Dr. Tilt informs us that, having carefully interrogated one hundred women in whom menstruation had returned at different periods of lactation, he learned that the quantity and quality of the milk were varied as follows:
| The same in | 45 |
| Diminished only at the menstrual time | 8 |
| Completely checked in | 1 |
| Impoverished only at the menstrual time | 5 |
| Impoverished then and thenceforth | 2 |
| Increased at the menstrual time | 24 |
| A rush of milk afterward | 15 |
| 100 |
In making the above observations, the thriving of the children was the estimate of the quality of the milk. By “impoverishment,” was meant that the milk looked like whey, and sickened the children.
My belief, then, you will understand to be, that some other criterion than the reappearance of the menses is to be looked for in regard to the time you should continue to suckle a child. Your own health, the infant’s health, the season of the year, the stage of teething, and a variety of circumstances, are to be taken into the account. And I am fully persuaded that the mere fact of the menstrual discharge coming on, is not a sufficient reason why the child should be weaned. Moreover, weaning should be a gradual process, which it cannot be if a woman must cease to nurse it as soon as the menses come upon her.
Food and Drink proper during Lactation.—As a general principle, it may be stated that whatever is best for the constitution of the mother, is also best for that of the child.
Every thing that goes to injure the mother during the period of lactation operates powerfully upon the mammary secretion, deteriorating it in the same proportion that it acts as an unfriendly agent upon her. This secretion, too, be it remembered, is one of the very first of the fluids of the body to become affected under unfavorable circumstances. We know how quickly the milk of a distillery-fed cow becomes impoverished and unhealthy, when the improper food is given to the cow; and precisely the same great physiological principles hold good in the woman as the animal.
Suppose you have a fine cow, to which you have become very much attached, and that has a fine calf; or even suppose you have a sow, to which you have devoted a more than ordinary share of attention, and that she has a fine brood of pigs. It is naturally to be supposed that you would take as much pains as possible with the cow, that she might give good milk for the calf; and if you have a fancy for raising pigs, you would be equally careful in regard to the sow. We will suppose you think there is danger that the animal will not produce milk enough for the required purpose. In such a case, would you give it tea, coffee, or porter to drink? Most assuredly you would not; nor would you consider any woman in her right mind who would. Now, it is just as improper and inconsistent for you to take these articles, any one of them, with the view of improving either the quantity or quality of the milk, as it would be to give them to animals for the same purpose. Farmers can tell you how much better it is for animals, when they are giving milk, to have pure water to drink; and the purer and softer it is, the better does the animal thrive in every respect.
I will not deny that a woman probably needs more fluid when she is nursing than she does at other times, and I presume that she feels a desire for more; if so, she can take it. But surely no one will tell me that there is any thing in the wide world that will at all compare with pure water as a means of quenching the thirst.
In nursing, as well as in all situations, you will find the diet to have a great influence in regulating the desire for drink. If you eat salt, and highly seasoned or sweetened articles, you will experience much more thirst than you would if the diet were more simple. A stimulating diet causes a degree of fever in the body; and water being the best and most natural of all substances for curing fever, nature sets up a demand for it. Remember, then, when you eat any thing that makes you dry, you are doing unwisely, because you are causing a degree of gastric fever, greater or less.
I need not, I think, go any more into details concerning what you should eat and drink while giving suck. The great thing is to do the best possible for your own health, and that also will be best for the child. You should not eat or take nourishing drink any oftener than you would do at other times, nor should you overdo in quantity, because you think you have two to support.