September 2015

Fred had been unhappy since arrving at Edinburgh University.  The truth is that the year abroad in Ktzbuhel had been like a drug to him, and he came back reluctantly and unable to see any reason to go back into Academia.  Realising that, I had been concerned and had a made a trip or two to try and help him settle.  I realised all wasn't right, but I thought I'd done enough.  Matters weren't helped by him disliking the English part of his degree, whilst at the same time having contempt for the German part because he could speak it fluently.  There was one visit home that I remember vividly.  It was horrific.  He had talked about panic attacks and he had one at home.  He was shaking, crying believing someone was coming to get him.  I suspected drugs, but after calming him down and talking, whilst checking his beongings, this seemed unlikely.  Some months later the cause was to be revealed.

In January he announced he wanted to change course, and seemed to be going through the process to make that happen.  Oddly he never seemed to get to an end result.  As the weeks went by, he explained it was the University's hopeless administration system, and all would be well.  We spent time telling him to make sure he did well, otherwise they wouldn't let him change.  The year rolled on, he took his exams and headed to Norway for the summer.  No exam results he said, but he took that as a good sign.

Come September he returned after a good summer and we travelled north to settle him into his new student flat.  He had, he told me, a meeting on Friday and all would be settled.  We got to Edinburgh, unloaded the car...and I said I would see him the next day.  we said all the things you would expect, and just before I left he said, actually he didn't have a meeting ON Friday but had to see them before Friday.  In the hubbub, I just took note and carried on.  As I drove south the significance of that comment began crcling and after two and a half hours driving, when I was near Newcastle I rang Anne.  I said I thought I should go back.  She said she agreed.  I headed North again, eventually ringing him to tell him I was in Edinburgh.  From there the next 36 hours are a bit of a blur.  He had said when I left that he was going to the Uni, but he'd gone to the gym and had avoided doing that.  I got in the car and made him meet me on the 'campus'.  There in the discussions which went on for hours, it transpired that he had failed both English and German.  He had been spending his money of stuff to distract himself.  Worst of all, for me, he had not been going to lectures...sitting alone in his room.  That is an image that will never leave me.  When I left him that evening I cried like a baby.

The next day, I hauled him from the flat and we headed to the language department, knowcking on doors until we met one of the tutors he had been told to see.  He was lovely, helpful and sympathetic.  Geograpphy was off the agenda.  They would take him to resit German, and because he didn't want to do English another subject had to be found.  Norwegian came up.  He grabbed it.  The admin was done an hour later.  I took him back to the flat and there was a mixture of ranting father and sympathetic carer.  I stayed until his friends returned and took him to a party...I didn't want him to be alone.

The next day again I reappeared and we talked, headed to the supermarket to get him some food.  I know how I felt.  I believe he was devastated that he had got himself into this mess.  I'm not sure he understood why or how it happened.  Since then he has returned back to Essex for Katerine's 21st, and for the funeral of the school friend.  I have been up to Scotland twice...once disastrously by myself as I still had not got over the events in September, and once successfully in November.

He does seem to be back on course and more contented/reconciled.  Is all right?  No I don't think so, but I do think we drew back from anexceptionally dark and dangerous place.