Rest Cure

The rest cure was a treatment created by physician Silas Weir Mitchell in the nineteenth century for mental disorders, particularly hysteria, and was prescribed almost exclusively to women, many of whom were suffering from depression, including postpartum depression. Patients were confined to bed, secluded from family contact to reduce dependence on others, and told to avoid activities such as writing or drawing that might mentally exhaust them. Author Charlotte Perkins Gilman underwent the treatment under Mitchell himself and later wrote The Yellow Wallpaper based on the experience; the treatment is now regarded by experts as an example of nineteenth-century medical misogyny.