sband and wife, should be such that
no "certificate" should be necessary; but reality differs from the
ideal, and in some cases that we know the husband's suspicions were
allayed by the doctor's oral or written statement.

This is as good a place as any to emphasize, that if the bride has a
very strong, tough and resistant hymen, the new husband should not use
brute force in rupturing it. First, because the pain may be too
excruciating and this may create in the wife an aversion to
intercourse which may last for many months or years--in some cases
forever. Second, a severe hemorrhage may result, which may require the
aid of a physician to stop. Wherever a case of very resistant hymen is
encountered, the husband should make several attempts; gradual and
gentle dilatation, with the aid of a little vaseline and not forcible
rupture should be the aim; the result will usually be satisfactory. In
exceptional cases, a physician may have to be called in. The operation
of cutting the hymen is a trifling one.

It is also interesting to know that some wives have sex relations for
months and years, and the hymen remains unruptured. Pregnancy may also
result with an intact hymen.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

IS THE ORGASM NECESSARY FOR IMPREGNATION?

Suppression of Orgasm by Woman to Prevent Impregnation--Bad
Results of Suppression by the Woman--Orgasm: Relation of to
Impregnation--A Hypothesis--A Fanciful Hypothesis--Why Passionate
Women Frequently Fail to Become Mothers--Advice to Passionate
Women who Desire to Conceive.

Among the laity the opinion is quite prevalent that in order for a
woman to conceive she must experience an orgasm, she must have had a
pleasurable voluptuous sensation during the act. If she has no orgasm,
impregnation cannot take place. So sure are some women that this is so
that when they want to avoid conception they repress any orgastic
feeling; as they say, they don't let themselves go. Which, I will say,
by the way, is one of the causes of female frigidity. If you don't
habitually permit a certain feeling to develop, if you repeatedly
repress it at the very beginning, at its first manifestation, it is
apt to atrophy altogether, to become permanently suppressed, or the
suppression develops into a nervous disorder.

Among the medical profession no perfect unanimity has been reached as
to the role of the orgasm in impregnation. Some sexologists like Kisch
and Vaerting believe it does play an