Page:Sexology.djvu/177



"Quickening" is the common term by which is generally meant the first cognizance that a mother takes of the child's moving. The period in which it occurs varies; but, in the majority of cases, it dates from the eighteenth week of utero-gestation. The child may be felt earlier or later, stronger or weaker, probably according to its constitutional strength and the room it has to move in. I have seen cases where the mother prognosticated a strong, large child, from her feelings; while, to her great surprise, she gave birth to a small and puny infant. The great movement during pregnancy was due to an immense quantity of water in the sac, in which the child could float and move freely. Whenever the mother cannot give approximate data of conception, she may safely calculate the date of the end by adding four months and a half to date of quickening. These peculiar movements at first often induce sensations of syncope, or fainting, which gradually disappear as the woman becomes accustomed to the cause.

The sensation of quickening does not remove all doubt as to the existence of pregnancy. Some women have not only felt this, but have even thought of having seen the movements of the child through the abdominal walls, and yet were not pregnant. Again: women have been found pregnant when they had not been conscious of any sen- sation of quickening. The movements of the child may be so slight as to be imperceptible to the mother.

Two hundred and eighty days is the general average, which may be divided into ten lunar months, or nine calendar months and ten days.