Influencer diagnosed with ‘brain on fire’ reveals terrifying first symptoms

A woman who was diagnosed with encephalitis described how the first symptoms ended up with her getting sectioned while she didn't know what was happening to her.

Sabrina Bahsoon is an influencer who on 19 March made a video of herself on the London Underground with friends, but her trouble started when she got home that day and 'just started hysterically crying', with Sabrina left 'screaming, shouting, acting very psychotic' and she didn't know at the time it was her first episode of psychosis.

What she actually had was anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, a rare condition where the immune system attacks chemical receptors in the brain, your body starts fighting your mind.

It's depicted in the film Brain on Fire, and research into the condition has found that 'dramatic psychiatric symptoms' can show in as many as 60 percent of autoimmune encephalitis cases.

The morning afterwards, Sabrina was 'acting super strange', and having told her sisters she'd just broken up with her boyfriend they decided to get over to her as soon as possible.

"Thank god, because I don't know what I would do if I was alone," Sabrina said.

"When they came over I started going even crazier, I was posting TikTok videos, I don't know if anyone saw that, of me screaming, shouting at the camera, I started crying, trying to hurt myself and my sisters ended up calling the ambulance."

She was taken to hospital and she stayed for two days there, describing how she screamed the entire time and didn't get any sleep.

Her condition deteriorated, but she was discharged by the emergency room and Sabrina said she was starting to lose memories at this point, but knew she went back home.

When she started having violent outbursts and trying to hit things her family called paramedics, and the paramedics called the police who put Sabrina in handcuffs to restrain her.

Back at the hospital, she was sedated as she was 'violent with anyone who comes near me', and the decision was made to section her, with Sabrina transferred to a mental hospital and incorrectly diagnosed with psychosis.

Kept in a mental hospital with the wrong diagnosis for two months, Sabrina was on anti-psychotic medication that she wasn't responding to because it wasn't appropriate for her encephalitis.

She lost about 12kg and described being in a 'catatonic state', and eventually her dad pushed for her to get more tests done, which at last identified what was actually happening to her, with the mental hospital apologising.

On 18 June she was at least able to go through with an operation to treat her, and though the operation risked the loss of her ovaries she fortunately didn't have that happen to her, finally getting discharged in July.

Now she's figuring out getting back to her life and dealing with spending several months of it going through absolute hell.

"Sabrina has been through something most of us can't imagine, and the way she has fought her way back is remarkable," Thomas Drachkovitch of Dream Bay Group said.

"She's sharing her story so that others might recognise anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis sooner, and we're so grateful for all the support she's received."