‘A relatively treatable autoimmune illness, Anti-NDMA-receptor encephalitis, a brain lobe swell detected by brain biopsy.’
A Manilan spending summers with relatives in the rural, I remember
hearing of a young man “whose body and mind were demon-possessed, had
turned deranged and unmanageable that his impoverished family had to
take him to the deepest forest; left him there to live and die by
himself.” Filipinos read and hear too often of catatonic people of all
ages, believed to have been turned that way by mangkukulam; possessed
by witches; made fun of by middle-earth creatures called dwende; and
all sorts of frightening superstitions accepted by many as realities.
A new memoir, ‘Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness’ piece together
Susannah Cahalan’s physical and mental breakdown, her lost terrifying
one month in the hospital, and the grueling year it took to recover.
Sarah B. Weir, a Yahoo! blogger tells us the story: That before Susannah Cahalan, 24, mysteriously contracted the disease, she was a bright, outgoing, and ambitious reporter of the New York Post.
Weir continues with her narration about Cahalan: After exhibiting flu-like symptoms that were initially diagnosed as mono, the victim suddenly began experiencing delusions and behaving erratically. Within a few weeks, she became increasingly abusive, moody, and paranoid. Her doctors brushed off her condition as a result of too much partying and stress, but her first violent seizure signaled there was something critically askew.
Late one night, Cahalan’s guttural moans and grating squeaks woke up her boyfriend, Stephen. “My arms suddenly whipped out in front of me like, like a mummy, as my eyes rolled back and my body stiffened,” Cahalan writes. “I was gasping for air. My body continued to stiffen as I inhaled repeatedly, with no exhale. Blood and foam began to spurt through clenched teeth. Terrified, [he] stifled a panicked cry and for a second he stared, frozen, at my shaking body.” Cahalan now describes her seizures as eerily similar to the character Regan’s outbursts in ‘The Exorcist.’
Cahalan was plunged into a nightmare world of paranoia, psychosis, and ultimately, catatonia. In another era, it’s likely she would have been permanently institutionalized or given a lobotomy. In another culture, she might have been exorcised for demonic possession. [In back of beyond locations in the Philippines, the local priest would have been called to do exorcism with a Cross and holy water to get the devil out of her body.
That failing, the undiagnosed victim may have been left in the jungle to fare for herself. In Manila, she may have been confined at the National Psychopatic Hospital chained to her bed.]
Cahalan was admitted to the New York University Medical Center, and spent a month that was forever erased from her memory as her brain short-circuited. Only later, by cobbling physicians’ notes and her father’s journal, and viewing chilling hospital videos would she fully understand the extent of her disintegration. Her frontal lobe function was almost at zero and the medical staff couldn’t be sure the right hemisphere of her brain would be salvageable. Although $1 million worth of medical tests provided few clues to her illness, her parents never gave up. “They were completely focused on finding an answer.”
Her savior, who she lovingly refers to as Dr. House, was Souhel Najjar, a Syrian immigrant. While her other doctors had all but given up on finding a diagnosis, Dr. Najjar swiftly ordered a brain biopsy that would confirm his hunch that she was suffering from an autoimmune disease that had been identified only two years earlier.
“[Dr. Najjar] life’s experience shaped who he is as a doctor, and he also happens to be brilliant,” says Cahalan. “He’s so adamant about getting the full sense of you as a person…he was told that he was too slow for his elementary school. He’s made it his life’s mission to not let people fall through the cracks.”
Cahalan was the 217th person in the world to be diagnosed with anti-NDMA-receptor encephalitis, a relatively treatable illness that causes swelling in the right lobe of the brain. Untreated, she may have sunk into coma and eventually died.
Najjar also provided the title to her book. “At a pivotal moment in my disease, he pulled my parents out of the hospital room and literally said to them, ‘Her brain is on fire,’” Cahalan tells Shine. “At that point, they felt it was a relief to hear that. Describing it in layman’s terms gave them some hope.”
