Student Name
Professor Kelly Martin
English 1302 (Web)
07 April 2006
How Does One Define Crazy?
Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s Inaccurate Account of a Struggle with Mental Illness
	Throughout Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s story “The Yellow Wallpaper,” many themes are exposed in regard to conflicts with environment, relationships, and self.  From these conflicts, Gilman creates a character who expresses numerous symptoms indicative of postpartum depression.  Gilman’s personal experience with the illness allows her to provide an accurate account of the symptoms and suffering caused by her mental disposition. Gilman’s experience, however, also clouds her ability to illustrate the possibility that her own character may in fact suffer from other forms of mental illness.  Other flaws created by Gilman are fostered by situations, such as lack of knowledge in medicine during this time period, contribute to Gilman not acknowledging symptoms of other mental illnesses.  Symptoms such as depression, fatigue, and mood swings could be easily diagnosed as postpartum depression, such as in Gilman’s case, after the birth of a child.  While these experiences indicate postpartum depression, Gilman fails to explore other mental influences causing these type of symptoms to surface, thus suggesting postpartum depression is not the diagnosis.
	Gilman manifests many symptoms, such as depression and restlessness, of mental illness throughout “The Yellow Wallpaper”: “I don’t sleep much at night, for it is so interesting to watch
developments . . .” (Gilman 1892).  Gilman describes this type of restlessness as a driving force
in her obsession with focusing on the wallpaper in her room that she finds to be atrocious.  Loss of sleep and restlessness could be a symptom of postpartum depression, as Sylvia Brown, a supporter of research in the areas of postnatal development in women notes: “Unfortunately, fatigue is part of the postnatal period.  Although sleep deprivation is almost inevitable, utter exhaustion is avoidable . . ..”  As Brown suggests, Gilman’s depression may have been a result of sleep deprivation due to her child’s erratic sleep pattern.  Brown also states, “Fortunately, it takes just two or three nights in a row of uninterrupted sleep to cure these symptoms” (Brown 2003).  The depression Gilman faces incapacitate her in her daily activities. As she distresses, “Of course it is my nervousness.  It does weigh on me so not to do my duty in any way!”  (1152).  The severity of Gilman’s mental condition demonstrates her inability to accurately account for her condition and methods for self medicating.  Gilman’s perception of her mental illness has been clouded by her own judgment of the causes of her condition.  While Gilman attempts to focus on her illness she develops tunnel vision, contributing to the inaccuracies of her situation as she deletes the possibility of other factors contributing towards her mental illness.  
	Symptoms outlined by Gilman describe an individual who has lost touch with reality to the point of insanity.  Gilman describes thoughts and feelings as though she is aware that she is suffering from other mental illness not identified by her husband.  As Gilman describes seeing patterns within the wallpaper, she admits to experiencing mental illness through her explanation of descriptors that trigger her into fits of delusion.  This is not a common symptom of postpartum depression, but rather an indication of prior developing mental illness: “When considering factors toward mental instabilities, past events often resurface as methods of projection as means to displace oneself into objects of dislike” (Belvin 2004).  Dr. Belvin 
continues, “ . . . objects of dislike make it easier to provide methods of ridding oneself of unwanted memories and events” (Belvin 2004).  As Dr. Belvin suggests, in an effort to rid herself of negative past emotion, Gilman uses the yellow wallpaper to displace negative emotions from her mind into an object that makes it easy for Gilman to express dislike without expressing dislike toward the actual emotions.  When an individual acknowledges the presence of negative emotion, this opens the possibility of more mental problems.  According to Dr. Belvin, it becomes easier to cope with such possibilities through removing the problem from oneself.  This indicates that Gilman may have experienced past mental trauma that surfaced during a trying time in her life with the birth of her first child.  Gilman fails to provide background information concerning the relationship between her and her husband, who also happens to be her physician: “If a physician of high standing, and one’s own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is nothing the matter with one . . . what is one to do?” (1150).  Expressing frustration in this matter, Gilman finds herself trapped within a conflict of interest between her illness being properly diagnosed and her treatment methods concerning the illness.  When Gilman’s husband inaccurately diagnoses her, he provides more stress on Gilman as he offers little support to help her overcome her mental disposition, thus becoming a factor toward her dwindling mental condition.  
	Gilman’s experiences with postpartum depression are not isolated to her situation.  Many women suffer from the diagnoses of postpartum depression., as Dr. Kenneth Boyd suggests, “Psychological science as we know it is simply subjective to various scenarios . . . depression, isolation, insomnia critical points of postpartum depression are common emotions felt by all humans.  It is what makes psychology a ‘pseudoscience’ the possibility of postpartum depression 
solely existing to pinpoint a specific cause for emotion” (Boyd 2004).  Gilman’s husband, therefore, diagnoses Gilman with a mental illness with which he feels comfortable.  This also allows Gilman’s husband to treat her with methods he finds to be safe and effective, while being 
reluctant to try newer methods of medicine thought to carry side effects; Dr. Boyd argues, “ . . . drugs may alter hormonal input/output levels, however, who are we to say what levels are normal and when those levels are reached, how do we continue treatment?” (Boyd 2004).  

