Healing from Autoimmune Brain Inflammation

If you are….

Looking for information about brain inflammation,

Newly diagnosed with autoimmune encephalitis (or another autoimmune disease that affects the brain), or

Looking for ways to decrease inflammation and promote healing in your body….

You are in the right place.

While no two journeys to health are the same, approaching recovery one step at a time, and healing using multiple approaches starts here. Learn how:

  • Early and aggressive treatment leads to the best outcomes in cases of AE.

  • Decreasing inflammation in the body is key to healing from autoimmune disease.

  • A combination of conventional and holistic approaches are needed to reverse autoimmune disease.

  • Adopting an anti-inflammatory diet, making changes to environment, mindset, and lifestyle helps to decrease inflammation, and promote healing.

  • To become a participant in recovery, not just a patient waiting to see if medications work.

  • Take control of your healing.

A woman with glasses and a colorful scarf, smiling, holding a camera and trekking poles, standing in a forest near a river.

A devastating diagnosis of brain inflammation caused by autoimmune encephalitis, led Lisa to leave no stone unturned in the pursuit of recovery.

In 2017, forty-five-year-old Lisa Lauter experienced mysterious neurological symptoms. For months, she didn’t feel herself and doctors had no answers. A mother of three preteen boys, Lisa had many reasons to explain away her odd symptoms. In her situation, what parent wouldn’t be tired, forgetful, and sleep-deprived? But that didn’t explain the weakness in her left side, the tingling feeling, and numbness. It didn’t explain why, on a relaxing summer day, Lisa had her first tonic-clonic seizure.

Her new book, Songbirds Keep Singing: A Memoir of Healing from Autoimmune Brain Inflammation, blends memoir, research, and her public health background as she searches for answers following her first big seizure. It provides the knowledge and tools needed to approach brain healing comprehensively, by combining holistic and conventional approaches. From multiple therapies to trying different diets and exercises, Lisa tries them all. As she researches the environmental, hormonal, and lifestyle factors that contribute to inflammation, she also learns how to listen—and advocate—for herself.

What is Autoimmune Encephalitis?


Encephalitis = brain inflammation

Autoimmune = caused from within the body

Autoimmune Encephalitis (AE) = brain inflammation caused when the body starts producing a substance, also known as an antibody, that starts attacking the brain by mistake, causing a wide range of neurologic and psychiatric symptoms.

It is difficult to diagnose and treat this disease and it can leave the patient with many debilitating effects that often require targeted and lengthy rehabilitation and medical treatment. There is no check-list for recovery. There is no, “one size fits all approach”.

Early on in my journey, I decided to do everything I possibly could to survive, following the overwhelming effects of brain inflammation on my health.

Useful for anyone wishing to tame inflammation caused by autoimmune disease or recovering from brain injury.


Get more FACTS on Encephalitis


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