The Mother And Her Child Part 46

If the nervous baby has older brothers and sisters, see to it that he does not, through pet and peeve and other manifestations of temper, control the family and thus dictate the trend of all the children's play. Early train him to be manly, to play fair, and when his feelings are hurt or things do not go just to his liking, teach him, in the language of the street, to be "game." It is equally important that the little girls be taught in the same way how to take disappointment and defeat without murmur or complaint.

TEACHING SELF-CONTROL

When nervous children grow up, especially if their parents are well to do, and they are not forced to work for a living, they are p.r.o.ne to develop into erratic, neurasthenic, and hysterical women, and worrying, inefficient, and nervous men; and in later years they throng the doctor's offices with both their real and imaginary complaints.

These patients always feel that they are different from other people, that something terrible is the matter with them or that something awful is about to happen to them. Their brains constantly swarm with fears and premonitions of disease, disaster, and despair, while their otherwise brilliant intellects are confused and handicapped because of these "spoiled" and "hereditary" nervous disturbances--with the result that both their happiness and usefulness in life is largely destroyed.

The fundamental abnormal characteristic of that great group of nerve-patients who throng the doctor's office is sensitiveness, suggestibility, and lack of self-control. Sensitiveness is nothing more or less than a refined form of selfishness, while lack of self-control is merely the combined end-product of heredity and childhood spoiling. I am a great believer in, and pract.i.tioner of, modern methods of psychological child culture, but let me say to the fond parent who has a nervous child, when you have failed to teach the child self-control by suggestive methods, do not hesitate to punish, for of all cases it is doubly true of the nervous child that if you "spare the rod" you are sure to "spoil the child."

Let me urge parents to secure this self-control and enforce this discipline before the child is three or four years of age; correct the child at a time when your purpose can be accomplished without leaving in his subconscious mind so many vivid memories of these personal and, sometimes, more or less brutal physical encounters. Every year you put off winning the disciplinary fight with your offspring, you enormously increase the danger and likelihood of alienating his affections and otherwise destroying that beautiful and sympathetic relations.h.i.+p which should always exist between a child and his parents. In other words, the older the child, the less the good you accomplish by discipline and the more the personal resentment toward the parent is aroused on the part of the child.

CRIME AND INTEMPERANCE

While it is generally admitted that feeble-mindedness lies at the foundation of most crime, we must also recognize that failure on the part of parents to teach their children self-control is also responsible for many otherwise fairly normal youths falling into crime and intemperance. The parents of a nervous child must recognize that they will in all probability be subject to special danger along these lines as they grow up. The nervous child, as it grows up, is quite likely to be erratic, emotional, indecisive, and otherwise easily influenced by his a.s.sociates and environment.

Nervous children are more highly suggestible than others, and if they have not been taught to control their appet.i.tes and desires, their wants and pa.s.sions, they are going to form an especially susceptible cla.s.s of society from which may be recruited high-cla.s.s criminals, dipsomaniacs, and other unfortunates.

It is true that any spoiled child, however normal its heredity, may turn out bad in these respects if it is not properly trained; but what we are trying to accomplish here is to emphasize to parents that the nervous child is doubly p.r.o.ne to go wrong and suffer much sorrow in after life if he is not early and effectively taught self-control.

UNSPOILING THE CHILD

If the child of nervous tendencies forms the habit of crying, sulking, or otherwise misbehaving when it is denied its desires, or when something it wants done is not immediately attended to, it will be found an excellent plan simply to stand still and let the little fellow have it out with himself, in the meanwhile kindly reminding him to say, "please mamma," "please papa," etc. I well remember one nervous little girl who would yell at the top of her voice and become black in the face the moment she wanted a door opened or anything else. A few weeks of patience and firmness on the part of the mother entirely cured her of this unbecoming trait.

As a rule, it will be found best not to argue with the nervous child.

The moment your commands are not heeded, when you have admonished the child once or twice without effect, take him quickly to the crib or the nursery and there leave him alone, isolated, until he is in a state of mind to manifest a kindly spirit and an obedient disposition.

