Page 118
“…a fever came over her…”
Sims hurries past the deterioration in Lucy’s condition; I have protracted it somewhat.
SIMS, J. Marion, (1885). The Story of my Life, ed. by H. Marion-Sims. D. Appleton & Co: New York, p. 238.
“They changed the ticking…”
The details of Lucy’s care at this point are inferred from Sims’s account. He does not specify how Lucy was cared for, but at the time of the experiments Sims was also maintaining a busy practice of paying work. Necessarily, Anarcha, Lucy, Betsey, and the others would have been left to fend for themselves. I have projected onto these days the sorts of care that are ordinarily associated with recovery from fistula surgery.
“…the experiment had gone well, he said…”
SIMS, J. Marion, (1885). The Story of my Life, ed. by H. Marion-Sims. D. Appleton & Co: New York, p. 237.
Sims, J. M., & New York Academy of Medicine. (1858). Silver sutures in surgery. New York: S.S. & W. Wood, p. 53.
“…collected in a small tin…”
“On the Treatment of Vesico-Vaginal Fistula,” J. Marion Sims, The American Journal of the Medical Sciences, Vol. XXIII, 1852, p. 77.
“…she gave out a long, throbbing sob…”
SIMS, J. Marion, (1885). The Story of my Life, ed. by H. Marion-Sims. D. Appleton & Co: New York, p. 238.
“…the last bits of life…”
Notably, Sims’s 1857 Silver Sutures address—in which he detailed his fistula experiments for the medical profession in a form that would be preserved for posterity (as opposed to his 1854 speech, proposing Woman’s Hospital, which was not preserved)—did not mention the catheter that almost killed Lucy at all.
“On the Treatment of Vesico-Vaginal Fistula,” J. Marion Sims, The American Journal of the Medical Sciences, Vol. XXIII, 1852, p. 77.
SIMS, J. Marion, (1885). The Story of my Life, ed. by H. Marion-Sims. D. Appleton & Co: New York, p. 238.
