Soon after the story begins we start to learn that the narrator suffers from a mental illness. We see this demonstrated by the narrator’s reference to the fact that her husband and brother are both doctors, and believe she is not sick.  She goes on to state, “If a physician of high standing, and one's own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression--a slight hysterical tendency-- what is one to do?”

                As she begins to describe the wallpaper you start to get a glimpse into her mental illness by just her choice of descriptive terms. “One of those sprawling flamboyant patterns committing every artistic sin.”(Gilman)  She then goes on to discuss how the pattern is so hard on the eyes because it, “plunges off at outrages angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions.” Leaving the reader to wonder is this really the pattern on the wall or just in her head. As the story progresses you start to see how the wallpaper is symbol of her mental condition. How she is the woman creeping behind the bars that are the pattern, how she must creep all day because if her husband or Jennie found her writing they would yell at her. Slowly over the course of the story you start to wonder how much of the wallpaper is really anything other than just a drab yellow, and how much is her mind coping with her own prison of her mind.

                The way the story progress from her being totally appalled by the paper, to her acceptance of the paper, and finally to her want for no one else to see the paper the way she does. She becomes suspicious of the others in the house, thinking they are drawn into the wallpapers memorizing appeal. While the story brings the reader on a journey into the fragile mindset of the narrator we see the wallpaper is nothing more than a metaphor, it resembles the strife and anguish going on in the narrators mind.  The way it builds throughout the story makes for a very interesting read. I found Gilman’s style of storytelling to be a pleasant change from the more straight forward writing styles I have become use too. The way Charlotte makes you question the narrators sanity and her passion for the wallpaper, from a definite dislike, to her obsession, and finally to her need to be set free by tearing the paper off the walls, all showing the narrators worsening mental condition .