Brain on Fire

 Tell me a story... about one woman’s rebellious brain

Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness by Susannah Cahalan

Publication date: November 13, 2012

Date read: October 2, 2021

Twenty-four-year-old Susannah Cahalan has a good job as a reporter at the New York Post, a steady boyfriend, and a pretty satisfying life. Out of the blue, she begins to notice things being a little off - a numbness in her arm, lights looking too bright, trouble concentrating, anger issues. When her boyfriend suspects her of having absence seizures, she goes to the doctor, eventually getting admitted to the Epilepsy ward at the hospital. What follows is Susannah’s account - with the help of her friends and family often having to remember for her - of her illness and the doctors attempts to identify the cause before it’s too late. 

As someone who enjoys a good medical mystery, I found this book very well done. It must have been especially hard for Cahallan to tell this story, both because she didn’t remember a lot of it and was relying on hospital video surveillance and the memories of her family and caregivers, but also because what she does remember does not always paint her in a positive light. It was obviously not her fault when she acted out, but I can’t imagine that it was a pleasant topic for her to revisit. 

There is a fair amount of medical talk in this book, but I didn’t think that it got too difficult to follow. Having some background in medicine helped, especially for the most complicated topics such as the discussions about genes and receptors, but I don’t believe it would be too difficult to follow for the non-medically trained. And even if a few paragraphs of medical talk go a little over the readers head, it won’t take away from the story, so don’t let it scare you. 

One thing I couldn’t help but coming back to while reading was how fortunate Susannah was that - if she HAD to get this condition - that she got it when she did. She was living in New York City, giving her access to some of the best doctors in the world, at a time when at least one doctor in the US had some knowledge about these kinds of diseases. Even 5 years earlier and this would have gone undiagnosed, and in almost any smaller city in the world it probably would have as well. I can’t imagine the number of people who may have had this in the past and been diagnosed with schizophrenia or severe autism instead. 

Overall I thought that this was a very interesting book. It’s personal without being sappy and it deals with a medical topic without being dry. I’m glad she was able to tell her story and that hopefully it brought a little more attention to these types of disorders. Recommended if you enjoy memoirs or medical mysteries. 

Rating: 4/5 stars

Trigger warning: mental illness, forced institutionalization, detailed descriptions of medical procedures, including brain surgery