What is "distension"

Usage examples of "distension".

But supplementary to this, it has hypothetically occurred to me, that as ordinary fish possess what is called a swimming bladder in them, capable, at will, of distension or contraction.

The distension of the nostrils is not for the sake of scenting the source of danger, for when a horse smells carefully at any object and is not alarmed, he does not dilate his nostrils.

It seems, therefore, not improbable that the distension of the ocular vessels, thus induced, might act by reflection on the lacrymal glands--the effects due to the spasmodic pressure of the eyelids on the surface of the eye being thus increased.

We have an analogous case in the orbicular muscles being almost always contracted in some slight degree, even during a gentle crying-fit, when there can be no distension of the vessels and no uncomfortable sensation excited within the eyes.

In this case there has been no screaming and no distension of the blood-vessels, yet through habit certain nerve-cells send a small amount of nerve-force to the cells commanding the muscles round the eyes.

At the same time the spasmodic pressure on the surface of the eye, and the distension of the vessels within the eye, without necessarily entailing any conscious sensation, will have affected, through reflex action, the lacrymal glands.

In the meantime, the soft strait passage gradually loosens, yields, and, stretch'd to its utmost bearing, by the stiff, thick, indriven engine, sensible, at once, to the ravishing pleasure of the feel and the pain of the distension, let him in about half way, when all the most nervous activity he now exerted, to further his penetration, gain'd him not an inch of his purpose: for, whilst he hesitated there, the crisis of pleasure overtook him, and the close compressure of the warm surrounding fold drew from him the extatic gush, even before mine was ready to meet it, kept up by the pain I had endur'd in the course ot the engagement, from the insuffer-able size of his weapon, tho' it was not as yet in above half its length.

This continuation of that grateful stricture which is in us, to the men, the very jet of their pleasure, I ow'd, it seems, to a happy habit of body, juicy, plump and fur-nished towards the texture of those parts, with a fullness of soft springy flesh, that yielding sufficiently, as it does, to almost any distension soon recovers itself so as to retighten that strict compression of its mantlings and folds, which form the sides of the passage, wherewith it so tenderly embraces and closely clips any foreign body intro-duc'd into it, such as my exploring finger then was.

This probably resulted psychosomatically in the other symptoms of a phantom pregnancy, like abdominal distension and the emission of breast milk, which developed as a result of the enormous importance of this 'pregnancy' to the Queen.

Her subsequent depression and the indications that she ate very little during pregnancy may suggest that she suffered from a spell of anorexia, which also produces distension and might well have delayed the resumption of her periods until August, when she had to admit to herself that it had all been a terrible mistake.

At the base of her sinuses, she tasted the last savour of the tea that she had swallowed, and felt the faint distension of her stomach around the warm liquid.

And she did, as a singer would, from deep in her belly -- her back muscles tightening, her diaphragm thickening until her throat, too, showed the distension of breath support.

Her body trembled with the pain as the sharp knife like stabs became rips and tears and Kristy's belly began the contorted distensions once again.

On her abdomen's ballooned distension the black-and-gold armor that sheathed it had separated, the sclerae stretched apart, like polished warshields on a white wall.