It is an excellent plan quietly and quickly to deprive such children of their pleasures temporarily, in order to produce thoughtfulness; and these methods are often more efficacious than the infliction of varying degrees of pain under the guise of punishment.

Nervous children must be taught to go to sleep by themselves. They are not to be rocked or allowed to hold the hand of the mother or the caretaker. The nervous baby should not be encouraged to exhibit its cuteness for the delectation of the family or the amus.e.m.e.nt of strangers and visitors. He should be especially trained in early and regular habits, taking particular pains to see that bed wetting and similar bad habits are early overcome; otherwise, he may drag along through early life and become the cause of great embarra.s.sment both to himself and his parents.

The control of these nervous habits is somewhat like the management of the slipping of the wheels of a locomotive when the track is wet and slippery. The little folks ofttimes endeavor to apply the brakes, but they are minus the sand which keeps the wheels from slipping. The parent, with his well-planned discipline, is able to supply this essential element, and thus the child is enabled to gain a sufficient amount of self-control to prevent him making a continuous spectacle of himself.

When nervous children do not walk or talk early, let them alone. Of course, if later on it is discovered that they are manifestly backward children, something must be done about it; but if the nervous child is encouraged to talk too soon there is great danger of his developing into a stutterer or a stammerer.

PREVENTING HYSTERIA

Every year we have pa.s.s through our hands men and women, especially women, who possess beautiful characters, who have n.o.ble intellects, and who have high aims and holy ambitions in life, but whose careers have been well-nigh ruined, almost shattered, because of the hysterical tendency which ever accompanies them, and which, just as soon as the stress and strain of life reaches a certain degree of intensity, unfailingly produces its characteristic breakdown; the patient is seized with confusion, is overcome by feeling, indulges in an emotional sprawl, is flooded with terrible apprehensions and distracting sensations, may even go into a convulsive fit, and, in extreme cases, even become unconscious and rigidly stiff.

Now, in the vast majority of cases, if this nervous patient, when a baby, had been thoroughly disciplined and taught proper self-control before it was four years of age, it would have developed into quite a model little citizen; and while throughout life it would have borne more or less of a hysteria stigma, nevertheless it would have possessed a sufficient amount of self-control to have gotten along with dignity and success; in fact, the possibilities are so tremendous, the situation is so terrible in the case of these nervous babies, that we might almost say that, in the majority of such, success and failure in life will be largely determined by the early and effective application of these methods of preventive discipline.

I was recently consulted by a patient whose nervous system was in a deplorable state, who had lost almost complete mental control of herself, and who really presented a pathetic spectacle as she told of the fears and worries that enthralled her. In an effort to get to the bottom of this patient's heredity I had a conference with her father, and I learned that this woman, in her childhood days, had been constantly humored--allowed to have everything she wanted. She was a delicate and sensitive little thing and the parents could not bear to hear her cry, it made her sick, it gave her convulsions, it produced sleepless nights, it destroyed her appet.i.te, and so she grew up in this pampered way. The father recognized the greatness of his mistake and he told me with tears in his eyes how, when the ringing of the school bell disturbed his little girl baby, he saw the school directors and had them stop ringing the bell, and he even stopped the ringing of the church bells. He was an influential citizen and could even stop the blowing of the whistles if it disturbed his precious little daughter.

And so this woman has grown up with this nervous system naturally weakened by heredity and further weakened by "spoiling"; and fortunate indeed she will be if off and on the most of her life she is not seeking the advice of a physician in her efforts to gain that self-control which her parents could have so easily put in her possession at the time she was three or four years of age, if they had only spent a few hours then, instead of the many months and years that subsequently have been devoted to medical attention.

METHODS OF DISCIPLINE

We run into many snags when we undertake to discipline the nervous baby. The first is that it will sometimes cry so hard that it will get black in the face and may even have a convulsion; occasionally a small blood vessel may be ruptured on some part of the body, usually the face. When you see the little one approaching this point, turn it over and administer a sound spanking and it will instantly catch its breath. This will not have to be repeated many times until that particular difficulty will be largely under control.

