SPECIAL BENEFIT TO WOMEN FROM THE USE OF THESE EXERCISES
The combined massage exercises are extremely beneficial
to women and girls of all ages.
Women suffer more from constipation than men. This may be due to the use of corsets, which at times prevent the respiratory muscles from being put into full play, or hinder the blood from circulating freely and often cause flabbiness or even atrophy to the abdominal and pectoral muscles. It is therefore often the original and chief cause of disorders in the digestive and abdominal organs.
It is especially important that women, looking forward to motherhood, should possess strong and healthy abdominal organs and muscles. These will cause a quick and natural delivery of the child; and children born under such conditions are not likely to suffer deforming injuries, as for instance, the tearing of a nerve leading to an arm (brachial paralysis), etc., which often occurs when artificial means have to be used at their birth.
Pregnancy is, however, not feared so much either for the inconvenience of carrying the infant or its delivery, but chiefly because of the current idea that a woman may lose her girlish appearance or not feel as young as before; this has often happened to many. If from early youth a woman has exercised and trained her abdominal muscles, the state of pregnancy will be less disagreeable. She would also look forward to this state with more hope and delight, if she could be made to realize that by care, massage and exercises of the abdominal muscles, after
