Convulsions (female) and masturbation (male)

“ . . . the medical community’s concern with eliminating masturbation in men was matched only by its preoccupation with quelling convulsions in women. The parallel . . . was drawn frequently; both were regarded as symptoms of deleterious sexual excess. Adhering to the Enlightenment model of convulsions, provincial doctors routinely recommended marriage as an antidote to convulsions, [but] marriage and motherhood were as likely to cause as to cure convulsions. Just as frightening to women as epidemics was the prospect of childbirth which marriage inevitably brought with it” (L. Wilson, loc 871-872). Among adolescent girls, provincial physicians believed convulsions typically manifested anxiety at early signs of sexual maturity that could be potentiated by sexual teasing or assault. The convulsions were often accompanied by aversion to food and the evacuations that resulted from food intake (loc 947-951).