Review By: Samia Mehbub
Brain on Fire is a heart touching book about Susannah Cahalan, a talented journalist for the New York Post, whose health drastically declined due to a rare neurological disorder called anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, which resulted in her brain becoming disoriented. It caused the author psychiatric illness, which led to manic episodes, mental breakdowns, and dangerous incidents. She almost seemed possessed as she experienced hallucinations, seizures, and psychosis. Her ability to bounce back from the black hole that she was in was what inspired many.
With a loving and concerned family, there was no doubt Cahalan recovered in time. However, it was a journey of drudgery. There were many things she couldn’t remember that her family could, which shocked her as she wrote this book. Initially, she thought it was alcohol withdrawal, but that was not the main cause. She began forgetting many things and became numb to everything around her. Imagine how scary a situation she was in, going through paranoia and violent outbursts, and thinking the whole world was against her.
Cahalan’s cognition declined and she could rarely walk. She was having manic episodes at work and failing when her symptoms started. The number of symptoms that she had gone through was unbelievable—from not being able to properly speak, attempting to escape, hallucinating, and failing at cognitive tasks. She was often misdiagnosed with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and multiple personality disorder, but this was not accurate. It was anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis that caused these disorders. However, she was very resilient, strong, and passionate enough to rewire her brain back to her normal healthy self. This is what makes her stand out from others.
Honestly, her talking so openly about her disease while exposing her vulnerability like that was not easy and took quite strength and courage. Personally, I loved this memoir because as someone who went through many mental health struggles myself, including being hospitalized, I could relate to many of her symptoms, such as psychosis, schizophrenia, severe mood swings, and hallucinations. However, I don’t think I or others that have mental illnesses are anywhere near what she went through. She had undergone all phases due to her anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis that aggressively attacked her brain. Due to her bravery, I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in mental health advocacy because this will give us knowledge of what hospitalized patients go through daily.
Cahalan was strong to be able to come out of what she was in. I don’t know how she did it, but that’s what makes her so remarkable and inspiring. It shows us how it’s possible to rewire our brain and live our lives all over again. We don’t always have to fight with ourselves. We can heal, recover, and persevere. I hope that this book gives hope to all people who have this disease or have any kind of mental illness and wants to come out of it.
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