LAZINESS


The slight or smell of food induces in the hungry an outpouring of saliva. What is its purpose? To act as a lubricant and enable one to swallow the food more quickly, say ignorance, laziness and impatience. Not so. Lubrication may be a part of its duty but its more essential use is to digest starch and in order to attain that end it must be thoroughly mixed with the food.


In the rush and bustle of modern life, how many are there who take time to eat? They hurry in from office or mill or workshop, rapidly fill their stomachs and hasten back to work. And these same people would be astounded if one told them that they were lazy. Yet the accusation can be justified. They are hungry. Hunger means an empty stomach. The stomach must be filled in the shortest possible time and so the food is pushed in and washed down and the digestive system left to get on with its job as best it can.

May not that be characterized as laziness? Does “eating” merely signify filling the stomach, regardless of the pabulum and the means used? Surely not. Does not ones daily work proclaim and infinitum that the vast majority of people are appallingly ignorant of how to eat and too lazy to exercise a little common sense about it?.

How few there be who can truthfully say that they come hungry to every meal, and fewer still who have sense enough to refrain from eating when they are not hungry. The stomach has been filled at the last meal in the manner described above, (no leaving off while still hungry for such as these), and before it has time to deal with it and also get rid of the resultant evils, another meal is taken. No wonder these people are never hungry.

“Indigestion,” flatulence, acidity, heartburn, gastric and duodenal ulcer, gastroptosis, enteroptosis, constipation, even cancer—are not all these possible results? How? Well, what processes are included under “eating”? I should say three, salivation, mastication, deglutition.

SALIVATION.

The slight or smell of food induces in the hungry an outpouring of saliva. What is its purpose? To act as a lubricant and enable one to swallow the food more quickly, say ignorance, laziness and impatience. Not so. Lubrication may be a part of its duty but its more essential use is to digest starch and in order to attain that end it must be thoroughly mixed with the food.

MASTICATION.

The lazy one masticate just long enough to enable them to gulp the food down, whether its passage is hastened by a mouthful of some liquid or not. The real purpose of mastication is twofold: (1) Maceration, reducing food to pulp so that digestive juices can reach every particle, and (2) thorough admixture of food with saliva so that all starch will be digested.

DEGLUTITION,

not an action to be inaugurated at the earliest possible moment, but a passive involuntary process following the completion of mastication. Chew a mouthful of bread until there is nothing left to chew and you will find that most of it has disappeared though you are not conscious of having swallowed it. Repeat that with every mouthful of solids or semisolids, and when you have thoroughly accustomed yourself to this method, it will be uncomfortable or even painful to swallow anything that is insufficiently masticated.

“Havent time,” say laziness and impatience. No? Well, make your choice. Either take time to eat correctly or, a few years later, make time to be in your doctors hands, to be off work at intervals, to be in hospital for weeks, to have operations or, perhaps, finally to hear that dread word, “inoperable” “Havent time?” You may take ten minutes longer over your meal, but you require less food because you get the last ounce of nourishment out of what you do eat. Is not it worth while even to save your pocket?.

Now eating is finished, what is the next stage? Stomach, filled by the lazy ones with chunks of solids which cannot quickly be penetrated by the gastric juice, diluted as it is by the liquids used to wash down said chunks. Digestion, therefore, is delayed, and the stomach is not fully rested before the next meal is pushed in ; when it is accomplished, what is the state of affairs? Fats and proteins and some starch have been dealt with and passed on to the bowel digestion, but a mass of undigested starch is left behind. In the effort to do something with it, the stomach pours out more acid which, not being able to tackle unsalivated starch, is left “free” and becomes the source of acidity and heartburn and, in some constitutions, ulceration and, eventually, carcinoma of they escape perforation. The starch decomposes into gases causing flatulence and distension with all their attendant ills.

R. W., 45. Clerk, 2-3-31. Complained of abdominal pain last two months, right or left iliac or umbilical. At first, pain began about 7 p.m., and ceased on going to bed; now comes any time; gnawing, not acute; becoming more frequent and more severe; < cough; slightly > passing flatus. Took all meals in a hurry, alternating bite and sup. Can eat anything. Craves strong tea and highly seasoned food. Smoking three ounces of pipe tobacco and 60 cigarettes a week. Constipation. Stomach dilated and slightly ptosed. TREATMENT. Stop cigarettes and reduce pipe tobacco to 2 ounces. Moderate strength of tea. Take all meals dry and drink afterwards. Masticate thoroughly. Avoid beef, liver, pork and bacon. For constipation, stop cascara, and take olive oil at bedtime and half a pint of cold water on rising in the morning. No medicine given.

30-3-31. Very much better. Abdominal pain much less, though severe one day after beef. Bowels still costive, but has not taken any cascara. This is an illustration of what can be done even without the aid of the similimum.

So far the laziness has been laid entirely at the patients door. But are we altogether blameless? Are we educating our patients in these important matters or waiting till they come to us in need of treatment? Some teaching will fall on deaf ears– the ears of those who refuse to profit by the mistakes of others, but some will be forewarned and saved much needless suffering. So much is heard now-a-days of preventive medicine. The correct ingestion of nourishment is one aspect of preventive medicine, and one that is of far greater value than many vaccines and so- called specifics.

Here is another. During school-days we are playing games or taking strenuous exercise of one kind or another and, consciously or unconsciously, keeping our muscles fit. But what of those who afterwards go to sedentary occupations? For the first few years many keep themselves fit by fames, gymnasium, swimming, etc., but sooner or later comes a day when these fail to attract, and laziness begins to hold sway. Then that most important group of muscles, the abdominal wall, becomes slack and fatty, no longer able to keep the organs in their places.

Ptosis in greater or lesser degree becomes the order of the day and many evils follow in its train, of which I will mention two as subjects for remark.

1. Constipation. Laziness knows at once what to do for this; the only possible cure is a purgative whose name is legion. Is it? What did Isaac Newton say in the 17th century? “To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” To every action of a dose of opening medicine comes unfailingly the reaction of increased constipation. The bowel is being taught to wait for the artificial stimulus instead of initiating peristalsis by natural means.

2. Increasing weight and the drag on abdominal organs causing dyspnoea, discomfort in walking, a tendency to catch the feet and trip, etc., etc. If one is to believe the innumerable advertisements in public and medical papers, the only cure for a pendulous abdomen in some form of belt or corset, and laziness would rather spend money on these than bestir himself or herself to obtain a real cure.

In both conditions, the essence of cure consists not solely in medicinal treatment but also in restoring and maintaining muscle tone and the integrity of the abdominal wall. The passive movements of massage and a belt may be needed in the initial stages, but these should be regarded merely as a means to an end, not as a permanent substitute for muscular activity, and as soon as possible suitable exercises should be begun and continued as long as the patient has the vitality to do them. Of course, diet should be regulated according to individual needs, and half a pint of cold water taken first thing in the morning is a great help towards encouraging natural bowel action; it matters not at all whether it is taken quickly or sipped, but it must be swallowed cold.

The following simple abdominal exercise. I have found invaluable: Any clothing which prevents full expansion of chest and abdomen must be removed. Lie flat on the back. Fill the lungs to capacity, hold the breath and, while doing so, alternately contract and expand the abdomen at the rate of fifteen contraction to the half-minute.

This keeps the abdominal muscles in excellent condition, and massages the abdominal organs; if practised before rising in the morning, it starts peristalsis and obviates constipation; it will shift obstructed flatulence more quickly than anything else that I know of.

I have only touched upon a very few of the innumerable ramifications as regards both causes and effects, of the conditions mentioned here. It would need a book to cover them.

C. Gordon