At this period also mumps may be a serious matter for you, so if you have a little brother or sister who is suffering from this disease of childhood, you should keep out of the room and, if possible, out of the house. No matter if you did have the mumps when a little girl. If you catch the mumps during the first years of your young womanhood the affection MAY go to your ovaries. This, of course, produces a painful swelling and, if not attended to by a reputable physician, will go to destroy the usefulness of the ovaries――prevent you from ever having children. This has happened in girls who did not know――or rather their mothers did not know――what the danger was, and when the girl grew up to be married and no children came, she was blamed, often accused of being one who did not want children. Many a time when a young woman had been married several years and was childless, I have asked the mother if her daughter had the mumps when she was growing into womanhood, and if she suffered pain in the groin and back. “Why, yes, Doctor――but what has that to do with it?” “Didn’t you know that the mumps sometimes went to the ovaries and destroyed their function?” “Why, no; it can’t be possible?” “Yes, possible and probable. Your daughter can never have children because you did not tell her all about her sex organs, and when her little brother had a swelling and pain in the glands of throat and jaws, you did not know enough to send her away or keep her away from him, telling her plainly why you did so. “But you were never allowed to mention these things when you were a young woman――you never knew these important things? Exactly so, and this is the punishment thousands of mothers and daughters are receiving for this prudery.” CHAPTER III THE DISORDERS OF MENSTRUATION AND GENERAL HEALTH Civilization has brought many unnatural effects upon the monthly period of women, and ignorance of how to care for the body has made matters worse. It is with these unnatural disturbances that you are mostly concerned. The inability to understand certain symptoms of your menstrual flow, the consequent neglect of these symptoms or ignorantly taking drugs and medicines for the troubles, are the causes for so many girls and women being miserable and invalids struggling on under most distressing conditions. There is always a good cause for any irregularity or stoppage of the monthly period; some reason why the flow is scanty or too profuse. These causes can readily be discovered when the girl knows herself and all that pertains to that self. In the healthy girl the flow should come and go without any marked pains or distress. Of course during four or five days there will be a feeling of weakness, lassitude, a “please-let-me-alone” attitude, and in many girls, a desire for pure love and caresses. These various feelings are natural and only go to show that you are a full-blown woman.