p.4 “When critics dismiss these friendships as symptoms of illness rather than a legitimate attempt at community building, they deny the personhood of those who cannot “recover,” people who end up getting left behind has Esther moves toward normalization.”<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n This sounds like intentional dehumanization, potentially\neven rooted in misogyny. The dismissal and denial of community is also a method\nof control. Isolation can make and\/or keep people “mad” and thus keep\nthem in requirement of “care” (a case could be made for this scenario\nin “The Yellow Wallpaper”). Control under the guise of healing is\nalso a plot point in many a modern horror story and psychological thriller \u2013\nGrady Hendrix’s “IKEA” horror comedy Horrorst\u00f6r <\/em>comes to mind, since it plays with Foucault’s idea of\ndiscipline and punishment and the iconic panopticon. <\/p>\n\n\n\n p.8 “Graphic novels and comics, Gross argues, are important modes of communicating trauma: they can present experiences of disability in images when words fail. This is especially important when dealing with mental illnesses which have symptoms that may be impossible to express in words and are also often invisible to others.”<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Visual media representation (that is accurate and empathic) is\nso <\/em>important, especially nowadays\nwhen more people are reading comics and watching TV\/movies rather than reading\nnovels or short stories. I also admit there have been several instances in my\nown life when I wished I had the artistic skill to visually express what I was feeling\nwith regard to my anxiety & depression, and my executive dysfunction because\nmy words were failing me or generally getting jumbled up\/not making any sense,\nand other people just weren’t understanding what I was trying to say. Visual\nart and media can be so incredibly powerful and sometimes people just have no\nidea just how much power a poster or a TV appearance can be. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Overall, this reading interested me because of the diversity\ninvolved with the project. It made me interested in writing the whole book to\nsee a diverse set of writers talking about a diverse set of issues and topics within\nthe larger discussion of disability studies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n p.113 “If people think you’re crazy, they don’t listen to you.” <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Coupled with a line on p.109 about the importance of patient\nexperience, it’s very hard to get successful treatment when your doctors don’t\nlisten to you. I had a psychiatrist I had to quit seeing because he wasn’t\nlistening to what I was really saying, and it was like all he heard was\n“insomnia” and “depression” so he essentially just threw\nWelbutrin and trazodone at me and called it a day. He barely even talked to me,\nand I was only ever in his office for like 15 minutes at a time. It was frustrating,\nand I hated going every month, since he wasn’t listening, and the medications\nweren’t working, and I told <\/em>him they\nweren’t working. I finally found a therapist who, though she can’t prescribe medication,\nlistens <\/em>to me and talks <\/em>to me. She’s been more help than\nany meds have ever been. It’s fortunate that I’ve been in a situation where I\ncan choose to quit an unhelpful doctor and find another. Many people aren’t so\nlucky. <\/p>\n\n\n\n p.116 “Sometimes a sick animal knows more about how another sick animal should be treated.”<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Sometimes the best help comes from someone who’s been where\nyou are and understands. Sometimes doctors only have a theoretical, superficial\nunderstanding and not an experiential <\/em>one,\nand therefore don’t know what it’s actually like being ill. That lack of\nunderstanding can lead to frustration on both ends at best and gross\nmistreatment (both medically and socially) at worst. <\/p>\n\n\n\n p.118 “They reached out to their patients. [\u2026] Some suggestions were as radical as simply calling the patients by their names.” <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n This really shouldn’t be so radical! The fact that people\ndon’t seem to grasp basic human decency is appalling. Utterly astounding that\nbasic courtesy can lead to vast improvements in interpersonal relationships\ndoes unrecognized. Talk to people. Use their names. Listen to what they’re\nsaying \u2013 they typically know their own lives better than you do. They live them\nafter all. They live with their minds\/bodies every day. You don’t. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In general, I think it’s important that this chapter\nemphasizes in several places that recovery is rarely linear. Relapses happen. Something\ncan trigger an anxiety attack or a nervous breakdown. The important fact is\nthat we’re trying to recover and working toward recovery, and a little support\nfrom our supposed professionals and a sense of community can go a long way. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The whole “doctor knows best” trop really needs to\nbe modified. The doctor may know how to treat maladies, but they don’t know\nwhat the patient actually lives through. They need to listen to their patients\nto have any hope of success. The patient knows their own body\/mind. They live\nwith it. Every day. The doctor doesn’t. Even in the case of The Yellow\nWallpaper, the doctor husband and doctor brother don’t live with the patient day\nin and day out. The husband is away during the days and sometimes even away\novernight. So he’s not there day in and day out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There are several instances where it reads like the\nnarrator’s husband is keeping her ill as a means to keep her close and\ncontrolled, since he’s often away from the house. He has her completely isolated,\nand even though this was supposedly a common treatment of “nervous\ndisorders” back in the day, the fact that the narrator isn’t allowed to\nsee any friends or family at all, and if she weren’t in a beautiful ancestral\nhome (in need of renovations), she might as well just be locked up in an\nasylum. She, the narrator, is absolutely convinced that she would do better if\nshe just got to see some friends and family, had a little bit of stimulation,\nbut her husband, “the doctor” keeps her isolated and “controlled.”\nKeeps her insane. After all, I think we’ve established this semester that isolation\ncan cause insanity. Human beings are social\/pack animals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The fact that the doctor-husband clearly “knows\nbest” and won’t even listen to his wife is telling. The level of control\nthere is alarming. A case can be argued that the doctor-husband fainted in the\nend of the story because either he realized he couldn’t control her anymore, as\nthe narrator explicitly states, or he was utterly astonished to be incorrect in\nhis treatment\/diagnosis, because obviously he knows best, and she was improving\nphysically (and wouldn’t even listen to the possibility that her mind was\ndeteriorating). <\/p>\n\n\n\n It could even be said that it wasn’t the wallpaper itself\nthat drove the narrator mad. It was the isolation, the lack of stimulation and\nany real companionship outside of her illness. The wallpaper was the only\nstimulating thing available to her that she could focus on, since she wasn’t\nallowed the creative outlet of writing \u2013 hiding her writing had exhausted her\nto the point where she couldn’t even do that anymore. She was essentially completely\nalone with no companionship, no stimulation, and a semi-checked out husband.\nThat would drive anyone mad, even the healthiest person in the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I’m not really sure what to say about this poem. Part of it reads\nlike the poetic speaker is being treated without being listened to at all. Like\nthe poetic speaker is just being loaded up on sedatives to keep her compliant\nand “happy.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n I’m not even sure what the tulips are supposed to mean,\nsince traditionally red tulips are indicative of pure\/true\/eternal love, which\nseems incongruous with the rest of the narrative. Plath has always been\ndifficult for me to parse out, but especially here, since I’m not sure what’s\nreally going on outside of the sedatives and hospital bed. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Notes on Airless Spaces p.4 “When critics dismiss these friendships as symptoms of illness rather than a legitimate attempt at community building, they deny the personhood of those who cannot “recover,” people who end up getting left behind has Esther moves toward normalization.” This sounds like intentional dehumanization, potentially even rooted in misogyny. The dismissal … Continue reading “Smith’s Notes on 4\/4 Readings”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[58,33],"class_list":["post-1254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-reading-notes","tag-section-02"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/papJgd-ke","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1254"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1254\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1255,"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1254\/revisions\/1255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.chris-foss.net\/dislit19\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Notes on The Snake Pit<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Notes on The Yellow Wallpaper<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Notes on Tulips<\/h2>\n\n\n\n