Dr James Le Fanu: 3 May
It is difficult to imagine how people in the past coped with the practicalities of their bodily functions. How, for example, did women deal with the inconvenience of the ‘curse’ in the epochs before the invention of the sanitary towel?
It was certainly a major preoccupation of their lives. The first sign of ‘the blood which wants to flow’ observed a 16th-century Italian physician Giambattista da Monte was ‘latitude, heaviness and headaches due to the many ascending vapors’. Then came the colic and back pain, ‘like that of a woman in labour as her child seeks to open a passage for itself’.
Women’s letters to each other, too, are full of references to the ‘monthly malady’ – though they did have two advantages over women today. First, they had far fewer periods. Puberty came later, the menopause earlier and with an average of six pregnancies in between, with long periods of breast feeding, it is calculated they would on average have only 160 periods during a lifetime. This compares with almost three times as many (450) nowadays.
Next when it arrived the ‘monthly malady’ was welcomed as a sign of continuing health and necessary for eliminating those ‘acid and poisonous humours whose deleterious qualities harm the constitution’. It was thus both curse and blessing.
We no longer believe in ‘acid and poisonous humours’, so there can be no similar consolation for modern women. They must put up with their numerous periods as best they can – though thanks to modern medicine they do not need to – except when deliberately trying to conceive. ‘It is simplicity itself to eliminate menstruation with the safe, inexpensive and widely available oral contraceptive pill,’ observes Dr Charlotte Ellertson. The conventional way to take the pill has always been three weeks (or 21 days) of taking, with seven days off to allow a ‘withdrawal bleed’.
But Dr Ellertson points out that this pattern was adopted primarily for psychological reasons to reassure women by mimicking the normal menstrual cycle. There is, in fact, nothing to be gained from bleeding every month and so no reason why women should not take the pill continuously and thus spare themselves the inconvenience of it all for years on end.
THIS WEEK’S MEDICAL QUERY comes courtesy of a lady from Southampton troubled by ‘foul smelling flatulence’. ‘I have tried wheat-free diets, giving up dairy products and avoiding foods like baked beans,’ she writes. Her doctor has prescribed various peppermintbased tablets, but to no effect. ‘All I can do is employ various pleasant smells around the house to counteract the problem.’
This offensive flatus reflects the composition of the bacteria in the gut. Theoretically, it might be influenced by treatment with antibiotics – tetracycline, neomycin and metronidazole have been reported to have a favourable effect. Some too are helped by ‘recolonising’ the friendly bacteria found in natural yogurt, such as Yakult. It is also helpful to know that lighting a match after a visit to the toilet will eliminate any sulphurous smells. Solicitous hosts will leave a box of matches in the ‘little room’ for this purpose.
drjames@lady.co.uk
It was certainly a major preoccupation of their lives. The first sign of ‘the blood which wants to flow’ observed a 16th-century Italian physician Giambattista da Monte was ‘latitude, heaviness and headaches due to the many ascending vapors’. Then came the colic and back pain, ‘like that of a woman in labour as her child seeks to open a passage for itself’.
Women’s letters to each other, too, are full of references to the ‘monthly malady’ – though they did have two advantages over women today. First, they had far fewer periods. Puberty came later, the menopause earlier and with an average of six pregnancies in between, with long periods of breast feeding, it is calculated they would on average have only 160 periods during a lifetime. This compares with almost three times as many (450) nowadays.
Next when it arrived the ‘monthly malady’ was welcomed as a sign of continuing health and necessary for eliminating those ‘acid and poisonous humours whose deleterious qualities harm the constitution’. It was thus both curse and blessing.
We no longer believe in ‘acid and poisonous humours’, so there can be no similar consolation for modern women. They must put up with their numerous periods as best they can – though thanks to modern medicine they do not need to – except when deliberately trying to conceive. ‘It is simplicity itself to eliminate menstruation with the safe, inexpensive and widely available oral contraceptive pill,’ observes Dr Charlotte Ellertson. The conventional way to take the pill has always been three weeks (or 21 days) of taking, with seven days off to allow a ‘withdrawal bleed’.
But Dr Ellertson points out that this pattern was adopted primarily for psychological reasons to reassure women by mimicking the normal menstrual cycle. There is, in fact, nothing to be gained from bleeding every month and so no reason why women should not take the pill continuously and thus spare themselves the inconvenience of it all for years on end.
THIS WEEK’S MEDICAL QUERY comes courtesy of a lady from Southampton troubled by ‘foul smelling flatulence’. ‘I have tried wheat-free diets, giving up dairy products and avoiding foods like baked beans,’ she writes. Her doctor has prescribed various peppermintbased tablets, but to no effect. ‘All I can do is employ various pleasant smells around the house to counteract the problem.’
This offensive flatus reflects the composition of the bacteria in the gut. Theoretically, it might be influenced by treatment with antibiotics – tetracycline, neomycin and metronidazole have been reported to have a favourable effect. Some too are helped by ‘recolonising’ the friendly bacteria found in natural yogurt, such as Yakult. It is also helpful to know that lighting a match after a visit to the toilet will eliminate any sulphurous smells. Solicitous hosts will leave a box of matches in the ‘little room’ for this purpose.
drjames@lady.co.uk