Another researcher in the area of postpartum depression, Joel Roller suggests that baby blues are just a natural part of the postnatal period: “New mothers are placed on depression medication that has proven to be ineffective after two weeks, or become habit forming due to ingredients of the drug” (Roller 2000).  Roller explains that doctors use a chart outlining mild depression and postpartum depression.  Using this tool doctors are able to, by asking a series of questions, diagnose a patient with suffering from either mild depression or postpartum depression.  Roller claims, “As doctors mis-diagnose depression levels, they provide treatment nonspecific to the patient’s needs” (Roller 2000).  The degree to which Gilman’s illness has proliferated, shows the lack of compassion Gilman’s husband has towards the illness he inaccurately addresses.  Treatment provided by Gilman’s husband in no way could benefit her mental condition as she was forced into treatment for an illness she did not suffer.
	The mental problems Gilman describes resemble those of  dementia.  As stated in Kathryn Slade’s story “Lost in the Light,” “With my mind in motion I saw myself, not as I was or as I am, but rather as I will be.  Looking at myself escaped from my body . . . I was finally free” (Slade 1990).  In “Lost in the Light,” Slade tells the story of a woman who suffers mild dementia after she finds her husband killed their only son.  The shock of this tragic event sent 
Slade’s character, Amy, violently into insanity.  In “The Yellow Wallpaper” as Gilman confesses to displacing her emotions into a figure of a woman that she sees trapped in the yellow wallpaper, she displays traits of Slade’s character, who also finds herself displacing her mind from her body to become free from tragic emotion.  Gilman also claims to have suffered this type of displacement while as a child she would, “ . . . get more entertainment and terror out of blank 
walls and plain furniture than most children could find in any toy store” (1153).  This suggests that Gilman has experienced mental illness prior to her child’s birth.
	Other types of mental illness from which Gilman suffers could account for a diagnosis other than postpartum depression: “He [John] says that with my imaginative power and habit of story-making, a nervous weakness like mine is sure to lead to all manner of excited fancies . . .” (1157).  Gilman’s “overactive imagination” could be viewed as a sign of adult attention deficit disorder (A.A.D.D.).  In reference to the wallpaper in Gilman’s room, “ . . . I believe-and follow that pattern about by the hour . . . I determine for the thousandth time that I will follow that pointless pattern to some sort of conclusion” (1154)  Throughout the story, Gilman devotes the most attention to her obsession with the wallpaper.  In modern medicine this fixation on the wallpaper could be a form of obsessive compulsive disorder, with her desire to find some sort of pattern out of random design that intends no order.  These examples would prove Dr. William Bell’s theory, “Mental illness often takes many forms.  These forms often cloud the ability of even the best physician to cure” (Bell 1998).  As Gilman’s husband attempts methods of healing such as isolation, he is attempting to cure illness that has not been correctly identified.  As Bell continues, “Attempts of therapy such as isolation, sedation, and shock treatment have shown us the advancements in medicine over the past century.  Although many advancements have been 
made, today we still generalize diagnosis in the areas of postpartum depression” (Bell 1998).
	Postpartum depression, in Gilman’s time known as puerperal mania, had not yet been pinpointed by science in regard to cause, treatment, and diagnosis.  What Gilman had actually suffered, by today’s standards would have been severe depression caused by earlier events that  
resurfaced as result of her child’s birth.  As life changing events occur, one tends to reevaluate one’s life.  While doing so, Gilman placed herself in a state of mental influx.  The hormonal imbalance that Gilman was experiencing, in lieu of her child’s birth, allowed this mental state to flourish into deep depression as she displayed symptoms of other types of mental illness as well.  The prognosis would have been followed through differently today than in Gilman’s time.  Medication could have been a catalyst in the battle against her illness.  The other symptoms expressed may be solved in a similar manner, such as her apparent obsessive compulsion.   Other methods of therapy could have helped Gilman come to terms wither her feelings of helplessness or solve questions about her past behaviors.  

Works cited
Bell, William.  Therapy, are we right? San Francisco: Grooper, 1992.  
Brown, Sylvia.  Managing your Energy After Childbirth.  New York: Pearson, 2003. 
Eastgate, Boyd, et al., eds.  Psychiatry is a Pseudoscience.  Tampa FL.: Preston,  2004.
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “The Yellow Wallpaper.” Making Literature Matter. Ed. John Clifford and John Schilb. 2nded. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2003.  1149-61. 
Roller, Joel.  Baby Blues vs. Postpartum Depression.  Nashville: Singleton, 2000. 
Slade, Kathryn.  “Lost in the Light.”  Stories by Women for Women.  Ed. Josh Cooley. New York: Syracuse UP, 1994.  102-28.