Depression In The Yellow Wallpaper

The short story, The Yellow Wallpaper was written by a lady named Charlotte Perkins Gilman. “Charlotte was a young lady born in the 1860s right into poverty. Her upbringing was in poverty and didnt have it very easy at a young age. She was born in England and at the age of 22 she married a man by the name Charles Walter Stetson. They eventually had a child and almost immediately right after the birth of the child Charlotte fell into a deep depression. She then entered the controversial treatment in a sanitarium in philadelphia” (Gilman Society). The biography of Charlotte Perkins Gilman shows the hard times she had to go through. The short story, The Yellow Wallpaper is a story about what she went through. She went to a sanitarium just like

During this era women were looked at as stay at home mothers. If a women had a husband back then, the husband was the one expected to work in the family while the mother stays at home cooking and cleaning. ”Postpartum depression is a transient state of heightened emotional reactivity the occurs in about 50% of women who have recently given birth”(Miller). Some women after having a child get labeled by their husbands or by society mentally handicapped. Most women were diagnosed with postpartum depression. Postpartum depression occurs after birth when the hormones of women are changing which causes many symptoms such as irritability, hot flashes, and sadness. In the short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper” the narrator suffers from postpartum depression and is put into a mental hospital by her husband only to find out in the end he was not who she thought he was and the place she was living was not what she had

It is quite alone, standing well back from the road, quite three miles from the village. It makes me think of English places that you read about, for there are hedges and walls and gates that lock, and lots of separate little houses for the gardeners and people”(Gilman).

This quote is showing people at the beginning of the story how she views her situation. She 's in love with where she is and what she has. The narrator describes where she lives as a beautiful place to live. At this point in the story the narrator is in a mental hospital. Every perspective and belief she has on where she is at has been put into her head by her husband. Everything she knows about her situation is to calm her down and not make her think for herself. As the story continues the narrator begins to start thinking on her own. Getting flashes of independence going through her brain along with realizing a little bit of her situation. Once this starts happening her husband John tries to shut it down restating that everything will be okay by calling her demeaning names and explaining why everything is okay. Gilman