Broken Homes | Page 9

indicate.
Less well understood by the lay worker are actual maladjustments, both
physical and mental (or spiritual), which prevent the complete
satisfaction of one or both. Some of these are curable by medical care,
others by instruction and education. This instruction should be given,
needless to say, by the physician and not by the case worker. If
uncorrected such maladjustments are apt to result in marital shipwreck.
No attempt can be made here to discuss actual sex perversions in their
relation to desertion. Their effect is obvious; and the social worker
should be sufficiently well informed, not only from a few standard
books on the subject,[13] but from a knowledge of the phrases which
are used in the tenements, to understand them, so that significant
symptoms are not overlooked. So intimately are sex difficulties
connected with the neuroses that the lay social worker should consult
the psychiatrist freely wherever one is available, before attempting to
deal with them.
12. Vicious Habits.--Sexual immorality, through its degenerative effect
on personality and the lowered ideals of marriage it induces, has a real
effect in bringing about desertion. The "other man" and the "other
woman" type of desertion, however, is often itself only a consequence
of a previously existing state of temperamental or sexual
incompatibility. If these underlying causes can be attacked and changed

such a desertion may be "repairable."
A young man deserted his wife and three children and eloped with an
eighteen-year-old girl who had made his acquaintance in a street car
flirtation. He had been "an obedient boy with good principles," and his
later record showed steadiness and ability; but he and his wife had been
drifting apart--their marital relations had not been "quite the same" as
formerly. Arrested and brought back, he did not impute any blame to
her, however, but said he "must have been crazy." In spite of the
circumstances, the judge decided to give him six months in the
penitentiary; and a man visitor from the family social agency interested
began at once to try to secure an influence over him. On his release the
couple again went to housekeeping. The wife had been cautioned on
how to receive him; but things went badly at first, and the man began
again insisting that they were mismated. (He "had the other girl still
considerably on his conscience and heart.") Tangles continually arose
which the society's visitor was hard put to it to straighten out. Once the
wife found a letter from the girl; but finally, after the charity
organization society in the city where he had left the girl reported that
she was doing well and not breaking her heart about him, the man
decided to "cut out" the correspondence. A little later the girl
eliminated herself by marrying. A year after the reconciliation the wife
told the friendly visitor that the trouble was gone between them, and "it
was just like a new life." For another year efforts were continued to
strengthen the attachment and make the home more attractive, at the
end of which time it was felt that the home was stable enough to need
no further supervision.
For reasons of convenience we may include here the causal relations
between venereal disease and desertion. In so far as syphilis brings
about mental and physical deterioration, the relation between the two is
obvious. The presence of the disease in the man, if known to his wife,
may lead her to sever relations with him in self-protection, and this
severance, in turn, may lead ultimately to desertion or complete
separation. Often separation is desirable, but the syphilitic who is on
the whole a good family man raises some of the most difficult
questions with which the social worker has to deal. Whether to try to

force him out of the home and thus make an unwilling deserter;
whether to violate the diagnosis given in confidence by passing it on to
the wife for her protection--these are only two of the puzzles that may
arise.
The relation of alcoholism to non-support and desertion is too well
known to require discussion. The causative relation between alcohol
and desertion is so direct that it probably ought not to be included
under contributory causes at all. As it is an active poison to the cells of
the nervous system, it may bring about deteriorations of mind and
character that are directly to blame for such anti-social acts as desertion.
The same is true in less degree of the use of narcotics; though drug
habits are far less common in connection with desertion than
alcoholism. What relation drugs and alcohol will hold to desertion after
July 1, 1919, remains to be seen. Alcoholism in the woman is, however,
a real contributory factor, and one frequently met with. The experience
of social workers leads them