A Mind Unraveled

by Kurt Eichenwald

  Morrison took a long look at me. “Okay,” he said. “Then I have to put you in contact with my counterpart at Region 3 in Philadelphia. If you want a federal investigation of Swarthmore, it falls into his jurisdiction.”

  He was all business now. The first step, he said, was for me to fly to Swarthmore and occupy my room. The school would either leave me there or force me out. Both responses would be helpful evidence in the looming war.

  * * *

  —

  The intensity of the past few days transformed my father. Whether he had been consumed by discomfort over my epilepsy or by guilt about my mismanaged care, he experienced an extraordinary metamorphosis into my strong advocate. The Dickerson tape convinced him—Swarthmore had tricked him into turning against his son, and now the school was hunkering down, preparing to deny me an education.

  Taking charge, he told us to tape every call with the school. Then we could compare recordings and verify what each of us had been told. We also would send letters from my doctors attesting, in one sentence, that I was medically and psychologically capable of returning to college.

  While my mother and I were at HHS, my father picked up the doctors’ letters and sent them by certified mail to Dickerson. I called to let him know that HHS had recommended I occupy my room at Swarthmore despite the possibility that the school might have me arrested for trespassing. After we spoke, my father dialed the dean’s office with a tape rolling.

  “Dean Dickerson, this is Dr. Eichenwald. We need to know what decision you have made.”

  She replied that they had sent a letter and it would arrive at our house the next day.

  “What does it say?”

  “It simply says that Kurt may return when we have evidence that he is ready to return and be a fully functional student.”

  My father swallowed his anger; he knew Swarthmore could have asked my doctors that question long ago. But the school had already labeled Naarden and Roskos as unreliable based on the falsehood that they were his colleagues.

  He told her that letters from the doctors were on the way. Dickerson said she hoped everyone understood Swarthmore was acting only in my best interest.

  No one believed that, my father replied—not the family, not me, and certainly not the doctors. “It was their impression that there are two things going on,” my father said. “One is [to] somehow label Kurt as having a psychiatric illness and not true seizures, which of course is ridiculous. He wouldn’t be on two toxic or potentially toxic drugs if that was a thought. And the other consideration is, there really is an attempt to keep him out.”

  “I don’t want to keep him out…”

  “That’s fine. Then we both agree.”

  “I am not trying to make a specific attempt to keep him out.”

  She mentioned Swarthmore’s insistence that I be evaluated by a college psychiatrist. While Naarden and Roskos said there were no psychiatric or medical issues that would interfere with my attending college, Whitaker and Millington maintained there were. My father couldn’t believe it—Dickerson valued the opinions of a college psychologist and internist who barely knew me over those of a renowned neurologist and psychiatrist who had spent time with me, diagnosed me, and treated me?

  In fact, she explained, the school doctors believed the experts were wrong. “What they say is that the cause of Kurt’s seizures is not just physical—”

  “No, that’s quite incorrect. I don’t know where Dr. Millington got this information from,” my father replied. “Like Kurt told you, both of us and Mrs. Eichenwald were in the office with Dr. Naarden when Dr. Millington called. So we know exactly what Dr. Naarden said.”

  He recited my experiences in Chicago with the toxic medication. “Dr. Naarden put him on a second set of drugs. You see, there is no way that Dr. Naarden, who I respect very much as a physician, would expose Kurt to drugs that can potentially kill him on the basis of just thinking, ‘Well, maybe it’s epilepsy.’ ”

  Dickerson started to speak, but my father interrupted.

  “He can register on Monday morning with the registrar. Is that correct?” he asked.

  No, Dickerson replied, first I would need to be screened by a psychiatrist chosen by the school. My father insisted he would never condone that examination, which clearly—as everyone knew—would be a setup.

  “I really don’t want to get the feds into this, but that condition is not acceptable, and if the college insists on it, we are going to have to go the legal way,” my father said.

  Well, she replied, the school was ready to defend itself. “Our college counsel believes that we will be found not guilty. But I don’t want to get to that. I want Kurt to be in school.”

  But first, the conditions had to be met. She maintained that the school was being reasonable by allowing an outside psychiatrist to conduct the evaluation since we had made it clear no one trusted Whitaker.

  “To put it mildly,” my father responded. “In fact, Dr. Naarden feels he may well report Whitaker to his professional organization. I don’t know if you are aware of the fact that Dr. Whitaker has been telling students, without identifying Kurt, that he was able to diagnose a brain tumor—”

  “Diagnose what?”

  “A brain tumor in an individual where the physicians had felt there was no such thing.”

  “Are you kidding?” Her astonished tone was real.

  “We have this from four different sources.”

  “Oh my goodness.”

  “That’s all right,” my father said. “If he wants to be a damned fool, that’s fine, because obviously the students who made the connection, when they see Kurt again, are going to know he still has all his hair and his skull is still intact, so he didn’t have a brain tumor.”

  Back to the law. “We’re not keeping him out because he has a seizure disorder,” Dickerson said.

