Brain On Fire

The care Cahalan receives at NYU is better than what she received previously. The neurologists are more thorough with their examinations. In this chapter, we see excerpts of texts in different typefaces to indicate different states of mind and different moments in time. The “normal” font is Cahalan writing from the future where she is recovered. The italics are spurts of recollection she had in real time during her madness, of which there is a swift and accelerated escalation in symptoms. There is a third, smaller font, too. This font represents video footage of Cahalan in her room at NYU.

Cahalan’s initial diagnosis at NYU is Capgras syndrome, a psychiatric disorder also known as “imposter syndrome,” in which a person afflicted with the syndrome believes friends, family and other people close to the person afflicted to be identical impostors to the actual people they know.

This is the first chapter where the reader encounters neurologist Dr. Russo, who thinks Cahalan has postictal psychosis, or bipolar disorder. After one examination, Russo prescribes Cahalan antipsychotics. Dr. Siegel is a general practitioner who charms Cahalan’s mother, Rhona. He says to Rhona, “‘We will figure this out. Susannah will be fine.’ My mother clung to these words like a life raft and nicknamed the doctor ‘Bugsy’—her own gangster doctor” (82).