Yellow Wallpaper by Dakota Douglas

Diagnosis #1: Postpartum Psychosis (Hunter)

26641_17 — 2025-03-04 17:11:28 UTC

In "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the author conveys that the protagonist suffers from postpartum psychosis. Postpartum psychosis occurs after one gives birth and is extremely dangerous. The condition is rare and can effect about 2.6 out of every 1,000 births and is more common to people who already suffer from other mental illnesses. The most common symptoms are hallucinations, insomnia, agitation and delusions. The two most common tests for the condition are tests with bodily fluids and imaging scans. Postpartum psychosis can be treated with medications and electroconvulsive therapy (Raza).

Diagnosis #2: Bipolar Disorder (Connor)

26641_17 — 2025-03-04 17:12:09 UTC

In the short story, "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the author alludes to the protagonist suffering from bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression, is a mental health disorder that causes a person to have extreme changes in their mood. It consists of emotional highs, which are known as mania or hypomania, (hypomania is less extreme than mania) and emotional lows like depression. This disorder causes you to feel sad and hopeless and to lose interest in activities you once loved. When you get the emotional highs you are in a state of euphoria. When you get the emotional lows you feel utterly miserable. Around 40 million people in the world suffer from bipolar disorder and it affects their mood, energy, sleep, activity, judgement, behavior, and ability to think clearly.

Works Cited

26641_17 — 2025-03-04 17:12:17 UTC

Raza, Sehar K. “Postpartum Psychosis.” StatPearls [Internet]., U.S. National Library of Medicine, 26 June 2023, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK544304/.

“Bipolar Disorder.” National Institute of Mental Health, U.S.

Department of Health and Human Services, www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/bipolar-disorder#:~:text=about%20bipolar%20disorder-,What%20is%20bipolar%20disorder%3F,%2C%20activity%20levels%2C%20and%20concentration. Accessed 7 Mar. 2025.

Hyper fixation

26641_17 — 2025-03-04 17:12:37 UTC

"...lay there for hours trying to decide whether that front pattern really did move together or separately" (Gilman 10).

"I fancy it is the pattern that keeps her so still. It is so puzzling. It keeps my quiet by the hour" (Gilman 10). Dakota

Depression (Dakota)

27427_21 — 2025-03-06 17:36:42 UTC

"...nervous depression-a slight hysterical tendency..." (Gilman 1).

"...suddenly commit suicide-plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions" (Gilman 3).

Fatigue (Dakota)

27427_21 — 2025-03-07 16:58:49 UTC

"It makes me tired to follow it. I will take a nap I guess" (Gilman 7).

"Half the time now I am awfully lazy, and lie down ever so much" (Gilman 8).

Irritability (Dakota)

27427_21 — 2025-03-07 17:05:22 UTC

"I get so unreasonably angry with John sometimes. (Gilman 2).

"But I am here, and no person touches this paper but me-not ALIVE!" (Gilman 14)

Delusions (Dakota)

27427_21 — 2025-03-07 17:11:35 UTC

"The outside pattern I mean, and the woman behind it is as plain as can be" (Gilman 10).

"Sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, and sometimes only one, and she crawls around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over" (Gilman 12).

Distractibility (Dakota)

27427_21 — 2025-03-07 17:15:29 UTC

"...think about my condition, and I confess it always makes me feel bad" (Gilman 2).

"I even said so to John one moonlit evening, but he said what I felt was a DRAUGHT, and shut the window" (Gilman 2).