It will be discovered when you undertake to break a bad habit in the case of a spoiled child who is of a nervous temperament, that your discipline interferes with the child's appet.i.te and nutrition. The delicate little creature who has perhaps already given you no end of trouble regarding its feeding, will begin to lose in weight, and even the doctor often becomes so alarmed that he advises against all further methods of discipline. We think this is usually a mistake.

Both the nutrition and discipline should be kept in mind and carried harmoniously through to a successful finish. It will be necessary during such troublous times to conserve both the physical and nervous strength of the child; it should not be allowed to run about and over-play, as such high strung children often do. It should be given a reasonable amount of physical exercise, and two or three times a day should have short periods of complete isolation in the nursery, where it may quietly play with its blocks and toys, sing and croon or talk as the case may be, but should be left entirely alone.

Wise efforts should be put forth to keep the feeding up to the proper number of calories, and to see, if the child does not gain during this disciplinary struggle, that at least it does not lose; and I give it as my experience that I have yet to see a case in which both the child's nutrition and discipline cannot be efficiently maintained at one and the same time, though it does sometimes require adroit scientific and artistic management. But the game we are playing is worth the effort--the battle must be fought--and it can be fought with the least suffering and sorrowing the earlier the conflict is waged to a successful issue.

I am decidedly opposed to allowing these young nervous children to over-play and thus wear themselves out unduly. This over exhaustion sometimes renders the training of the child much more difficult, as it is a well-known fact that we are all much more irritable and lacking in self-control when we are tired, more especially when we are over-tired and fatigued.

Let me emphasize the importance and value of proper periods of isolation--complete rest and partial physical relaxation. You can take a child who has gotten up wrong in the morning, whose nerves are running away with him, who is irritable, crying at everything that happens, who even rejects the food prepared for him, and who, when spoken to and commanded to stop crying, yells all the louder--I say you can take such a little one back to its crib, place it in the bed and smilingly walk out of the room. After a transient outburst of crying, within a very few minutes you can return to find a perfect little angel, winsome and smiling, happy and satisfied, presenting an entirely different picture from the little culprit so recently incarcerated as a punishment for his unseemly conduct.

But let me repeat that while such methods of discipline often work like magic on normal children, they must be repeated again and again in the case of one who is nervous in order to establish new a.s.sociation groups in the brain and to form new habit grooves in his developing nervous system.

RESPECT FOR AUTHORITY

There are just two things the nervous child must grow up to respect; one is authority and the other is the rights and privileges of his a.s.sociates. The nervous child needs early to learn to reach a conclusion and to render a decision--to render a decision without equivocation--to move forward in obedience to that decision without quibbling and without question; that is the thing the nervous man and woman must learn in connection with the later conquest of their own nerves; and a foundation for such a mastery of one's unruly nerves is best laid early in life--by teaching the child prompt and unquestioning obedience to parental commands. At the same time, endeavor so to raise the child that it acquires the faculty of quickly and agreeably adapting itself to its environment, at the same time cheerfully recognizing the rights of its fellows.

It is a crime against the nervous child to allow it to hesitate, to debate, or to falter about any matter that pertains to the execution of parental commands. Let your rule be--speak once, then spank. Never for a moment countenance anything resembling dilatoriness or procrastination, let the child grow up to recognize these as its greatest dangers, never to be tolerated for one moment.

FALSE SYMPATHY

We are aware that many good people in perusing this chapter will think that some of the advice here given is both cruel and hard hearted; but we can safely venture the opinion that those who have reared many children, at least if they have had some nervous little ones, will be able to discern the meaning and significance of most of our suggestions. Sympathy is a beautiful and human trait and we want nothing in this chapter in any way to interfere with that characteristic sympathy of a parent for its offspring--the proverbial "as a father pitieth his children"--nevertheless, there is a great deal of sympathy that is utterly false, that is of the nature of a disastrous compromise, for the time being making it easy for both parent and child, but making things unutterably more difficult later on in life when both (or perhaps the child alone) must face the calamitous consequences of this failure early to inculcate the principles of self-control and self-mastery on the mind and character of the nervous child.

