A compelling look at what happens when mind and matter face off. Insightful and interesting to the scientifically-minded and the literary-minded alike.
Summary:
Susannah Cahalan was a young ambitious extrovert in New York, with a thriving career as a reporter and a blossoming relationship. Just a month later, she awoke in a hospital room, suffering from seizures, paranoia, and violent psychosis and having absolutely no memory of any of it. In this memoir, Susannah investigates the events leading up to her decent into madness, the lost time of her illness, and the long recovery to her former self. Her story goes past the personal to the larger picture as well, acting as a prime example of what happens when the brain and body go to war with each other in a case that would be labeled a medical marvel to diagnosticians across the globe.
Verdict: 8/10
I'm not usually a memoir person, but this book was just too interesting to pass up.
The author did a great job at explaining the medical jargon and bizarre symptoms in a very relatable way. The story progressed as a narrative, which made it much easier to follow as I was very concerned it would lose me in all of the science talk. But the reader went right along with Susannah and those closest to her throughout the disease. You get to see how much of an emotional toll this type of disease takes on family and friends along with the patient, which makes it so personal, along with the more academic side of how much our brain really controls us and shapes us. It gives us our sense of reality and self, and if there's even one small glitch, that can all come crumbling down.
It's interesting having nonfiction with a writer that recognizes themselves as an unreliable source from the start. Though she had many hallucinations and unreliable memories of that time, they're italicized in the book to show the questionable reality and how hard it can be to distinguish the truth in the throws of this disease. You find that the author as an investigative journalist is discovering this truth along with you, which added a fascinating layer to the situation.
I can't say it was the most thrilling book, though there are many points of action and mystery. The main draw is really all the questions it brings out for the reader. How can a kind person become psychotic and violent without any knowledge that it's happening? How can an intelligent reporter lose all mental capacity to the point of having a the IQ of a child? How can someone lose themselves so entirely? And even more astounding come back from it to the point that they can write a book this well?
I'll admit I got slightly lost on the different parts of the brain but was mesmerized by what doctors do to solve the mystery of what's going on in a patient. One of the best parts of the book is the turning point of the clock test. Susannah goes through dozens of blood samples and scans and screenings that all come back negative. But what ends up providing the most answers is a drawing. It's just amazing how something so simple can provide the biggest picture to what's really going on in our heads.
What's more alarming isn't just the case itself (though the symptoms recall scenes out of The Exorcist or other such horrific examples), but that this could be a more common disease than people think. From the little that experts know, it largely affects young women and still haven't identified the cause to the point where it can seem to strike at random. So it's hard to read this and not get a bit paranoid that you could catch something as debilitating as an auto-immune disease.
Besides her amazing and disturbing case, Calahan also brings up the fact that this disorder is a fairly recent discovery. Doctors can infer that it's been around for ages, yet was only identified in 2007. So logically there's a lot of big looming questions.
If the author was only the 217th person to be diagnosed, how many thousands of people before her had this disease but were misidentified as schizophrenic or epileptic? How many patients suffering from a psychical condition were placed in psychiatric wards or thought to be demonic? And how many individuals are still going undiagnosed and dying from an ailment that is relatively easy to treat? Unfortunately, many of these questions are left unanswered, but it is very compelling and thoughtful in all that we're still learning about our bodies and minds and everything that makes up ourselves.
"Brain on Fire" raises awareness and ultimately enthralls the reader into a personal account of what our minds are capable of. I found it very though-provoking and educational.
Sidenote: Netflix did adapt a movie out of this a year or two ago that I'm planning to watch. Stay tuned for a review.
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