I was an invalid from the time of my birth, and it was believed that I had inherited spinal and kidney disease,— since all my life I suffered a great deal from them.—also a very weak stomach. I had so many sick spells that I could average only about half the school year, the rest of the time being spent in bed. My parents moved to Kansas when I was quite small, and I seemed to be more susceptible to the climatic conditions than the rest. I had the ague in its worst form for years, varied with two or three spells of bilious or intermittent fever each year. For years I had to take quinine as regularly as my meals, only more frequently. When I was about twelve I suffered so much that a thorough examination was made, with the result that my head was shaved at the back, and counter-irritants applied the whole length of the spine. I spent many days lying face down, with a dreadful raw sore the whole length of the spine, so that my mother often wept over the dreadful conditions. This had to be repeated every three or four months and was kept up for a period of about twenty years. If it was not done thus often I would have violent paroxysms, so that two or three men could not hold me, although in my usual condition I was a weak and delicate child. When a little past twelve I had membranous diphtheria and my three younger sisters died from it. I was then left in such a condition that I overheard the doctors telling my parents that I could not live a year. For years after this, in fact until I was healed by Christian Science, I was subject to the most violent attacks of sore throat, with swellings which would sometimes extend down into the chest. I lived in constant dread.
When I was about eighteen years old one physician advised change of climate for me and my mother took me to Wisconsin to stay the summer. I seemed to get better in many ways, so that we were quite encouraged. I had always been ambitious to have a college education, and while I had labored under such difficulties, I had managed to keep along with my classmates in my studies, as I usually kept my books on the bed with me. When I came home, feeling improved in health, I began the school year with great hopes, but I soon lost all I had gained of physical strength, and during the next three years I had pneumonia and several spells of fever, and finally such an attack of brain fever and heart trouble that the doctors forbade my ever attempting to finish my course in college. I was in such a state that I could not do anything. I had forgotten things that I knew as well as my own name, and in desperation I gave up all my plans, and for two or three years I traveled and visited among relatives in different States; but wherever I was, I had to keep up the counter-irration of the spine. While under the care of a noted specialist for spinal trouble, I was quite a little improved, and in the course of a year or two was married. My husband, like my parents, made my health the first consideration. We tried many new cures, but in spite of all the love and care, I got worse instead of better, and was finally a total wreck. I was for sixteen years one of the greatest sufferers on earth, — my husband spending thousands of dollars in trying to bring me comfort, but nothing seemed to help me even temporarily.
These years, before I was finally healed by Christian Science, were one long agony. I think I had been under the care of about twenty-five physicians during my life, many of them noted, and I am sure they did all they could do for me. My physicians were my friends, and I feel very grateful to all who tried to help me. At the last I was for three years confined to my bed. and then it was that Christian Science found me. For fifteen years I had not slept one hour at a time. I was said to have Bright's disease in the last stages, and suffered awful agony. I had gravel in the most painful form, and there was seemingly not a particle of color to the blood. My stomach was so I could not take food without severe pain. I had such violent attacks of neuralgia of the heart that many times my friends were called in to see me for the last time. My spleen and liver were greatly enlarged and very painful, and for eighteen years I never had a natural action of the bowels. I had inflammatory rheumatism till my hands could not be straightened. I had been given up by every one as incurable. I was a misery to myself and I felt I was such a care and burden to my friends that I prayed I might die.
