“The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a representation of a time in her life where she had a nervous breakdown. Many readers have thought the illness described in the tale as depression, or hysteria. Others have taken the story and related it to women’s discourse as well as the role of sexual identity in the late 1800s. Many descriptions in the story relate to these illnesses, but the mental disorder that has the most similar symptoms is schizophrenia. There are many periods in the story where her descriptions can relate to both schizophrenia and types of depression. Ultimately the illness described by the author in “The Yellow Wallpaper” relates more to the mental disorder of schizophrenia rather than different forms of depression and hysteria. 

A major mental illness that has affected many people for centuries is schizophrenia, a disorder that causes people to interpret reality in an abnormal way. Early in history, before there was any research on this illness, researchers thought schizophrenia “to be the result of possession by (or involvement with) the devil or an evil spirit of some sort” (History of Schizophrenia). In early unscientific times, many patients diagnosed with what would later be called schizophrenia, were given harsh and deadly treatments. This included isolation, and many other times procedures such as trephining, which resulted in drilling holes in the skull to release what they presumed to be demons. In the late 1800’s schizophrenia became more popular again, and many scientists began to develop a better understanding of the illness. The term, created by Ewald Hecker, hebephrenia was used to describe schizophrenia as an illness with “symptoms of cognitive disorganization and silliness” (History of Schizophrenia) and is still used, though rare, in today’s time. Although people began to gain more interest in schizophrenia, the treatment used lacked an understanding of what it actually was. In the 1800’s, many patients would be bound up by chains or locked away in unsanitary “insane asylums” and left for days on end. This relates directly to “The Yellow Wallpaper” as the narrator was placed in a room where she was left to be alone for months. Finally in 1911, Doctor Eugen Bleuler, a Swiss psychiatrist coined the term schizophrenia. He began to realize that patients suffering from schizophrenia would lose focus with reality, and created the term, translating to “split mind.” The information that the narrator gives narrator displays clues to the reader that her sickness relates mainly to schizophrenia. 

One source takes information from the book and relates the narrator’s illness to hysteria, which was also known as women’s disease in the 1800s. This source also mentions the possibility of the disorder being postpartum depression. In the story, the narrator mentions her nervousness towards her baby, as well as the feeling of discomfort and awkwardness. Many times during the story the narrator will comment on her nervousness, and how almost everything she does and feels makes her on edge. She explains her sickness as a “nervous condition” similar to her husband exclaiming “that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression-a slight hysterical tendency” (Gilman 300).  The treatments given to the narrator for her nervous inclinations include confinement, a halt to any intellectual behaviors (including writing), and a practice of self-discipline. Many of these treatments have also been used in treating schizophrenia, as well as depression and hysteria. There are many ways in which the symptoms and treatments for these disorders cross, but what makes it clear as to how this is schizophrenia, are her hallucinations of seeing another woman in the walls. This is a common case for patients with schizophrenia. The narrator exclaims how she sees eyes in the walls at night, and finally she sees a woman. She describes this situation many ways, but more often than not, she exclaims “At night in any kind of light, in twilight, candlelight, lamplight, and worst of all by moonlight, it becomes bars! The outside pattern I mean, and the woman behind it is as plain as can be” (Gilman 307). Finally, when she rips the paper off of the walls to free the woman, she sees multiple women coming out of the wallpaper. As well as seeing these women, she claims to have talked to them. Hearing and speaking to voices is also a major symptom of schizophrenia, which is also very rarely seen in cases of depression. The narrator declares that the woman in the wall helped her to tear down the wallpaper. This woman in the wall can be seen as many things, mainly a side effect of a terrible mental disorder, but other times the woman is seen as a metaphor of women’s discourse, which goes hand in hand with the diagnosis of schizophrenia. 

As well as mental illnesses being a major part of this story, many sources have also included information on women’s discourse. In “Escaping the Sentence: Diagnosis and Discourse in ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’” by Paula Treichler, there are mentions of discourse and how that can be related to the mental illness. Many see the wallpaper as both a metaphor for the illness and women’s discourse. Specifically how her madness sends her off the edge into a rage that unveils her true self and opinions. By ripping off the wallpaper, she is setting herself free to where she will be able to say what she wants without the opinion of a man to get in her way. Tearing at the wallpaper signifies a new era of women, where they will be able to make choices of their own without the punishment of being titled “insane.” Treichler writes, “Like all good metaphors, the yellow wallpaper is variously interpreted by readers to represent (among other things) the ‘pattern’ which underlies sexual inequality…” (Treichler 62). Sexual inequality was a major issue in the 1800s, where everything was under the rule of the man. This is why the narrator is inclined to stay put in confinement. The status of her husband makes this even worse for her, since he has the knowledge and power to know what is best for her. Ultimately, the significance of women’s discourse in this story also correlates with the mental illness. Her outbursts and hallucinations involved with her illness of schizophrenia are what finally cause her to rip all the wallpaper off, thus leading to the revelation of women’s discourse. After shredding off all the wallpaper, her husband enters the room and promptly faints. The narrator views this as a triumph over her husband and how she had defeated him and his diagnosis. The story ends with the narrator exclaiming how she was left to walk over his body every time she would circle the room. The narrator feels as if she will be free of her husbands grip after her victory, but what she fails to realize is that this will only put her in a worse situation. The narrator mentions Weir Mitchell, and how her husband tells her he might have to send her to him. After this fit her fate will likely consist of being sent to Weir Mitchell. Many readers believe the onset of her psychotic break was triggered by the conditions she was placed in, and that if she is referred to an environment with even poorer conditions, her mental state will only continue to worsen. This theory shows how schizophrenia is linked to women’s discourse in the story. 

Overall, many symptoms in the story can share diagnostics to various different mental illnesses. The connection of women’s discourse and schizophrenia help to map out how the narrators mental illness can be specifically pinned to schizophrenia. Along with the certain symptoms such as hallucinations, nervousness, and paranoia, it is assured that no other illness could compete with the signs described by the narrator as well as what the scientific symptoms are for schizophrenia. 