Cahalan wants her story to help people who might “otherwise get lost in the system.” She tells Shine [a publishing institution in the USA]. “We don’t understand how neurological autoimmune disorders work. They are so under diagnosed. About 75 percent occur in women who may get told they are just stressed. Or they are hysterical. My disease was only discovered in 2007—how many more diseases haven’t been identified yet?”
Sarah B. Weir, a Yahoo! blogger tells us the story: That before Susannah Cahalan, 24, mysteriously contracted the disease, she was a bright, outgoing, and ambitious reporter of the New York Post.
Weir continues with her narration about Cahalan: After exhibiting flu-like symptoms that were initially diagnosed as mono, the victim suddenly began experiencing delusions and behaving erratically. Within a few weeks, she became increasingly abusive, moody, and paranoid. Her doctors brushed off her condition as a result of too much partying and stress, but her first violent seizure signaled there was something critically askew.
Late one night, Cahalan’s guttural moans and grating squeaks woke up her boyfriend, Stephen. “My arms suddenly whipped out in front of me like, like a mummy, as my eyes rolled back and my body stiffened,” Cahalan writes. “I was gasping for air. My body continued to stiffen as I inhaled repeatedly, with no exhale. Blood and foam began to spurt through clenched teeth. Terrified, [he] stifled a panicked cry and for a second he stared, frozen, at my shaking body.” Cahalan now describes her seizures as eerily similar to the character Regan’s outbursts in ‘The Exorcist.’
Cahalan was plunged into a nightmare world of paranoia, psychosis, and ultimately, catatonia. In another era, it’s likely she would have been permanently institutionalized or given a lobotomy. In another culture, she might have been exorcised for demonic possession. [In back of beyond locations in the Philippines, the local priest would have been called to do exorcism with a Cross and holy water to get the devil out of her body.
That failing, the undiagnosed victim may have been left in the jungle to fare for herself. In Manila, she may have been confined at the National Psychopatic Hospital chained to her bed.]
Cahalan was admitted to the New York University Medical Center, and spent a month that was forever erased from her memory as her brain short-circuited. Only later, by cobbling physicians’ notes and her father’s journal, and viewing chilling hospital videos would she fully understand the extent of her disintegration. Her frontal lobe function was almost at zero and the medical staff couldn’t be sure the right hemisphere of her brain would be salvageable. Although $1 million worth of medical tests provided few clues to her illness, her parents never gave up. “They were completely focused on finding an answer.”
Her savior, who she lovingly refers to as Dr. House, was Souhel Najjar, a Syrian immigrant. While her other doctors had all but given up on finding a diagnosis, Dr. Najjar swiftly ordered a brain biopsy that would confirm his hunch that she was suffering from an autoimmune disease that had been identified only two years earlier.
“[Dr. Najjar] life’s experience shaped who he is as a doctor, and he also happens to be brilliant,” says Cahalan. “He’s so adamant about getting the full sense of you as a person…he was told that he was too slow for his elementary school. He’s made it his life’s mission to not let people fall through the cracks.”
Cahalan was the 217th person in the world to be diagnosed with anti-NDMA-receptor encephalitis, a relatively treatable illness that causes swelling in the right lobe of the brain. Untreated, she may have sunk into coma and eventually died.
Najjar also provided the title to her book. “At a pivotal moment in my disease, he pulled my parents out of the hospital room and literally said to them, ‘Her brain is on fire,’” Cahalan tells Shine. “At that point, they felt it was a relief to hear that. Describing it in layman’s terms gave them some hope.”
Cahalan wants her story to help people who might “otherwise get lost in the system.” She tells Shine [a publishing institution in the USA]. “We don’t understand how neurological autoimmune disorders work. They are so under diagnosed. About 75 percent occur in women who may get told they are just stressed. Or they are hysterical. My disease was only discovered in 2007—how many more diseases haven’t been identified yet?”
No comments:
Post a Comment