Chelsea's post (posted by Dr. R)

I have read “The Yellow Wallpaper” on a few different occasions, but now that I am older and more aware of issues between genders and constraints on women during this time a few things stood out more to me. In the beginning the narrator explains that however troubled she feels mentally her husband and her brother tell her she is just “slightly” depressed. She simply complies with what these men in her life tell her because of the patriarchal household where what your father, brother, or husband tells you to do is what you are to do. There is also a sense of oppression when she talks about her writing. They do not allow her to write even though it is therapeutic to her and instead she tries to hide the fact that she is doing it, which drains her even more. Like her the woman in the wallpaper must sneak around at night and is freer during the daylight. She explains that this is normal because "most women do not creep by daylight." A woman can complete her duties during the day, but is never to be mischievous at night. The wallpaper symbolizes the narrator’s own trials and tribulations and by her removing the wallpaper she is in turn removing her own burdens, freeing the woman. When her husband discovers what she has done he faints, which can also symbolize the fact that a free woman is shocking to him.