137. Five Still-Births.
Mine is rather an exceptional case. Through being left without a mother when a baby—father was a very large farmer and girls were expected to do men’s work—I, at the age of sixteen, lifted weights that deformed the pelvis bones, therefore making confinement a very difficult case. I have five fine healthy girls, but the boys have all had to have the skull-bones taken away to get them past the pelvis. Always a case for two or three doctors, so you will know I have suffered something. I wish more could be done to train young girls to be more careful. Over my first baby I was eleven months before I could walk again. A woman ought, in my opinion, to be treated more or less as an invalid during pregnancy. I suffered most with sickness and swollen legs, terrible bad carryings. You cannot follow up with work as you ought to do. I suffered with a terrible bearing-down pain all through carrying. I often wonder how some poor women do that have such very fast confinements every twelve months and no care at all bestowed on them.
Wages 20s. to 22s. 6d.; five children and five still-births.