We so often hear "mother love" eulogized. It is a wonderful and self-denying human trait; but, as a physician, I have been led to believe that "mother loyalty" is of almost equal or even greater value. All mothers love their children more or less, but only a few mothers possess that superb loyalty which is able to rise above human sympathy and maternal love, which qualifies the mother to stand smilingly by the side of the crib and watch her little one in a fit of anger--yelling at the top of its voice--and yet never touch the child, allow the little fellow to come to himself, to wake up to the fact that all his yelling, his emotion, his anger, and his resentment are absolutely powerless to move his mother. Thus has the mother--by her loyalty to the little fellow--taught him a new lesson in self-control, and thus has she added one more strong link in the chain of character which parent and child are forging day by day, and which finally must determine both the child's temporal and eternal destiny.

SYSTEM AND ORDER

System and order are desirable acquisitions for all children, but they are absolutely indispensable to the successful rearing of the nervous child, who should be taught to have a place for everything and everything in its place. When he enters the house his clothes must not be thoughtlessly thrown about. Every garment must be put in its proper place. These little folks must be taught a systematic and regular way of doing things.

Nervous children must not be allowed to procrastinate. They must not be allowed to put off until tomorrow anything which can be done today.

They must be taught how to keep the working decks of life clear--caught right up to the minute. They should be taught proper methods of a.n.a.lysis--how to go to the bottom of things--how to render a decision, execute it, and then move forward quickly to the next task of life. When they come home from school with home work to do it would be best, as a rule, first to do the school work before engaging in play. In fact, all the methods which are needful for the proper discipline of the ordinary child are more than doubly needful for the training of the nervous child; while more than fourfold persistence is needed on the part of parents to make them really effective.

EMOTIONAL RUNAWAYS

Whether the child be two years of age or ten years of age, when the parent discovers that the nervous system is "losing its head," that the child is embarking on a nervous runaway, or that it is about to indulge in an emotional sprawl, it is best to interfere suddenly and spectacularly. Lay a firm hand on him and bring things to a sudden stop. Speak to him calmly and deliberately, but firmly. Set him on a chair, put him in the bed, or take him to a room and isolate him.

In the case of the older children, tell them a story of the horse which becomes frightened, loses self-control, and tears off down the highway, wrecking the vehicle and throwing out its occupants. Explain to them that many of the mistakes of life are made during the times of these emotional runaways, these pa.s.sing spells of lost self-control.

Tell the little folks that you have perfect confidence in them if they will only take time to stop and think before they talk or act. Explain to them that since you saw that they were rapidly approaching a foolish climax you thought it was your duty to call a halt, to stop them long enough to enable them to collect their wits and indulge in some sober thinking.

Personally, we have found it to be a good plan not to be too arbitrary with the little folks, like putting them on a chair and saying, "You must sit there one hour by the clock." They usually begin to indulge in resentful thoughts and a situation is often produced akin to that of the stern father who felt compelled to go back and thrash his boy three different times during his hour on the chair, because of what he was satisfied was going through the boy's mind. No, that is not usually the best way. Put them on the chair with an indeterminate sentence. I prefer to carry it out something like this: "Now, son, this will never do; you are running away with yourself. Stop for a moment and think. Now I am going to ask you to sit down in that chair there and think this over quietly. I will be in the next room.

Whenever you think you have got control of yourself and have thought this thing out so you can talk with me, you may get up from the chair and come into the room to me." Sometimes five minutes, sometimes fifteen minutes, and the little fellow will walk in and talk to you in a very satisfactory manner. He will give you his viewpoint and you will be able to adjust the matter in a spirit of conference which will be satisfactory to both parent and child, without doing the least violence to the responsibility of the one or the individuality of the other.

Very little is to be accomplished, when the child starts to indulge in an emotional runaway, if the parent contracts the same spirit, begins to talk fast and loud, to gesticulate wildly, grabs the child, begins to slap and shake it--that is merely an exhibition on the part of the parent of the very same weakness he is trying to correct in his offspring. I am afraid it is entirely too true that for every time you shake one demon out of a child in anger, you shake in seven worse devils. When all other methods fail and you must resort to punishment, do it with kindness, deliberation, and dignity. Never punish a child in haste and anger.

THE FINAL REWARD