Nellie Bly’s “Ten Days in a Mad-House” uses first-hand experience and personal observation to illustrate how women were not treated in a healthy manner during the late 1800s in mental institutions. Men did not treat women in a positive way and this, in turn, led to poor a mental state. By treating women more as objects and not as a person who needs to be loved and cared for it lead to a bad deterioration of the mind. By putting women in the mental institutions or “mad-houses” this further deteriorated their mental states and did nothing to improve anything and this is what Nellie Bly observes in her experience in the mental institution. Due to the terrible accommodations that the women in the mental institutions in only lead to a worse mental state, the institutions did not improve the women’s actual condition. After Bly’s publication of her eye witness account of the inside of Blackwell’s Island Lunatic Asylum the composition and goal of mental institutions changed for the better. The women that were in these insane asylums or mental institutions were wives and mothers that had either made a small mistake or actually did something bad that led to their placement in the mental institution.

In 1880, when Nellie Bly wrote “Ten Days in a Mad-House”, it was the beginning of public and private mental institutions, which at the time were called “asylums.” Just like Dr. Ellen Holtzman reports in her article “A home away from home”; “There were only two in Massachusetts in 1879” (Holtzman 1). Mental asylums were just starting to grow across America. As the 19th century came at end so did the lack of mental institutions. Just like Holtzman reports “two grew to 20 in 27 years” (Paraphrase Holtzman 1). The country would move forward at an exponential growth rate in the amount of mental institutions across the United States. All after Bly’s game changing first-hand experience in the mad-house with the other women, she realized what kind of terrible place it was and sought to make things better and her publication of “Ten Days in a Mad-House” did just so. It led to revolution in the development in mental institutions. Everyone realized how corrupt and terrible they were and the country moved forward on addressing and fixing the problem. Mental Institutions in the 1800s were not as beneficial to Women’s mental health development and Bly’s novel points out the fact that they needed to be changed and improved.

The treatment in the insane asylum were different for women and men in the 1800s because women did not have the same rights as men. Women were placed in mental institutions if they didn’t behave the way men wanted them too. Just like Pouba and Tianen say in their article “Between the years of 1850-1900, women were placed in mental institutions for behaving in ways that male society did not agree with” (95). If a man was mad enough at a woman for even the simplest thing he could put her in a mental institution from anywhere from a month to life depending on her cooperation and attitude once admitted to the asylum. Women would have to make sure to be extremely respectful and cautious of the things they did and said so they made sure not to end up in one of the mental institution. Some men were crazier than others and would make sure a woman would end up in one of these insane asylums just for barely yelling at them. Other cases of men being the result of a women ending up in a mental institution were for attacking the man or trying to kill themselves. And in this time if a man ended up in a mental institution if he was polite then he would probably be released in a timely manner. The difference in treatments was extremely sexist and intolerable. Women deserved to be cared for in a much better manner. They deserved to be cured or cared for so that their well-being would improve not worsen. No one even noticed that they were being treated badly until Nellie Bly came along and exposed what actually happened inside of a mental institution. She made a huge breakthrough in the development of mental institutions. She was the reason that they began fixing them in the first place after she published her famous piece about the mental institutions or asylums.

In Nellie Bly’s “Ten Days in a Mad-House” she reports on her first-hand accounts of being in the mental institution and how they treated, fed, and clothed the women in the mental institution. The women were not given many essential things needed for comfort and well-being, which led to the further deterioration of their health conditions. The women were not given the same things the nurses had while they were in the same mental institution. The nurses all had fur coats to keep them warm in the winter while the all of the patients just had the minimal clothing on their backs to keep them warm. They were not given any extra coats or shawls when they asked for them. Here an old woman asks why “Oh, what are you doing with me? I am cold, so cold. Why can’t I stay in bed or have a shawl?” (Bly 294). The nurses never answered her and if she got up and tried to leave they would jerk her back and sit her down again. An old woman, treated with no respect just because she is in a mental institution is very wrong. The nurses were the terrible people in the mental institution. They were mean and exercised their power just because they could. The nurses were bullies. They used an unnecessary amount of force on women who just wanted to be given a little more food or a coat. And Nellie underwent all of these conditions just so that she could expose the terrible things that they did inside of mental institution during the late 1800s. She risked her life just to expose how horrifying it was to be locked up inside of one. She pretended to be mad so that they would accept here and “care” for her and it worked. She was taken in by Blackwell’s Island Lunatic Asylum. They didn’t torture her while she was there but they also didn’t give her a room of her own and her notebook and pencil. Eventually after she asked enough times they gave her the notebook without the pen. That was just a cruel and unnecessary thing to do to Nellie. Although they may have thought she was mad, they should have given her the notebook and pencil that belonged to her. But despite all the nonsense Nellie survived and dealt with their crap. She continued to act a little mad here and there, but then decided that she was going to act as best as she could. She was nice to the doctors and nurses and in the end her friends made sure she got out alive. And she publishes her story only a short while after being released. Nellie put up with it all just so other people could see the corruption and terrible circumstances of the mental institutions.

Since the 1800s there have been hundreds of discoveries and advancements in treatment and care for people in mental institutions. All of these are because of Nellie Bly. After Nellie’s publication of “Ten Days in a Mad-House” it changed everything people turned their attention to fixing the mental institutions and making a place where people could heal or be cared for not a prison that thought they were doing good when in fact it was just leading to further deterioration of women’s mental states. Just 20 years after they already had way more actual mental institutions. These institutions that opened up after the 1880s were all opened up to care for and cure the mentally ill, both men and women. There were so many people that were treated poorly until Bly came along. She was a hero who saved lives and contributed to a cause that would heal some and help others live in better conditions. She had to experience the insane asylum all just to be able to help others. Without her sacrifice it would have taken decades before someone else realized it and spoke up about it or publishing something about what actually goes on in a mental institution. Today’s mental institutions might not be as beneficial to patients if it weren’t for Nellie Bly. She poked at something terrible and people listened and fixed the problem over the next few decades.
