In the 19th century the medical field was studying the women’s body. During this study they determine women are weak and sick. They believed the wombs were the reason why the women got sick and weak because their wombs were evil. They also believed that their wombs caused them to get the nervous disease. The nervous disease was about women trying to break free of housewife role, which came from social norms. The men tried to control women so they would not step out boundaries and the men would control the man would keep control over the women. In the “The Yellow Wallpaper” John is controlling his wife but she is trying to break free of her role. John tries to make sure she is not working or writing by giving her the “rest cure”. The “rest cure” is supposed to cure the mind and fix the nervous problems but the cure did not cure people like they expected. So society did not accepted the incurable people because they would not get better. The doctors treated the patients like prisoners because the social norms affected the way people thought about the incurable people. Society tells about social norms of men and women, but you are isolated or punished if you don’t follow the social norms. 

Social norms tell what is accepted in society and what roles men and women were expected to have in the 19th century. The social norms in the 19th century for men were that they have control; they were smart, provided and worked. In the “The Yellow Wallpaper” John fits the man’s role in the 19th century. John is described by his wife as “practical in the extreme… no patience with faith… horror of superstition” (Gilman 299). The social norms for the women were to be good hearted, domestic and moral. In the 19th century the men were expected to work and provide for his family, which means he would control what goes on in the his house. For example in the “The Yellow Wallpaper” John was a doctor and he would be in control of all his patients. At home his role was to make decisions and protect his family. John tries to protect his wife by isolating her and he believed that was the best decision for her. The wife in “The Yellow Wallpaper” disagreed with her husband’s decision, but she could not say anything because it is not her role to call out her husband, so she had to do whatever he said. The wife’s role in the book was to do house work, take care of the kids and be a good person. If the wife was sick then that mean she was not doing her role. 

The women could not do her role because she was sick, weak and could not control herself. John’s wife says “I get unreasonable angry with john sometimes… I think it is due to the nervous condition” (Gilman 300). The women had roles and the women was rebelling because they were tired of doing what the husbands tell them do and say. John responded to his wife saying that she does not have self-control and that she is while out of line. John is trying to control his wife so she fits the social norms of a women role. John is being successful with his plan at first because his wife feels bad and says, “ of course it is only nervousness. It does weigh on me so not to do my duty in any way!” (Gilman 301). The nervousness disease gets worst because she fighting her frustration from John controlling her and social norms telling her how a women should act and be seen as. In the 19th century doctors believed that most of the women pretended to be sick to get out of their work by using the common nervousness disease. 

The common disease for women was the nervous disease. The symptoms for the nervous disease are headaches, nervousness, and feebleness (Wood 29). The “real disease” reached all around the American women but one half of the women were suffered by it (wood 27). The doctors treated the sick women like they did because they wanted the women to be childlike. John treated his wife like she was his little girl for example the wife told the reader that “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 got tired my head” (Gilman 305). The man did not want the women to think for themselves they wanted to think for them because they did not want the women to out step the pursuits beyond her sphere (Morantz and Zschoche 568). If the women started to thinking they could more than just a house wife the men thought they would take other men jobs and the men would think they would have less power over the women. The reader can see how John is telling his wife that no one can help her but him and he is telling her to stay in her zone by telling his wife she must use her will and self-control and not let any silly fancies run away with me (Gilman 305). The social norms shows that the men wanted to think for the women all the time but the women was trying to broke free of being controlled. 

In “The Yellow Wallpaper” the wife was diagnoses with nervous disease and it was not accepted by the society because the man thought women were faking to get out of housework. For example John says “…there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression…” (Gilman 300).  In the 19th century it was normal for women to be seen as ill and weak because they were just woman (Wood 28). During this time the man thought the women wombs were evil and the wombs were making the woman ill. The people thought woman were two times more likely to get sick then man because the woman have a womb (Wood 29). Male doctors did not know how to deal with the issue, so it caused them to think all women were sick. The male doctors treated women harsh to keep power over women so they can get back to their roles. According to Morantz and Zschoche doctors give harsh punishments to stay in control of the woman would not stay true the role of a true woman (568)? Social norms effected doctors as well as man and woman and it caused the doctors to punish the woman. In society if a person do not follow the social norms they would get punished. 

During this time period if a person were to not follow the social norms they would be isolated. The “rest cure’ was used to punish the woman that had nervous disease. The “rest cure’ was the woman to rested for six weeks and they were not able to see anybody, read, get up from bed and pretty much could not do anything (Wood 31).  In the book “The Yellow Wallpaper” John locked his wife away because he thought the “Rest Cure” was the best thing for her. This cure means she could not do anything, she was not allowed to do anything and she was isolated. The wife said “I believed that congenial work… would do me good” (Gilman 300) but the wife tells herself “… I am absolutely forbidden to “work’ until I am well again” (Gilman 300). The wife feels this way about her health because the social norms tell her that the man is smarter and they know best for the cure. The man was trying control the woman minds by manipulating them by the rest cure (Verbrugge 960). In the 19th century they thought the “rest cure” would cure the mind. It was expected that the patient should eat regularly and gain weight in order to get better and cure the nervous disease (Wood 31). John knows his wife is getting better because she is eating more and he tells her “I am a doctor, dear, and I know. You are gaining flesh and color, your appetite is better, …” (Gilman 307).   The woman was locked away if they were put on this cure because it was not accepted in society. If the women were mental ill patients they would be treated like prisoners.

