The Dominant/Submissive Relationship in the Yellow Wallpaper In "The Yellow Wallpaper," by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the dominant/submissive relationship between an oppressive husband and his the submissive wife pushes her from depression to madness. It is about the growing madness of a young married woman resulting from the pressures of her life. A woman being treated for postpartum depression is slowly driven mad by the treatment itself: forced isolation and deprivation of her work, her writing and her words. The error of human nature seems to play a major role in its collapse. Her husband, a well-known doctor, is unwilling to admit that there might actually be something wrong with his wife. This same attitude is found in his brother, also a doctor. While this attitude, and the actions taken because of it, certainly contributed to its downfall; It seems to me that there is a rebellious spirit in her. Perhaps she subconsciously seems determined to prove them wrong. At the beginning of the story, the woman talks about her depression and how her husband and brother reject her. "You see, you don't believe that I am sick! And what can be done? If a top doctor, and one's own husband, assures friends and relatives that in reality there is nothing more than temporary nervous depression - a slight tendency hysterical: what to do?" These two men, both doctors, seem completely incapable of admitting that there might be something more to his condition than stress and a mild nervous disorder. Even when a summer in the country and weeks of bed rest don't help, her husband refuses to accept that she might have a real problem. Throughout the story there are examples of the dominant-submissive relationship. She is practically imprisoned in her bedroom, presumably to allow her to rest and regain her health. She is forbidden to work: “So I… am absolutely forbidden to “work” until I am well again.” He shouldn't even write, "John comes, and I must put this away: he hates that I write an opera." She has no say in the location or decor of the room in which she is practically imprisoned. "I don't like our room at all. I wanted to... but John wouldn't hear of it." Another factor is the ban on visitors: "It's so discouraging not to have any advice and company about my work... but he says he would soon put fireworks in my pillowcase rather than allow me to have those inspiring people around me." Now." Probably largely due to its oppression, it continues to decline. "I'm becoming very fond of the room, despite the wallpaper. Maybe thanks to the wallpaper. It stays like that in the mind!" Here she expresses her feelings about the room she has been forced to live in, as it grows on her. At this point it becomes quite evident, to the reader, that the situation is not improving. In the following lines she talks about herself lying on the bed and trying to follow the lines to their destination, wherever they may lead. The wallpaper of the room begins to occupy her mind and her changing attitudes towards the wallpaper reflect the her changing attitudes towards her situation, and eventually towards herself At first she is aware of the influence the wallpaper has on her and resents it "This paper seems to me as if it knows which evil influence he had! There's a recurring point where the drawing hangs over you like a broken neck and two bulbous eyes stare at you upside down. I definitely get angry at the impertinence of it and the timelessness." She repeatedly asks her husband to take her somewhere else, where she could receive.