The Yellow Wallpaper Postpartum Depression

The Woman Behind the Wallpaper Many great stories are written not solely because the author had a simple idea, but also of what he or she experienced in their life. Some authors gain the inspiration for their works through experience and this is found true in the case of Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” is a short story depicting a woman who is under a rest cure for dealing with postpartum depression. As the story continues, the woman dwindles farther into hysteria. Gilman had a similar fate as she also was prescribed the rest cure after falling into depression following the birth of her child. Therefore, the facts from the writer’s life or their biography provides an important and essential aspect of understanding their work and the significance behind it. A year after Charlotte marries Walter Stetson, they have a child, and Charlotte’s depression starts to arise. This depression after childbirth can be defined as postpartum depression and is typically characterized by inability to sleep, change in appetite, feeling unable to love the baby, lethargy or extreme fatigue, mood swings, irritability, loss of interest in hobbies or …show more content…
Fortunately, Charlotte did not experience such vivid hallucinations or creep such as Jane in the story. However, Charlotte did embellish the mental deterioration of Jane to carry out the ideal of the escape of charlotte 's deep and dark depression (Perkins). Not only this but, the entirety of the short story was written to inform people of the treacherous result of the rest cure and to prevent it from happening to others. “It was not intended to drive people crazy, but to save people from being driven crazy, and it worked” (Perkins). Charlotte went as far as to send a copy of her short story to the physician who almost drove her over the edge of crazy and soon thereafter, he stopped prescribing the rest