a few hours, before labor commences, the child "falls" as it is called; that is to say, there is a subsidence—a dropping—of the womb lower down the abdomen. This is the reason why she feels lighter and more comfortable, and more inclined to take exercise, and why she can breathe more freely.
3. The only inconvenience of the dropping of the womb is, that the womb presses more on the bladder, and sometimes causes an irritability of that organ, inducing a frequent desire to make water. The wearing the obstetric belt, as so particularly enjoined in previous pages, will greatly mitigate this inconvenience.
4. The subsidence—the dropping—of the womb may then be considered one of the earliest of the precursory symptoms of child-birth, and as the herald of the coming event.
5. She has, at this time, an increased moisture of the vagina—the passage leading to the womb—and of the external parts. She has, at length, slight pains, and then she has a "show," as it is called; which is the coming away of a mucous plug which, during pregnancy, had hermetically sealed up the mouth of the womb. The "show" is generally tinged with a little blood. When a "show" takes place, she may rest assured that labor has actually commenced. One of the early symptoms of labor is a frequent desire to relieve the bladder.
6. She ought not, on any account, unless it be ordered by the medical man, to take any stimulant as a remedy for the shivering. In case of shivering or chills, a cup either of hot lea or of hot gruel will be the best remedy for the shivering; and an extra blanket or two should be thrown over her, and be well tucked around her, in order to thoroughly exclude the air from the body. The extra clothing, as soon as she is warm and perspiring, should be gradually removed, as she ought not to be kept very hot, or it will weaken her, and will thus retard her labor.
7. She must not, on any account, force down—as her female friends or as a "pottering" old nurse may advise—to "grinding pains"; if sue does, it will rather retard than forward her labor. 8. During this stage, she had better walk about or sit down, and not confine herself to bed; indeed, there is no necessity for her, unless she particularly desire it, to remain in her chamber.
9. After an uncertain length of time, the pains alter in character. From being "grinding" they become "bearing down," and more regular and frequent, and the skin becomes both hot and perspiring. These may be considered the true labor-pains. The patient ought to bear in mind then that "true labor-pains" are situated in the back, and loins; they come on at regular intervals, rise gradually up to a certain pitch of intensity, and abate as gradually; it is a dull, heavy, deep sort of pain, producing occasionally a low moan from the patient; not sharp or twinging, which would elicit a very different expression of suffering from her.
10. Labor—and truly it maybe called, "labor." The fiat has gone forth that in "sorrow thou shalt bring forth children." Young, in his "Night Thoughts," beautifully expresses the common lot of women to suffer:
- "'Tis the common lot;
- in this shape, or in that, has fate entailed
- The mother's throes on all of women born,
- Not more the children than sure heirs of pain."