My School Years - College (Part 1)

Having completed high-school in 1954 the question arose – what was going to do with myself? Despite the weakness of the results in the Higher School’s exams I had spent two years in preparing for them (though I suspect it was contrived by my parents to keep me in school as long as possible) and it seemed it would be a shame if I did not use the experience to acquire a profession. But what? Without going into the objective and subjective factors in any detail which were taken into account, I decided to study law, a decision which illustrates that even then I had no real appreciation of the effect of my narcolepsy on my capacity for study. What is certain is that because of my left/liberal views I felt it was necessary to adopt an occupation/profession that would make me independent of the will of established society and it seemed to me that Law would best provide me with that independence.

The first thing it meant is that I would eventually have to go to England to take the Bar finals exam. The first part of the Bar Exams I would be able to take at home once I was accepted by the Inns of Court in London. I sought and obtained a job as an assistant clerk in a Resident Magistrate’s Court and acting upon the advice of more experienced heads in view of my somewhat limited qualifications I proceeded to apply to all the Inns for admission. Upon acceptance at Lincoln’s Inn I jumped at it started taking the subjects in Part 1 one at a time. When I managed to pass each subject with only one hiccup my confidence increased that I could succeed in passing the Bar exams.

To cut a long story short, upon completing all but one of the subjects in Part 1, I quit the civil service when I was not granted leave as many others had been to go abroad to complete the Bar exams and with some assistance from my parents I travelled to England to do so. I remained in England for two years and while there I was able to obtain electroencephalograph (EEC) tests and confirmed not only that I was in fact suffering from Narcolepsy but also that there was nothing else wrong with my brain. Another happy result of studying in England was that I was able to take advantage of their National Health Service and obtain my Narcolepsy medication free of cost. In fact, based on the advice of my doctors in England I continued to take approximately between 30 -40 mgs of Dexedrine daily for the entire time I was abroad and indeed for the next twenty – odd years after my return home, without any noticeably adverse side-effects. In fact it is worth commenting that the entire time I was in the UK no doctor ever warned me that the medication I was taking for Narcolepsy was a dangerous drug and that as an amphetamine ( and ,in the USA, a Schedule II controlled substance) it was extensively abused and was capable of creating “ extreme psychological dependence”. I wish to state categorically that at no time have I ever felt that I had become or was becoming psychologically dependent on Dexedrine. Nor have I ever felt an irresistible need to increase the prescribed medication and, remarkably, I frequently forgot to take the medication despite the fact that it is so important for my well –being. So much so that I have had to take special precautions to ensure that I always had a spare tablet or two on my person in case I forgot to take it. Incidentally, as you can imagine, while I was in England, many were the times that I would pass my ‘Tube’ stop and have to come off at the next or a later stop. I have even on a few occasions when I was particularly tired, travelled to the end of the line.