“BRAIN ON FIRE”

Susannah Cahalan, a 24-year-old New York reporter was a happy go lucky

person. She enjoys her life, she was loved by her family, friends, and her boyfriend, and
she’s even doing very well in her job. Until she was struct by this unknown disease that
attacks not only her body but specifically her brain. It all started with a flu, until it leads
to paranoia, into hallucinations. She also experiences seizures and later became
psychosis. She goes to different hospital to have her diagnose but she always failed to
have one. Susannah and her family’s struggle to get answers from doctors. She
insisted that, there is something wrong with her body. They run some different test in
her body, but they cannot seem to find what is wrong and her test always come back as
normal. That entails that there is nothing wrong with her body even she insisted that
there is. She struggles physically and mentally to the point where her health declined.

She experienced the darkness until Dr. S. Najjar came to the picture. The doctor
promised her that, together they will uncover this strange disease that makes her life
miserable, not only to her but also, to the family who was with her every step she makes
into her life. Cahalan struggles with speech, writing, and walking. She returns to living
with her mother and stepfather, and when she can leave the house again, she
experiences rejection because of her "strange" conduct, which is a result of her ill
health. Medical testing reveals that the sickness also decreased her mental sharpness,
which she learns. They run tests where the doctor asked her to draw a clock and she
did igt int the wrong way and that is where they uncover the truth behind all of this, she
has anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis; it is a disease where it attacks the brain of the
person having one that inflames her brain,

The unseen disease is powerful enough to destroy a person’s life and career. It
affects the emotion of a person that may lead to extreme anger, fear, and such. The
movie shows how a person can be misdiagnosed and how it is necessary to have the
second opinion specially when it concerns your health or your family. Because there are
some instances just like what happened to Calahan herself. This movie explains the
several factors affecting a person and how it is necessary to always have a check up
when you feel like there is something wrong with your body to avoid later problems and
to figure out fast enough the cause for it to not get worse. It raises questions regarding
on the mental health and how it is quickly lean to psychiatric care when there are some
unexplained disease and symptoms showing. This movie teaches us to question the
diagnoses our doctors give us when they can't give you the answers that you know
deep down are not right. Many treat symptoms with medication but don't go to the cause
or root of the problem. At the end of the movie, she slowly starts to take jobs from The
New York Post once more, and she also writes her own articles.