How great or how little influence a mother has over her child through her thoughts has not been proven, nor has the subject of determining or influencing sex of the unborn child been settled.
At the end of nine months the child's development is complete and it is ready for its journey to the outside world. The process of this journey is called “labor”—a word which will describe the mother's share in it. When this occurs before the embryo is able to live outside the uterus it is known as abortion.
REPRODUCTION—PART II.
In the first part of this essay I said that if the process of labor occurs before the seventh month (which is the earliest time the foetus can live for any length of time outside the womb) it is known as abortion or miscarriage. When labor occurs later than this or within two weeks before term, it is known as premature labor.
The average girl in using the word abortion, has in mind a criminal act, whereby the process of pregnancy is purposely interrupted. She prefers the word miscarriage.
There is also a belief among girls that a miscarriage occurring in the early stages of pregnancy can be brought about without bad results or any serious consequences to her health.
It is a mistake to regard an abortion as of slight importance, for any interruption in the process of pregnancy is always more dangerous than the natural labor at full term. One writer claims there are more women ill in consequence of abortion than from full term childbirth, on account of which there are so many women who are semi-invalids.
There can be no doubt that the often excessive loss of blood leaves the woman in a weak and rundown condition, thereby lessening her powers of resistance to other diseases.
The shock to the woman's system is greater than that produced by natural labor, and consequently leaves her in a hysterical and often critically nervous state for some time after.
The causes of abortion are many. Among them are overexertion, overexcitement, shock, fright, fall, great anger, dancing, fatigue, lifting heavy weights, purgative medicines and excessive sexual intercourse.