150. “Should never have had Children.”
I have not got one healthy child among my five, not because I did not get well looked after, but they are suffering through the past generation. My first child is now a man of twenty-seven, married, but has had a paralysed arm from two years old (a milder form of which was a family trouble). The second one died. My third, a daughter, is almost an invalid, through nerves, and has developed a state of “catalepsy” whenever she is overdone. She was trained to be a shorthand typist, but is unable to follow out same, as it excites her nerves. She is now a waitress, half time, and teaches music, to enable her to keep herself. The fourth suffers from congenital heart, and is always ailing more or less. She is a dressmaker. The fifth is now nine years old, and suffers from malnutrition, and is always ailing, but a clever child for her years. We have always been able to provide everything required to keep them in good health. But in the light of the knowledge I have got since I was able to grasp what things are, I have often said I was one of the women who should never have had children, as from a girl I was always ill, right through my married life till now. I have done child-bearing, and am now in better health than I can remember. I was married when I was twenty.
Wages 35s. to 45s.; five children.