The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-07-11
Home Health Club
Edited by DIR. DAVID H. BREEDER, Chicago

SELF PITY: If there is one kind of patient that the busy doctor dreads more than another it is the kind that is always pitying himself. At each visit the self-pitying patient has a long tale of woe and unless the poor doctor listens patiently and offers much sympathy, he is considered an unfeeling, unsympathetic, hard-heart- ed wretch and he is very likely to lose the patient.
 There was a whole sermon in the famous remark of Mrs. Wiggs, when she said: Don't you go and git sor- ry for yerself. That's one thing I can't stand in nobody. There's al- ways lots of other folks you kin be sorry for 'sted of yerself. Amt you proud you ain't got hair lip? Why, that one thought is enough to keep me from ever gitting sorry for my self"
 Many years ago, when I was at the head of a sanitarium and hospital a bachelor came for treatment and he was sorry for himself. He worried constantly and he worried every body that would listen to his tales of woe. The only thing about his con- dition that really needed attention could be easily remedied by a minor surgical operation and when I told him that this should be done he was the happiest patient in the institution. Just to think, real surgical opera tton with an anesthetIc. nurses and al that. It seemed most too good to be true. As tke operation requir- ed only 8 few moments time 1t was not necessary to secure comp!ere or deep effect of the anesthetic and he proved to be one of those cases in which the ether produced what is sometimes called an ether drunk. Tn this case all of his five senses were rendered abnormally acute and while he was helpless and speechless, he could hear and remember every word that was said. His case and habi of self-pity was freely discussed ant the hope expressed that tie psychic eitect of the operation would be ever of greater benefit than the operation
 A few days later he came to mt and said that he was cured and wal going home and to work. In m! surprise, asked him how he felt anC he laughed srd said that his bod! seemed to be ir perfect condition since the operation but that the CIT, had been brought about in an entire ly different manner from what he ex pected and then he told me of hi experience while under the anesthet ic and he was very thankful that W, had talked so freely. Never agai1 would he be guilty of self-pity,
 A very small irritating first caus frequently starts the trouble. It is con stantly overlooked by the patient a we'll as his doctor, but it continues t iriritate and shatter the nerve con trol. Therefore. when that kind o patients write to me. I tell them tha the first necessity is tc find the caus remove it, and nature will do the res if she is given half a chance,
 In some eases it Is eye strain, Il others phimosis, or adherent pre- puce, stricture of the sphincter-ani but in seventy-five cases out of ev cry hundred, it is worry, nothing bu worry, that starts the poor sufferer ol the road to self-pity-so quit the hab it of worrying. If that doesn't i'm prove your health, have a thorougl physical examination made by a doc tor who does not guess at it but find out the cause. .--.,. ,s...
 CLUB, NOTES.
 Dear Doctor; Several years hay