Read here the full transcript of MUSC cardiologist John Rhodes’ talk titled “How I Overcame My Learning Disabilities To Become A Physician” at TEDxCharleston 2022 conference.
Listen to the audio version here:
TRANSCRIPT:
Struggling Against the Current of Traditional Education
I was 10, and I was in a canoe, paddling as hard as I could in a river called traditional education. It was the last day of fourth grade, so I was pretty excited for the summer. I was trying to hear what my mom had to say to the teacher. She was saying, “My son over here, his little brother is in first grade and can read every book in the house. But he can’t read any books in the house; he just looks at the pictures.”
I’m not sure that my fourth-grade teacher said what my mom wanted because the next thing I know, I was in my canoe going to a new school. I got to the new school, and the teacher said, “You know, we tested him, and he reads on the level of a first grader. So we really need him to repeat fourth grade so he has time to catch up with all the other children.”
I said, “Mom, I made it through fourth grade, I just did it looking at the pictures.” She said, “Alright.” So the teachers came over and they said, “We’re going to put this bright orange sticker all the way down the handle of your paddle. It says ‘special education class.’ That way, when you paddle through that new school, everybody knows exactly where you’re going.”
Paddling Through Special Education
So I did that, and I got all the way up to seventh grade. My seventh-grade science teacher pulled me aside and said, “John, look, you actually know the material, you just do poorly on the test.” So he put me in a separate room and gave me no time limit to take the test, and I made an A. I came out, and nobody else was in the room, and he graded it. I thought, “This is fantastic.” But nothing changed; I just kept paddling with my orange sticker.
I got up to tenth grade, and my friends came over and said, “John, look, you can’t be in special education class the rest of your life. They don’t have that in college.” So they came and peeled that six, seven-year-old sticker off my paddle and threw it away.
I was paddling along with no orange sticker. I got my report card; I had straight A’s. Everybody was patting me on the back. Then this one girl in my class, blonde, tall girl, comes over and says, “John, look, he doesn’t need anything to make straight A’s in the regular general classes.”
I asked my parents and the teachers, and they said, “John, no, you don’t read fast enough to keep up with the children in those classes.” So I kept paddling. I saw this beautiful white rock, everybody gliding by the rock. I got up to the white rock and boom, just hit the bottom of my canoe. I had a big hole in my canoe; water was rushing out. I looked down, and it said SAT.
Navigating the Rapids of Higher Education
I looked at my parents, and they said, “S-A-T.” They had tears in their eyes and said, “Look, you did so poorly. We talked to your teachers, and we are just not sure that college is going to be for you.” And I said, “You know, I’m going anyway.”
So I put my foot over that hole, and I paddled myself right into North Carolina State University and got myself on the pre-med track. My mom was getting phone calls from all the other people along the bank. They were saying, “Wow, your son? He’s in the newspaper. He’s at a major university in the newspaper because he’s on the dean’s list.”
And then all of a sudden, it was amazing. All these other canoes, the pre-med canoes, they were coming to my canoe. They wanted me to tutor them in histology and biochemistry. They wanted to buy my note cards that took me 10 hours to make. But I said, “You know, I know what it’s like to struggle. So I will help you, and I will help you, I’ll help everybody.”
The MCAT Challenge
Then my pre-med advisor said, “John, you’ve got to take the MCAT, the Medical College Admissions Test. It’s three sections. Each section is 15 points. And you’ve got to get at least an eight on each of those three sections to be above national average. And you’ve got to do way better than that to really get into med school.”
So I paddled up to those 15-foot rocks. I glided by the first two science sections with no problem whatsoever. But I got to the third section, the verbal reading section, and the rock was jagged, and I couldn’t read any of the writing on the rock. It didn’t make any sense. So I just fell back in my canoe.
My pre-med advisor said, “What? What do you mean you made a one on the verbal reading section of the MCAT? You get a one if you just write your name on the paper.” She said, “I’ve never seen this before. This is like you getting a zero in reading.”
I said, “Well, what do I do?” And she said, “Well, you clearly know how to read. You just go take it again. You probably bubbled it in wrong.”
So I went back up to that rock, and I got around the little mossy edges there to a two and slipped back into my canoe and broke my paddle right in half. I was just drifting in that canoe, just looking at the beautiful blue sky with a broken paddle.
A Detour for Improvement
I pulled myself all the way up to the edge of that canoe and looked over the edge.
There they were, all those pre-med canoes that I’d been helping. They were gliding into the horizon to their medical schools. I thought, “You know, this isn’t working for me.”
So I reached down and picked that paddle back up again, duct-taped it, and paddled for three hours to an island. There was a short lady who lived there. She was a reading specialist. I said, “Ma’am, can you teach me to read faster?” She said, “Yes, but it will take intense work for at least a year.” I said, “Okay, well, you know what? I’m good at intense work, so let’s do it.”
So we did that. She jumped in my canoe a year later, and we paddled back up to that verbal reading 15-foot rock. I climbed my way around those words and jagged edges in the moss and got all the way to the six. I was dangling from the jagged edge of a six like this. I said, “I got to a six. I can’t go any higher. Is this going to work?”
She said, “John, you are going to have to accept that being a doctor is not for you.” I said, “That ain’t going to work for me.” So I took my canoe, put it on my shoulder, bumping her into the river. I climbed over that rock, dropped it down on the other side, jumped in the canoe, and paddled right toward the medical school.
