
 “The Yellow Wallpaper” features a young woman who has a mental illness. She is not receiving treatment for her illness and thus it causes her to recede into a childlike state. The story takes place after the woman gives birth and her husband senses she’s acting strange. He takes her to a secluded house for the summer. In this house her husband John, who is a doctor, keeps her confined to a room much like a child in trouble.  If the woman had received a more efficient treatment, then she may have returned to normal. Instead, she begins acting like a young child and even less like herself.

In the beginning of the short story, the woman complains about her husband’s actions. Yet, her response to them was “what is one to do?” (Gilman 300). The woman lets her husband control her and make many decisions for her like a child who doesn’t know any better.  John has an authoritative personality due to his job as a physician and his place of power in society. This makes him think that his opinion is best and that his wife must do as he says. This is reflective of how parents act towards their children. For the most part, children respect their parent’s decisions and obey their demands. The reader can see the woman do this with her husband.  In the story, the woman wants to stay in a room on the first floor of the house. The room is more open and decorated with roses on the window. Yet, John makes her stay in an old nursery. This nursery has bars over the window, a bed bolted down, and displays an intricate wallpaper. The woman obeys her husband despite how much discomfort the room causes her. John almost refuses to allow her to leave the room, trapping her like a young kid who has received a grounding. 

The audience sees that the woman is starting to adopt childlike behaviors. The woman claims that she has become more sensitive and acts out. The reader sees this when she says “I get unreasonably angry with John sometimes. I’m sure I never used to be so sensitive.” (Gilman 300). She admits to this change in behavior and describes herself as having unstable emotions. This behavior is like a child's who becomes upset at small insignificant things. The woman also tells the reader “I cry at nothing, and cry most of the time” (Gilman 304). Crying is a behavior of a baby commonly associated with a baby. Babies will cry continuously due to the inability to communicate with its caretaker. The woman cries because she cannot communicate her emotions and discomfort to her husband.  Unfortunately, her behavior doesn’t change the way John treats her or her illness. Till the end of the story, the woman stays in the old nursery and away from other people.

The woman begins to perform certain actions that are typical of a young child at the end of the story. Even her husband John encourages these actions.  The woman writes “dear John gathered me up in his arms, and just carried me upstairs and laid me on the bed, and sat by me and read to me till I tired my head.” (Gilman 305). John somewhat pushes for these actions by treating her like a child. He does it again as she describes, “he took me in his arms and called me a blessed little goose” (Gilman 302).  John also addresses the woman, in quite an authoritative way, by asking her “What is it little girl?” (Gilman 306). This kind of speech, and the nicknames, are not those that are stereotypical of a couple but of a father and child.  John does not notice how these actions reinforce the woman into believing that she is a child. This could be due to his new infant that he also has to take care of. So, he treats both the child and his wife with the same loving yet authoritative way. Yet, in “The Yellow Wallpaper” it says that John and his wife have a nanny named Mary. Mary’s job is to watch over and takes care of the baby, so this would not make much sense. The story ends with the woman crawling around the room and John passing out at the sight of her doing this. By this point in the story, the woman has receded into such a childlike state that she stopped walking.  Like a child instead, she crawls around the room that her husband confined her to.

“The Yellow Wallpaper” is from the perspective of a woman who is writing in a secret journal. It tells of her experience as her husband hides her away as he attempts to fix her mental illness. His approach to curing her essentially backfires. The woman ends up expressing the behaviors of a child instead of those of a typical adult, wife, and mother. The reader can see this begin with his insistence of her obeying his commands. The author then provides examples of the woman crying without any stimulus to cause her to cry. By the end of the story, the woman is crawling around her room, like a child. The woman ends up acting more childish at the end of the story than compared to when it began.

 

 