Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1909-04-02

Of complacently permitting its degrade
ton And in all these years to come
we shall have the nervous children with
us There will be children born with
the blight of ancestral faint upon them.
dwarfed in body and soul, idiotic and
epileptic.
But il is not of these wretched and
unfortunate little waits, the driftwoOd of
the world. that | am to speak in this
place: rather Of children born without
apparent mark of abnormality, but
destined to develop in early or adult life
the seeds of a miserable heritage which
lie latent in them and are not clearly
manifest TO the unframed eye. These
are the sO-called nervous" children.
You mothers call them nervous" They
may be unduly precOcious or unduly
dull. They are fretful and irritable.
They sleep poorly. and their sleep is
often disturbed by dreams, sometimes
by might terr0rs' or by sOmnambulism.
They twitch u great deal. They are
emotional. too easily made to weep or
laugh. Their nervous systems are I'M
usually vulnerable, so that passionate
outbursts, hysterical attacks. conyul-
sions. St Nitus' dance, and morbid
movements of various kinds (grmaces,
habit spasm. extreme restlessness, head
nodding, and head-jerking) occur more
readily in them than in perfectly nor
NAL children. They are subject to head
aches, and when i'll too readily become
delirious.
They may sometimes show a moral
peryersiOn, a prOneness 10 little or big
offenses against morality OUT of keeping
with their opportunities for moral train
ing and the examples of their elders and
playfellows, tendencies to be untruthful,
to steal, to be wsuLvG and cruel, There
may be precocitg of the sexual instinct.
All Of these and many other symptoms
which there is not space to describe here
are indicative Of an unstable nervous
system.
These are the nervous children" that
need careful guidance and skiful treat
ment in order - ward off the dangers
that menace their later development
The earlier the symptoms are recognized
and the preventive measures applied the
better The family physician should be
constantly consulted. and the duty de-
wolves upon him to make a thorough in
vestigation into everything bearing upon
the child's future. He should be fully
informed upon every point in connection
with the child's beredity. Nothing
should be concealed from him The
whole physical makeup Of the little pa
tent requires his careful scrutiny He
should have a complete understanding Of
| its psychology. When all this has been
spread out before his scientific eyes he
should prepare a map Of life" for the
I little one, a schedule Of existence in
[ which every detail as to diet, exercise.
baths. education, medicines, etc. should
+ have his thoughtful consideration.
/ Prevention is everything. Yet how sell
/ dom il is that the parents take thought
# the morrow and do these things. The
/ nervous child requires a bringing mp
quite different from that Of the normal
child. though even a normal one would
Z boz all the better for "A similar sort Of
nare. The main features to be delineat-
] ed in the nervous child's map Of life
may be briefly summarized as follows:
No stimulants should ever be given Il
the little one. no tea. coffee. wine, or beer