The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-05-23
Home Nursing
ATTEMPTED SUICIDE

A LICE and Mary Brown were nav. A ing a sisterly quarrel. Alice had thoughtlessly said that she hsa stolen her sisters sweetheart rt,. Wh0se dismorld ring she had been wearing TOT a week.
 Msrr. heinz young and tremendously ;n Iocs and extremely sentimental, rrshed 0ut of the room, crying that she wouId kill herself. To prove 1t, she rsn fo inc medicine cupboard in the bathroom and fnmbled for bottle or lswdanum which had been on an upper shelf for months. Mary, desperateIy in earnest. swallowed the contents or tha sraIl bottle and rushed into her own roon. where she fell on the floor, believing herself to be dying.
 Alice. in an agony of remorse knelt hos;de her. insisting that she had only hHen teaainr. With a last effort to rouse her sister from what she believed tn be fhe sleep of death, Alice rushed downstairs and through the garden to the docfor's house He was away from home. but his wife, being q practical woman. rose to the emergency after fhe incoherent Alice, half-frantic with fear and self-abasement, gasped out her story. .l,
 q was only teasing, sne sVDpeuf "and Mary believed me-she drank something out of the medicine cub board---I don't know what. Please, Mrs. Garland, do you think she VIII die?"
 Already hurrying across the garden, Mrs. Garland called, Bring a blg nitcher of tepid water and a cup and mi the coffee pot on with lots of cof- fee in it! Then come and help me '!
 Kneeling beside the girl on the bed room floor, Mrs. Garland saw with re- lief that her lips were not burned with carbolic acid.
 She felt her pulse and found that it was very full but very slow.
 Drawing up one eyelid, she found the pupiIs of the eye contracted like pin- point, and she noted that the girls face was very red. Mary was not uncon- scioue, but she was so drowsy that she paid no attention to the doctors wife, whose quick eye suddenly saw the lit tic empty bottle lying on the floor. The faint odor of sunkissed poppies came to her on the girls breath, which was made extremely slow, and examin- ing the bottle, Mrs. Garland found as she had suspected, that Mary had ta- ken laudanum and was suffering from opium poisoning.
 Tn such emergencies the first thing to do is to empty the stomach, then try to. arouse the patient, using force if necessary, because a human life is at stake. And it can be saved if the pa- tient is given proper first-aid, unless the amount swallowed is enormous. In Mary's case 1t was enough to bring on symptoms of opium poisoning, but intel iigent fiFst-aid saved her life.
 Tepid water, if given in sufficient quantity, will act as an emetic and cause the sufferer to vomit and empty the stomach, though mustard or table salt added (separately) to tepid water are even quicker emetics. Speed is the thing that counts when someone is poi soned, however, and tepid water is al ways available.
 After Mary had been exceedingly sick, Mrs. Garland and Alice supported her on either side forced her to walk in the garden, urging her, skipping her and shaking her when necessary to save her from slipping into the drowsiness : that benumbed her brain and limbs Then came drauehtsT of hot strong black coffee. Presently Mary, very shakeu and afraid, was rescued and life, which iA unbelievably sweet, reclaimed her from her foolish attempt to take her own life.