The mental patients were treated like prisoners because the doctors did not understand why people were going crazy or understand why women were getting sick. The way the doctors treated their patients were based on their social factors (Rosenberg 429). The wife was treated as an outpatient to order to keep her away from everybody and not to make her John look bad. The patients were treated based on social wealth and type sickness. (Rosenberg 431).  John and his wife were middle class people and he treated her on her sickness, so he rented a house away from everybody to help his wife get better. John needed his wife to get better so she can get back to normal. John tells his wife that if she does not get better he would send his to Weir Mitchell in the fall (Gilman 303). John is threatening to send her off to somewhere else because it was common practice move them around. According to Rosenbereg, “If a patient developed a contagious disease while in a private institution, he or she might be transferred to municipal hospital” (431). If a person is not getting better at one place they would move them around until they get better. The male doctors that some of the women were faking to be sick, so they moved them to somewhere else if they were are incurable because doctors refused to have incurable cases as free patients (Rosenbereg 431). John did not want take care of his wife anymore because she was incurable and she was a free patient. The social norms for doctors were to not accept incurable diseases because the hospital was seen as a bad place to be.  

The common nervous disease was popular social disease that women pretended to have in order got out of the social norms of a woman role. For the middle class women being ill became a trend to get away from the demands from being a woman (Wood 27). The woman was tired of doing housework because they wanted their freedom. Some women were actually sick but doctors were still hard on female patients because they thought all patients were faking to be sick. In the “The Yellow Wallpaper” the reader sees that the wife is really sick but the husband does not believe her because the society says women are faking to be sick to get out of work. The wife says, “He does not believe I am sick!” (Gilman 299).  The wife shows that she is really suffering but John believes that she is not suffering from anything by saying “John does not know how much I really suffer. He knows there is no reason to suffer, and that satisfies him” (Gilman 301).  John did not think she was sick because of what was going on with middle class women and that women were ill because their mind was not clean anymore. The man thought they had a better understanding of the women body and their mind then the women. 

During this time men were trying to figure out women and why they were getting sick and they thought they was getting sick because of their minds not being cleared. John tells his wife not to read or write. He wants her to not to think about anything because he thought she was sick because her mind was not clear. According to Morantz and Zschoche the man did not want the women to get higher education because it would treating the women the female health and the men saw women as weakness (568).  The men believe they could figure out women but they could not understand what was going on with the women. Men thought they were smarter than women but they did not understand a women mind. In the beginning of the story the wife tells the reader that her husband is a physician she goes on saying “…perhaps that is one reason I do not get well faster” (Gilman 299). John and many others men thought they knew the women how their minds and bodies worked but they did not understand because they are males. John tells his wife that “…you are really are better, dear, whether you can see it or not. I am a doctor, dear, and I know…” (Gilman 306).  Social norms said that men knew what was best for the women however women doctors understood more than male doctors.

Female doctors would have been better doctors for the women because they are a woman and they would have personally connections. During this time the women doctors believed the male colleagues was not the best fit for treating the women and children (Morantz and Zschoche 569). The female doctors felt like they would have been better for the job because the women would understand the women better than male doctors. The wife seems to like Jennie more because she leaves her alone when she wants her to (Gilman 304). For so long the wife have been in the room isolated in her room, however the wife have Jennie to look after her and she has more freedom. The wife is now aloud to walk on the porch, walk down the lovey lone and she gets to walk through the garden. The women felt like it was their job to look after the sick child and sick women. The women were called on with the sick women to find a cure for the female health and disease because the male doctors were not helping the women (Morantz and Zschoche 569). The social norms of the women roles affected the male and female doctors because they both had the same treatment styles. When John was looking over his wife he did not want her writing or reading and he would get mad at her for making her mind work. Later in the story it tells the reader that the wife have been writing on her own and John and Jennie saw it at different times. One day the wife caught Jennie looking at her writing on the paper and the wife comes up to Jennie to ask her why is she reading her paper and the wife says “… she turned around as if she had been caught stealing, and looked quite angry and asked me why I should frighten her so!” (Gilman 307). The women doctor’s treatments were almost the same to the male doctors because the medical treatments are influenced by social norms (Verbrugge 960). The social norms effected the doctor’s discussions and treatment styles. 

If a person did not follow the social norms during this time the doctors would isolate the sick person. The women that were isolated for a very long time their case of nervous disease seem to get worst over the time. John’s wife is an example of a woman that got isolated for a long time and now she is going crazy. She started hiding things that was not accepted for the social norms because she is tired of being told what to do. She wrote when she was told not to write and sometimes she liked her condition she had. She knows she is broking the social norms roles. She says “it must be every humiliating to be caught creeping by daylight.” (Gilman 309) She goes on saying that she creeps during the day too but it is behind closed days because she knew she was not allowed to do these things if John was there. She starting pealing the wallpaper off the wall because thought she kept thinking a woman is in the walls. Imaging a person is in the walls was not accepted in the society because many people would see her as crazy. She did not want people to she her because she did not want to get John in trouble or she did not want to get herself in trouble. John was a doctor and it would have been bad look for John if people found out if his wife was going crazy. Social norms play a big part in her condition because she is hiding all her problems.  

Social norms and the roles of men and women caused women to diagnose themselves with the nervousness disease. Treatments of mental illness and nervousness disease in the 19th century were based on the cultural attitudes towards the women that were sick (Wood 25). The cultural attitude towards the women wombs was evil and it caused the women to be always sick or weak. So the doctors punished them with the “rest cure” in order for them to get better and go back to working and doing what the husband tells them to do. In the “The Yellow Wallpaper” John does some of the same things the other doctors have done to control the female patients. John put his wife on the “rest cure” and he isolated her from the world because other people did not accept her. He thought he knew it all and that he knew what could help her however he did not help her like he thought he would but he really just made her worst. She has been in the room all this time and not being able to do anything but she was of tired of being locked down so she wanted to broke free from the orders John been giving her. The doctors treated the patients like prisoners because the social norms affected the way people thought about the incurable people. Society tells about social norms of men and women, but you are isolated or punished if you don’t follow the social norms.
