Intestinal Ills / Chronic Constipation, Indigestion, Autogenetic Poisons, Diarrhea, Piles, Etc. Also Auto-Infection, Auto-Intoxication, Anemia, Emaciation, Etc. Due to Proctitis and Colitis

by Alcinous B. Jamison

The change from the normal functions of the anal membranes is slow, and the symptoms are not well marked and are consequently ignored for years owing to inexpertness in detecting an invading serious disease, until the time comes when the suffering can no longer be tolerated by the victim of the neglect.

The result of disease to muscular tissue is contraction of its fibres, and the contractions become more painful as the disease increases. Accompanying the inflammation, there is a more or less inflammatory product secreted between muscular fibres that "glues" them together in their contracted state. And as the anal and rectal tubes are made up of round muscular fibres, it is not hard to see how the bore of the canal can be lessened by the slow binding together of its fibres in the contracted state. The fact is that when the anal structure is invaded by inflammation, there is more or less stricture of the canal and of the orifice.

Recalling the sleeve illustration, and how the wrist-band was puckered and bent back a trifle so that the contents of the sleeve would not pass out so easily, suppose you now pucker the wrist-band rather tightly, and suppose there is a forcible descent of sand in the sleeve, the natural result would be a bulging out of the lower portion of the sleeve just above the wrist-band, or place of undue constriction. If the abnormally constricted condition of the anal orifice has been growing from bad to worse for years, the locality immediately above the anal canal will become dilated or cavernous (caused by retained feces or gases), which cavity is called ballooning of the rectum. When a speculum is introduced into the rectum (as shown on page 14 of pamphlet How to Become Strong), and through it a bent probe is inserted to determine the depth of the dilatation or abnormal cavity, it is as if one were poking inside of an inflated balloon: hence the name.

Anatomists describe the rectum as terminating in a forward pouch, which is close to the prostate gland in the male and the lower part of the vagina in the female. In some cases there may be such a slight pouch, due to the anal canal not following the direction of the rectum, and slightly turning backward; but in most cases such a normal pouch is not perceptible or observed through the speculum. The small pouch sometimes found on the anterior wall of the rectum I have thought due to a very acute inflammation on the verge of forming abscess, which often occurs in the triangular space. (See 4 in diagram in pamphlet cited above.)

Immediately above the sphincter muscles on the posterior wall of the rectum the greatest dilatation is found (as shown by the bent probe), and extends on each side with less depth about the anterior wall of the rectum.

The greater portion of the lower part of the rectum, which part is about three inches long, is usually involved in the dilatation or ballooning. Often the upper half or more of the anal canal is also dilated with the rectum, leaving the sphincter muscles quite bare of fatty tissue, with anal length of a quarter of an inch or less.

Your attention was called to a sleeve containing sand, and the bulging or dilatation above the puckered wrist-band that was an inch or more broad. Now suppose there were two strong rubber rings at the lower end of the wrist-band, whose power of resistance to pressure is much greater than the tissues above them forming the wrist-band. Naturally, the tissues which form the upper part of the wrist-band would dilate the same as the terminal portion of the sleeve just above the wrist-band.

Similar changes in structure or formation take place in diseases of the anal and rectal canals which result in ballooning of the rectum; and two frail constricted sphincter muscles are left to guard this balloon, filled, as it so often is, with feces and gas.

Chronic inflammation, that results in contraction of the circular muscular fibres, will sooner or later constrict the gut so that it will lose its normal power to expand without causing pain. The anal canal may be said to be strictured to the degree in which it is unable to dilate normally, and this strictured condition usually grows from bad to worse.

The first symptom of rectal disease is usually an affection of the anus, which affection occasions an inhibition, that is, a reluctant permission for the passage of the feces; and this inhibition results, consequently, in some degree of constipation. And this constipation reacts more or less on the peristaltic action of the bowels and in time defeats the function of peristalsis. All this will react on the inflammatory processes at the anus, which originally engendered the constipation. The narrow and contracted strait or canal through which the feces must pass, gives a tape-like shape to the stools.