Persistence Pays Off
I went up to this private, prestigious university called Duke. I said, “May I have an interview?” “No.” And I paddled over to the University of North Carolina. I said, “May I have an interview?” “No.” I paddled over to Brody School of Medicine in eastern North Carolina. I said, “I’ve been here for a year with that lady on the island. Can you just interview me?” They said, “You’re the most determined person we’ve seen in a while, so we’ll interview you.”
So I paddled into that interview. This man with gray hair and a long white coat said, “John, you’re going to have to answer one thing for me. You’re going to have to explain why that short lady that you bumped out of your canoe on the other side of the rocks over there, why did she write us a letter saying that you don’t read fast enough to be a medical student?”
I said, “I don’t know why that nice lady was trying to capsize my canoe, but let me explain something to you, sir. It’s not that I can’t read. I know how to read. It’s just that I read slower. So I will study 10, 12 hours a day, which is twice the average medical student, if that’s what it takes for me to make it.”
And he goes, “Well, you’re in.”
Success in Medical School
So I paddled into medical school. I got in there and got some beautiful stickers. A green sticker that said “top score in histology.” An orange sticker that said “top score in gross anatomy.” And I got this beautiful blue sticker. It said, “99 on your biochemistry final.”
And all of a sudden, my biochemistry professor was paddling up to me with his canoe. When he tied up to my canoe, he said, “John, I think you cheated on my exam.”
I said, “Well, sir, I did not cheat on your exam. I took four poster boards and taped them all together. I wrote out every single possible pathway. And then I just learned it visually. It was easy, actually.”
And he said, “Well, no one else did that well on the exam, so I’m going to ask you the questions orally to be sure that you know the answers.” I said, “Okay.” He asked me all the questions orally. I got every single one right, including the one question that I had missed.
He said, “Well, why did you get it right? You just got it right. You could have had a perfect score. No one’s ever had a perfect score on my final.”
I said, “Sir, look, I just misread the word. I knew the answer.”
He said, “I want you to be my biochemistry research assistant all summer.”
I said, “Sure.” So I paddled in and did that.
Overcoming Challenges
And then I paddled into the second year of med school, and I was tired. It’s hard to do ten hours a day. And my canoe started filling up with water. It was filling, and my canoe was completely full of water. I thought, “You know, I can just leave my canoe and my paddle right here, climb out and swim home and tell everybody they were right. Or I could just hold on tight to my paddle and just sink with my canoe and let my life just go, avoid all the humiliation.”
I didn’t like those ideas. So I adopted a dog. I put him in the back. He paddled while I studied ten hours a night. And I got through, and I became a doctor.
A New Chapter in Charleston
And then my dog and I, we jumped in the canoe, and we paddled right here to Charleston. And I started my pediatric residency. I got assigned a resident advisor who I had to do clinic with every day. You have to go every day to do clinic. And one day I got there, this man was an older gentleman. He had these big, thick fingers and brown shoes, and he jumped in my canoe, and he reached over and took my paddle away. I was like, no one’s ever done that before.
I said, “What’s going on?” He said, “Well, you failed the U.S. Medical Life Museum, and you have not done well in the in-service exams.” I said, “Well, what do I do, sir?”
He hands me these articles. One article says “learning disabilities in medical students.” The other article says “dyslexia.” He said, “Come with me.”
He took my paddle and paddled me across the Ashley River to his friend, who tested me for hours. And then his friend comes out and says, “I have no idea how this young man got through medical school. I would not think it’s possible. He reads on a low middle school level. He cannot spell anything. He misspelled the word ‘physician,’ and he is one.”
I said, “Sir, look, this is very, very simple. Determination can outwit learning disabilities. It’s not that hard.“
He said, “Well, there’s one thing that is your strength. Visual spatial intelligence. He scored on the top percentile for that. So that means that you’re really good at picturing concepts in your mind.”
I said, “Sir, look, my mom and I have known since the fourth grade that I could just look at the pictures.”
He said, “Well, that’s what you need to do with your career.”
Finding My Niche in Cardiology
So I paddled into a career in cardiology where I do visual spatial imaging to move catheters through your body up to your heart and repair your heart. And I’m pretty good at it. And I’ve been pretty successful at it.
So after being diagnosed at 29 years of age, finally, at 38 years of age, that private prestigious university that would not even give me two seconds for an interview decides to hire me to come and be the chief of cardiology for 10 years.
Four Essential Elements for Success
So if somebody out there happens to be paddling and struggling against the current like me, and it is not uncommon, there are four things, and these are the only four things you need in your canoe:
Perseverance, because we do not outgrow learning disabilities. I know. Somebody told you that you do, but you don’t. I still have them. It’s a lifetime commitment. So you have to become really good at moving the canoe no matter what sticker they put on your paddle.
Resilience. When the setbacks occur, and they will occur in this world we live in, you have to put your foot over the hole, duct tape the paddle, climb over the rock, but just do not give up.
Adaptability. You can be successful with learning disabilities, but you have to be willing to adapt around your weaknesses, mastering using your strengths.
Courage, because when people come to you and say, “You’re just not fast enough,” or “You can’t keep up with the other children,” or “You really need to accept that you can’t be a doctor,” you just have to find the courage to trust what is in your heart.
