cts all secretions and how easily the adrenal and thyroid
glands are influenced by fear. This is the root of the trouble in many
cases of difficult "change." If an occasional body is not quite able
to regulate the chemical readjustment, we may have to administer the
glands of some other animal, but in the majority of cases, the body,
unhampered by an extra burden of fear, is quite able to make its own
adjustments. The hot flash passes in a moment, if not prolonged by
emotion or if not converted into a habit by attention.

One source of trouble in the menopause is that it comes at a time in a
woman's life when she is likely to have too much leisure. In no way
can a woman so easily handicap her body at this time as by stopping
work and being afraid. Those women who have to go on as usual find
themselves past the change almost before they know it,--unless they
consider themselves abused, and worry over the necessity for working
through such a "critical time."

=Three Rules.= Here are a few pointers which have have been of help to
a number of women:

1 Remember that this is a physiological process and therefore
abundantly safeguarded by Nature. If you don't expect trouble you will
not be likely to find it.

2 Remember that the sweating and flushing are made worse by notice.

3 Do everything in your power to keep from the public the knowledge
that you are no longer a potential mother. If you are past forty, do
not mop your face or gasp for breath or carry a fan to the theater!
Shun attention and fear, and you will be surprised at the ease with
which the "change" is effected.

=Nature's Last Chance.= While we are on the subject of the middle-aged
woman, it may be well to mention a phenomenon sometimes noticed in the
early forties. Often an "old maid" who has considered herself settled
for life in her bachelor estate, suddenly takes to herself a husband.
(I use the verb advisedly!) Mothers who have thought their
child-bearing days long past sometimes find themselves pregnant. "The
child of her old age" is not an uncommon occurrence. Unmarried women
who have "kept straight" all their lives sometimes go down before
temptation at this late time. There is a reason. It is as though
Nature were making a last desperate attempt to produce another life
before it is too late, speeding up all the internal secretions and
flashing insistent messages throughout the whole organism.

It may help some woman who feels herself inexplicab