  My father considered telling her that he had heard a recording of her saying the opposite. “You can’t keep him out for any reason, and you can’t bring in something else and say, ‘That is why we are keeping him out.’ That also is illegal.”

  Dickerson brought up our recent conversation—the one I taped—saying I had yelled at her. Again, my father felt tempted to tell her he had heard the call and that, while I sounded angry, I never raised my voice. Instead, he kept his counsel.

  * * *

  —

  Despite the finality of my vow in Morrison’s office, I remained unsure if I was making the right decision. Carrying on the fight might rob me of a college degree; the future that I had envisioned could slip away. Morrison, Cunningham, and Roskos all advocated leaving Swarthmore. Naarden agreed, urging me to make a strategic retreat; I would be under a microscope there, and the stress could make gaining seizure control harder, he warned.

  That night, I called Franz. Skipping the sordid details, I explained in general terms that the school was fighting to keep me out. “Why am I trying so hard?” I asked him.

  “Because we’re family,” Franz said. “Because you love us. You have too strong a sense of right and wrong to let this go.”

  After hanging up, I walked to my bedroom, picked up my tape recorder, lay down on the bed, and pressed the red button.

  I described the day’s events and pondered whether to take on the college. “So what I was told at HHS is that the possibility existed that I would not get an education because in fighting Swarthmore, they’d label me a troublemaker,” I said in a tense voice. “If I slipped, I’d be thrown out. To transfer, I have to get a recommendation from the dean’s office, or I would not be admitted anywhere else. So I have a choice. It comes down to: If I do this, I might not get an education at all.”

  I turned off the recorder, then later switched it back on. I had about forty-eight hours to decide. “It’s getting down to the wire. I’ve got this real bad feeling in my gut, like I ought to have an u
lcer, but I don’t,” I said. “I’m just torn. I’m scared, maybe because everyone has told me that I should be. I am just so scared. ‘You might not ever get an education, or you might get everything you want. What choice are you going to make?’ I haven’t decided yet. It’s hard to decide.”

  I rambled a bit, then wondered how I must sound. “I’m getting philosophical because I’m scared,” I said. “But there is a principle. I’m fighting for principles. That sounds ridiculous sometimes to some people. There is a justice, and there is an injustice. That’s what the fight is for. That is what my emotions are. If I deny myself the right to have what I want unjustly, I don’t think I’d ever be able to like myself again. Other people keep saying, ‘You can fight it once you’re gone. We’ll all fight it once you’re gone.’ I don’t think I could do that. I can’t turn tail and run.”

  The words spilled out until I noticed the cassette was almost finished. “This is the complete end of this particular tape,” I said. “See you in the next installment for our future excitement.”

  An audio diary from

  ELVA EICHENWALD, 1982

  Recorded the day before our return trip to Swarthmore

  Somewhere around Christmas, I finally began to hear and to understand what Kurt was saying. And I have reached the point where I can allow this young man his right and his privilege to be himself. It has taken a long time. No, it hasn’t. It has taken a lot of work during this time to finally reach the point of opening my hand and wanting my son to become the person he’s meant to become.

  During that time that he was at home, I went from being constantly afraid he was going to have a seizure to not worrying about it or at least not worrying about it a lot. I am aware that he can have a seizure at any time. I look where we are just simply so that I’m aware of what I can do to make things easier for him.

  But I am encouraging him to be at the school and to do whatever it is that he wants to do. I needed to know that his goals were healthy goals. I needed to know that he was fully aware of everything that might happen to him while he was here. I wanted him to know the consequences of his actions. And I think it was the only thing I could do as his parent while letting him go. And if he was not fully aware, I would have had to let him go anyway. He must reap the benefits of his own actions at this point.

  I would rather be going anyplace else but Swarthmore at this time.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Traces of red spotted the pocket of my button-down shirt. I noticed, then glanced at my aching hand; I had bitten my nails until two fingers bled. Damn. This was one of the new shirts I’d bought in Dallas, since most of my clothes were still in my dorm room. Now bloodstains caused by anxiety may have ruined it.

  It was Monday, and I was traveling with my mother to Philadelphia. As I asked a flight attendant for a napkin, my mother saw the bleeding. She brought a tissue out of her purse, and I wrapped it around my fingers.

  I had announced my decision the previous day: I was going back to Swarthmore, and if forcibly removed from campus, I would head to HHS in Philadelphia to sign the paper work for an investigation. Over the weekend, we received a Mailgram from Swarthmore dictating conditions for my return. There was, of course, meeting with a psychiatrist named Silas Warner, an associate of Whitaker. I was forbidden from using the health center, I was required to retain a new neurologist, my grades would be under constant review, and so on.

  After we received the Mailgram, I spoke with Paul Cushing, the HHS investigator who would be handling my case. Like Morrison, he warned that challenging the school might wreck my future. After I read him the Mailgram, he again urged me to skip confrontation and file for the federal inquiry. I repeated what I’d told Morrison. I wasn’t going to abandon my rights out of fear; I would not accept losing if I did not first try to win.

