Laura Wheeler
Professor Giaconia
The Glass Castle Essay
29 October 2012
Negligent Mother or Mentally Ill Woman?
Reading The Glass Castle and see how terrible the childhoods of the Walls
children are. Its easy to want to point fingers, name who is to blame and get angry at
those who are at "fault" for the way the these children's life has been. Of course, the two
names who are clearly at fault are father, Rex Walls, and mother, Rosemary. But, are they
really? Let's focus on Rosemary Walls. She not only neglected her four children
throughout their lives under her nonexistent care; she also trusted them with things no
healthy mother would do. With this in mind, Rosemary was seriously ill. From the events
told by her daughter, Jeanette Walls, one could conclude she was troubled with bipolar
disorder. This illness causes one to live through extreme manias and depressions, which
describes Rosemary throughout the book.
Regardless to whether you understand mental illness or not, one can firmly state
that Rosemary Walls has something wrong with her way of thinking. It is unknown to
what illness she may have, but one can infer Rosemary is troubled with bipolar disorder.
According to the National Institute of Mental Health, bipolar disorder is "a brain disorder
that causes unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity levels, and the ability to carry out
day-to-day tasks" ("Bipolar Disorder"). One with bipolar disorder goes through a series
of stages: depression. midrange, and mania. Each stage can last two weeks to months at a
time. Throughout The Glass Castle, Jeanette describes her mother in all three of these
stages many times in the storyline. Rosemary was mainly written about in an wither
manic or midrange episode in the book. Some characteristics of a manic episode are
extreme irritability, talking fast, jumping from one idea to another having unrealistic
beliefs of their own, or another's, abilities, and taking part in pleasurable behaviors, just
to name a few ("Bipolar disorder"). Jeanette writes about how her mother lets her cook
hotdogs at the tender age of three (The Glass Castle, 9) and at the age of six, was given
her newborn baby sister to hold on the long drive home from the hospital (The Glass
Castle, 46). Mothers should trust their children, but Rosemary trusts her child too much;
she has unrealistic beliefs of her young children's abilities. In the first case, Jeanette gets
sent to the hospital for six weeks from cooking all alone (The Glass Castle, 11). Jeanette
describes her mother's moods as: "She'd be happy for days on end, announcing that she
decided to think only positive thoughts" She goes on to say "But the positive thoughts
would give way to negative thoughts...when that happened, Mom would refuse to get out
of bed... she would lay wrapped up in blankets on the sofa bed, sobbing about how much
she hated her life" (The Glass Castle, 207). Common symptoms of a depressive episode
of bipolar disorder are feeling worried and empty, loss of interest in any and all activities,
irritability, and feeling tired ("Bipolar Disorder"). With this said, when things "just got to
[Rosemary]," she would retreat to her bed and stay there for days on end, :crying and
occasionally throwing things at us. She could have been a famous artist by now, she
yelled, if she hadn't had children, and none of [the children] appreciated her sacrifice"
(The Glass Castle, 187). For Rosemary, her depression landed her on the couch, crying,
physically unable to tend to the needs of her children. These symptoms are tough, if not
impossible, to overcome when severe enough. Another scary act associated with people
affected by bipolar disorder is suicide. "The mood disorders (depression and bipolar
mania- depression) are by far the most common psychiatric conditions associated with
suicide. 25% to 50% of patients affected with bipolar disorder attempt suicide at least
once (Jamison?). In the book, Jeanette writes about an instance where it looks either to be
Rosemary is attempting to kill herself or Rex is trying to throw her off the second story of
their house (The Glass Castle, 71). It is never fully revealed which one it is. Its Rex's
word against Rosemary's to the children. This could be taken as another potential look at
explaining Rosemary's probable disorder.
Along with the manias and depressions, those affected with bipolar disorder are
likely to have obsessive compulsions (Federman). These can be things such as washing
your hands from germs more often than necessary to doing an activity over and over
without needing breaks. Rosemary has a obsessive hobby she does to escape her own
demons, that is painting. She puts her paintings and supplies before the children's wants
and needs on more than one occasion. Rosemary was working on a painting a few days
after Jeanette get back from the hospital from the burns of cooking hotdogs. Jeanette
asked her mother if she would cook her one; Rosemary said no. "'Good for you,' Mom
said when she saw [Jeanette] cooking. 'You've got to get right back in the saddle. You
can't live in fear of something as basic as fire'" (The Glass Castle, 15). This is a great case
in point where Rosemary puts her painting (obsessive hobby), in front of one of her
children's needs. No matter where the Walls move to, down the street or across the
country, Rosemary always needed her paintings and supplies brought along. This made
less room for some of the children's things when packing the car for the Rex Wall famous
skedaddle (The Glass Castle, 17).
It is very apparent that Rosemary Walls has some type of undiagnosed illness
troubling her mind that she does not realize. A close to accurate conclusion is bipolar
disorder by looking at the evidence of the symptoms and events described in the book
The Glass Castle. Without diagnosis, Rosemary is at risk to herself and those around her.
Her children have suffered just as much, if not more, than she has, from her lack of care
and affection towards them. Though it would be easy to put all of the blame on
Rosemary, it would not be fair and just. Her undiagnosed disorder has influenced her
ability to mother her offspring in a nurturing environment young children need.