A woman's work in water cure and sanitary education / by Mary S.G. Nichols.

  • Nichols, Mary Sargeant Gove, 1810-1884.
Date:
[1874]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A woman's work in water cure and sanitary education / by Mary S.G. Nichols. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    10/176 (page 2)
    after the birth of my first child. I was cured by the application of cold water. Soon after our family physician was induced to allow me to cure a fever in the family by bathing, the application of wet cloths, and so forth. This was before we had heard of Priessnitz. I had a book, published in London,in which bathing was highly recommended as a prophylactic, especially in the care and rearing of children. My first child was therefore bathed in cold water from her birth. I early apprehended the first principle of water cure ; that there must be sufficient vitality in the system to cause re-action and warmth after bathing, the application of the wet sheet, or bandages. A permanent chill causes congestion of the interior and vital organs which may prove fatal. The chilling of a cold bath may cause bleeding of the lungs. A wise caution is therefore indispensable in water cure. Though I studied with allopathic physicians and for a time believed in their medication, I still got all infor- mation respecting water cure that was possible to me. I conversed with those who had visited Priessnitz, I read all that they and others wrote on the subject, and I was unwearied in practice. Having been ill from my childhood, I tried every bath and every mode of practice on myself. Adapting my treatment to my own re-active power and that of my patients, I gradu- ally evolved a mode of practice differing from that of any water-cure physician with whom I was acquainted. The intuitive faculty and a sympathetic disposition adapted me to be a successful physician, and made what is termed a vocation. I was often able to per- ceive internal disease in a manner that seemed mar- vellous to those about me, so acute do the perceptions become in a tender and sympathetic relation with suffering. This sympathy seems at times almost able to cure disease without any treatment. Great care in adapting means to ends with delicate