A Treatise on the Diseases Produced By Onanism, Masturbation, Self-Pollution, and Other Excesses.Deslandes, L. (Léopold)
Science
A Treatise on the Diseases Produced By Onanism, Masturbation, Self-Pollution, and Other Excesses.
Deslandes, L. (Léopold)
Masturbation
appetite more keen and the digestion more easy. In fact the appetite
does not long resist excesses of onanism: it first diminishes, then
disappears, and is often replaced by a decided disgust for every kind
of food; in some patients it becomes irregular, capricious: in others
it remains: the latter have most cause of complaint, for it continues
longer than digestion is performed. “My appetite remains,” writes
an onanist to Tissot, “but it is a misfortune, as eating is followed
by pain in the stomach and my food is rejected.” Many onanists feel
pains of a similar character after eating. In others there is a sense
of oppression, of fulness, in the epigastric region. In some there
is a gnawing feeling resembling that produced by a want of food:
this symptom is very common in girls, who in consequence of secret
practices, have become affected with leucorrhœa. In some the face and
cheeks present a redness which contrasts remarkably with their habitual
paleness: onanists are frequently affected with headache, vertigo,
flushed face, &c. In some the slowness of the digestion is indicated by
eructations, which occur long after taking food: or the belly is tense
and filled with wind. Food, which was formerly digested with ease, is
now oppressive: and the list of articles of diet is shortened every
day. Some onanists have been known in these cases to indulge in ardent
spirits with the vain hope of exciting their appetite, and regaining
their strength. Repeated vomitings, constant pain in the belly and a
slow fever are also frequent symptoms of the deep-seated affections of
the digestive organs. In many patients the intestinal canal is more
liable to be affected by venereal excesses, than the stomach. Obstinate
constipation in some, diarrhœa and borborygmi in others are the usual
signs of the affection of this canal. Fournier and Begin mention the
case of a young man, who almost constantly experienced after excess
in coition, severe colics followed by excessive diarrhœa and an
insupportable tenesmus. Rest, gummy drinks, the use of farinaceous food
and a small quantity of red wine, soon dissipated these symptoms, which
sometimes threw him into an alarming state of languor and debility.
(_Dict. des. Sc. Med._, _art. Masturbation_.) Hoffman relates a
similar case. We have more than once met with similar effects. A young
man whom we attended in 1832 died, after excesses in onanism, with
diarrhœa. This unfortunate individual, although in the last stages
of consumption, still indulged as soon as he was left alone, in his
deplorable habit. Diarrhœa, or rather intestinal ulcerations, which are
then the cause of it, generally appear in onanists as in those affected
with consumption, at the last stages of life. Thus a young man,
nineteen years old, addicted to masturbation from childhood, died a few
years since at Hotel Dieu. The most active watching and the strictest
mechanical methods could not arrest his fatal manipulations. Diarrhœa
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