Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Dr. Weir Mitchell

The Rest Cure The rest cure (also known as the bed rest cure) was a nineteenth century mental health treatment created by Dr. Weir Mitchell, a famed nerve specialist. The treatment called for the patient to undergo bed rest from four weeks to two months; to be secluded from family and friends, only seeing her doctor/nurse; to not use her hands creatively; and to be fed a diet of fatty dairy products.

Gilman’s Social Criticism of the Rest Cure Gilman speaks of her mental illness: “…I suffered from a severe and continuous nervous breakdown…. This wise man [Dr. Weir Mitchell] put me to bed and applied the rest cure…. I went home and obeyed those directions for some three months, and came so near the borderline of utter mental ruin that I could see over” (Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing 447-48). “…[I] sent a copy to the physician who so nearly drove me mad. He never acknowledged it. …Many years later I was told that the great specialist had admitted to friends of his that he had altered his treatment since reading ‘The Yellow Wallpaper.’ [The story] was not intended to drive people crazy, but to save people from being driven crazy, and it worked” (Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing 448).