I was the class jester at school, because I wanted to be liked. The truth was that I was struggling. I now know that I had a trio of conditions: dyslexia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and Irlen syndrome, a neurological condition that makes it hard to process visual information. Words swim on the page for me; it’s difficult to see them, let alone read them. When I started school forty years ago, no one knew about this. I just thought it was normal to see words swirling in 3D. I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t read or write like my friends, so I made a joke of it. But the joke carried on for too long.
When I startedsecondary school, a teacher made me stand on a chair and read. She wanted to show me I was stupid. It was so humiliating that I would shake, and I developed a bad stutter.
I didn’t talk to any teachers or family about this. I was clever at hiding it. When I had to write anything down, I guessed, forming what I hoped were the right words. I’d copy my friend’s work; he knew something was wrong, so let me. I cheated or guessed in tests. I became good at learning by heart.
I left schoolwith a qualification in home economics. My big brother Ian, my idol, had joined the military, so I did, too. I was a great soldier – I got my green beret – but I couldn’t write a report.
In 1994, I trained to be a medic in the military. Most of the work was in the field and I relied on my team for any written work. I became quite senior, working in war zones.
But things unravelled when I did a course in pre-hospital emergency care. I had passed all my practical exams, the problem was that I’d failed the written exam. The examining doctor wanted an explanation. I was embarrassed, but told him I had dyslexia and that I couldn’t read. He urged me to get back into education. I was thirty-four.
I applied to do a degree, biological medicine and health sciences, at the Open University. They set me up with an educational psychologist, who told me that my peer group outranked me by fifteen years. Then I was diagnosed with Irlen syndrome and finally everything made sense.
It was back to basics on the course. I knew the alphabet and some words, but my vocabulary was small. Using my disabled students’ allowance, I paid for a tutor, who worked with me every week, teaching me to understand words through pictures. I had a laptop with read-and-write and speak-and-spell programs. Reading material was printed on green paper to help with the Irlen syndrome – the colour helps my brain correct the distortion.
It took nine years to get that degree – something I had never dreamed of. Now, aged 47, I’m an ambassador for the Open University; this year I won an award in recognition of the way I’ve embraced education later in life. I now teach pre-hospital emergency care to doctors, nurses, medics and paramedics. I also teach children and adults with learning difficulties, because I want to give others the chances I had.