  My parents and I debated which of them would accompany me to Swarthmore. I said I needed someone there only to drive and possibly bail me out of jail if I was arrested for trespassing. And I imposed a rule: No one but me was allowed to speak to any official at the school.

  “If I screw this up, I can live with it,” I said. “If someone else screws it up for me, I will never forgive them.”

  By that point, my father was so angry I feared he might hit someone at the school. Mom was the choice by default.

  After landing, we drove to the Media Inn, the site of the chaotic night when I had staged a sit-in until I was allowed to bid my friends goodbye. I called Cushing, my lawyer, and my psychiatrist. Roskos was key; based on the advice of my lawyer and HHS, I could never accept Swarthmore’s demand that I speak to their psychiatrist. Roskos needed to be available for my planned compromise.

  My mother drove me to school. In our dorm room, Carl and Franz told me they had decided they would share the double and I would stay in the single. This seemed like a healthy way to address the mental exhaustion I was sure they must be experiencing. While I worried about being alone in a bedroom, I told them the arrangements were fine.

  After unpacking, I went down the hall to a phone for on-campus calls. I dialed Dickerson’s office and left a message that I was back in my dorm and wanted to meet the next day.

  * * *

  —

  On Tuesday morning, I walked to the registrar’s office. Although Cushing knew the ploy was a long shot, he advised trying to sign up for classes, which would make it harder to evict me. I filled out the documents, then handed them to the woman behind the counter, who promptly reminded me I needed approval from my academic adviser for my schedule.

  I headed to Trotter Hall and sat outside the office of Professor David Smith from the political science department. About an hour passed before he showed up and invited me in.

  “I know I’ve arrived late, but I wanted to get your approval of my schedule,” I said, handing him the schedule card.

  He didn’t look at it. “I’m sorry, but the dean has told me not to sign your registration records.”

  I nodded and took the card back. The gamble had failed, as expected.

  * * *

  —

  Hours later, Dickerson sat in front of me, looking nervous. With my mother beside me in silence, I tried to get a read on the dean. Until now, I had perceived her as someone who had slipped into error by originally engaging in “benevolent discrimination”—denying me my rights for my own good—but who then transformed into a monster, willing to destroy my future to cover up the mistake.

  Now as I studied her face, I softened. This was her first year as dean—maybe she had been deceived by advisers. The security department wanted me gone, the health center feared me. Millington was badly informed—thus his call to Naarden about my fictitious academic problems—and ignorant of the nature of epilepsy. But at the center of it all, I believed, was Whitaker, who started this ordeal with his brain tumor theory before pushing on to false declarations about my emotional health. Deans and internists would rely on a psychologist for assessments of a student’s mental state. They had no basis for challenging him.

  Perhaps, I thought, this amalgam of ill will, incompetence, arrogance, and error might have confused a novice dean who wasn’t experienced enough yet to recognize she was being fed bad information by others with undisclosed agendas.

  If my assessment was right, then I might be able to persuade her, to become a gentle force pushing back on her doubts. Persuade. I had learned that skill as a telemarketer. The last thing I should do is hit her with demands from the get-go.

  I spoke before the first question was asked. “I spent most of my time off in a really interesting job,” I said.

  She appeared disarmed by my words. “Yes, I heard that from your father. You were working with disabled people?”

  “Sort of. I mean, it was for a group of people with disabilities, but really what I was doing was investigating a situation involving a doctor. In fact, it looks like there wil
l be an article about what I did in the local newspaper.”

  She smiled. “That’s great!”

  After a few more minutes of chatting, I moved the conversation to the topic at hand.

  “The job was a lot of work,” I said. “Truthfully, I don’t think a lot of students here could have done it. I think that alone demonstrates there’s no reason to keep me out.”

  Like clockwork, Dickerson reverted to the stock response: No one wanted to block my return, but I had to meet six requirements. When she mentioned my grades would have to pass minimum standards, I stifled a laugh.

  “Well, I assume if I’m failing my courses, I won’t get to stay,” I said.

  I accepted other conditions without argument: I would not use the health center for seizure-related problems. I would obtain a neurologist in the area. However, I insisted, Naarden would be in charge; the other doctor could consult with him. Then it was on to the requirement I meet with a school-selected psychiatrist. I refused.

  “Dean Dickerson, that’s a ridiculous requirement, and it’s not going to happen,” I said. “I’ve seen a psychiatrist since I left—not because I’m mentally ill, but to help me deal with the emotions of having epilepsy.”

  “I understand that.”

  “You should already have a letter from him saying I’m fine. The idea that some guy who has never met me is going to speak with me for an hour and determine what’s going to happen over the next few months is absurd. Unless he’s breaking out a crystal ball, he’s going to be guessing.”

  I wanted to make sure I chose my next words carefully. “And let me be honest, any psychiatrist who thinks he can assess a patient in one session is incompetent.”