Reckless abandonment...in an orderly fashion

Once Edna faces the fact that she is hopelessly depressed, she resigns to this fact and completely gives up on trying to be a reasonable person.  She becomes impulsive and extremely selfish. With money that she has not earned herself, her husband's money, money that she greatly enjoys (8), Edna purchases a new home for herself “[w]ithout even waiting for an answer from her husband regarding his opinion or wishes in the matter” (80).  As a celebration for her success in purchasing for herself such a gift, she decides to throw herself a lavish party for the occasion: “I’ll let Leonce pay the bills.  I wonder what he’ll say when he sees the bills.” (81)

Her husband is actually more patient and lenient than one would expect of an oppressive Victorian man. The only request he asks of Edna: “don’t let the family go to the devil.” (54).  Edna, who would simply prefer not to deal with such a responsibility, is very brilliant and capable when she sets her mind to it; her children are absent from her life for a majority of the book, as she has dumped them off to stay with relatives.  Edna reveals time and time again that she is exceptionally capable of acquiring things that she wants as well as avoiding what she does not want.  She has the capacity to understand her feelings, as she reveals:

“One of these days,” she said, “I’m going to pull myself together for a while and think—try to determine what character of a woman I am; for candidly, I don’t know…I must think about it.” (79)

Edna is able to recognize and understand herself as a human being, but she simply prefers not to do so.  She opts out.