The patient, who had been listening to this statement with lowered eyes and
nervously intertwining fingers, then burst out as follows: There WAS trouble
between them and there always would be until it was settled right,--this
with much emphasis and emotional manifestation. So long as he insisted on
living where they did, just so long would she quarrel with him. She did not
like the neighbors, especially the woman downstairs, she did not like the
room, she did not like anything about the place or the neighborhood, hated
the very sight of it and would never cease attempting to move from there. It
came out on further questioning that the woman downstairs, whom the patient
particularly disliked, was a storm center in that the wife was jealous of
her, although she adduced no very good reasons for her attitude. Moreover,
the patient stated that she wished to move to a district where she had
friends, though other sources of information showed that these friends were
of a rather unsavory character. Her husband was absolutely determined not to
move from his house. He stated that he would rather have her go away and
stay away than move from there; that the rent was too high in the place
where she wanted to move, and that the rent was suitable where they were.
Moreover, for his part, he hated his wife's desired neighborhood and would
never consent to changing his residence from the present place to the other.
It came out that her fainting and vomiting spells and headaches usually
followed bitter quarrels, and on other matters these symptoms usually placed
the victory on her side. On this particular point, however, her husband had
remained obdurate. It was shown that the present attack of paralysis and
aphonia, symptoms of an unusually severe character, followed an unusually
bitter quarrel which had lasted for a whole day and into the night of the
attack.
The question arises at this point, "Why did this attack take the form of a
paralysis?" At first this seemed unaccountable, but later it was found that
the old woman for whom the patient had been caring had a "stroke" with loss
of the power to speak, though no aphonia. The patient had gone to work as a
sort of nurse for the old woman under protest, for she did not wish to do
anything outside of her own light housekeeping, although the added income
was sorely needed since work was slack in her husband's place of employment.
The pain in her side caused her to quit work as nurse, much to her husband's
dissatisfaction until she convinced him that her pain and disability were
marked. It was evident that despite the controversies and quarrels that
prevailed in the household, her husband sincerely loved her, for he stayed
away from his work during the three weeks of her illness to act as her
nurse. Moreover, he spent his earnings quite freely in consulting various
physicians in order to cure her.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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