Page:Contraception; 1st ed. (IA in.ernet.dli.2015.94163).pdf/93

ing the most excruciating pains, by the wretched practice of excessive suckling; and thousands more have perished by deleterious drugs which had been madly swallowed to procure abortions!"

I have been told by many poor mothers to-day that such and such a child in their families resulted from conception when nursing under the misapprehension that they would then be safe.

Comment.—While I give, of course, the warmest support to the view that mothers should nurse their own babies wherever it is physically possible, I most strongly condemn the suggestion that suckling should be advised as a contraceptive or that women should ever be misled by being told that they are safe from conception at this time. It is true, of course, that many women are less liable to conceive when they are suckling, but none are really safe from unexpected conceptions at that time. A woman who conceives again while she is nursing one infant, wrongs three people—the infant she nurses, herself, and the potential child in her womb. Suckling should never be encouraged as a contraceptive measure.