I think that I can safely say that Matt was the first autistic child in our small, rural public school. Special Ed classrooms were a futuristic concept. Well, the future smacked them right in the face when my brother walked through the door. They had to develop a new classroom without the space to do it. Someone had the brilliant idea of splitting the library in half and making the other half the special Ed room. The bookshelf divided the two rooms. Right next to the bookshelf was a huge box, the naughty box. When my class went to check out books, my brother was in that box kicking and screaming. The kids laughed, pretty damn funny, right? Despite everything I still love books. 

Recess was the same. They threw everyone out on the playground together. There was a group of older girls that would follow him around mocking his motions and calling him retard. He used to flap his hands together and make a motion that was like running in place, we called it flapping. 

Ironically, my mom received her college degree in a field where she works directly with disabled children. She worked in the field before I was born. She became a very strong advocate and support for other families going through hard times. I am so proud that she is still working full time as she is entering her late 60’s. Still advocating, making a difference, and finding true compassion that can only happen from living it. 

As Matt got older, the school could not handle his extremely violent behavior. They basically kicked him out. Just like my last blog, swearing in church, he became entirely home bound. The school sent a retired schoolteacher to the house to educate him. My mom had to really cut back her hours at work. She decided that since Matt was pulled out of school that she would pull the rest of us out too. I was homeschooled from 8th through 10th grade. I will save that for another blog, those experiences I never shared with anyone who didn’t know about it…

Homeopathic remedies and alternative medicine. We had 3 doctors that fit into this category. I only went along with Matt to the first doctor one time. All I can remember is the doctor asking if Matt’s urine smelled like popcorn. We travelled a couple of hours to see him and he seemed to be pretty legit. 

The second doctor was Asian. I think he was he was an immigrant from China bringing over his homeopathic elixirs, but that is a little hazy as I was pretty young. Again this doctor was several hours away. He had a tiny little office in a questionable neighborhood. His machine was in a small, dark room. The reading machine itself was the size of a mini fridge. It had a cord coming out of it hooked up to what looked like a computer mouse with a pointed end like a pen cap. He explained that there are certain locations on the hand that corresponded with the functioning of specific organs. I think the machine had a 1 to 100 scale. The higher the reading the worse shape your organ was in. The machine also emitted a sound, the higher the reading the higher the tone. He also showed us that nothing happened on the machine when the mouse was placed in the wrong spot. 

I remember him telling me that my nerves were shot. Although it didn’t take a genius to figure that out. I was a scrawny little kid, holding my body stiff as a board. I held my shoulders up to my ears and had hyper vigilant eyes. He gave us medicine in little glass bottles that had a dropper to administer. We put drops under our tongue and held it there until we counted to 100 before spitting it out. We had to come back every couple months to see if there was any improvement. Sometimes it was kind of difficult because mom said he had issues with something called a medical license. 

We also had a local homeopathic dentist. He was a very kind and caring man. He didn’t use the machine on us very often and said to never tell anyone that he had it. He took out all of our mercury fillings. After a rather long practice, he eventually lost his medical license too. 

Still no cure. 

Matt needed more help than the local allergist could provide. That summer we took another road trip with aunt Grace from WI to Texas to a hospital that specialized in caring for people with severe environmental allergies. But first Matt had to go through a major detox. I think it may have included extreme fasting. Now Matt had what doctors called a failure to thrive. Fasting made him very sick and feverish, mom thought he was going to die. 

Mom, aunt Grace, Luke, Matt, and I loaded up the car for our “vacation” to Texas. The plan was that we would drive to Texas, leave aunt Grace’s old car there for mom and fly back home doing the reverse for their trip home.  We made it there in 2 days. Time to drop off mom and Matt for the summer.  To enter the hospital, we had to wear 100% Cotten clothes, no synthetic fibers. Mom bought a new wardrobe that summer like she was going on a cruise. Reading tags for the 100% cotton. 

Mom made a lot of changes after the hospital trip. We got rid of our wood stove and got an expensive electric furnace that was safe for people with allergies. My brother got a charcoal mask to wear to filter toxins. If any farmer or the county sprayed pesticides within a half mile of the house, she would call them upset that we did not have time to leave the area. She took down her curtains in the bedroom because they had formaldehyde in them and put up old sheets. We had to brush our teeth by rinsing our toothbrush in peroxide and dipping it in baking soda. Glass bottled water only for Matt even though we had artesian spring water flowing from our well.  Any new items had to “gas out” in the garage before it was allowed in the house. 

No perfume, nail polish, or hair spray for me. No problem, I took my hair spray to school with me. Sneaking around the middle school like the girls who packed trashy clothes that their parents wouldn’t let them wear out of the house. C’mon it was the 80’s, I wore a half bottle of hair spray a day. 

Still no cure. 

i awoke again this morning to the sound of my cats crying. Painful crys, not the cry of hunger.

My mom was offered 2 free cats. I was so excited, I remember going to pick them out. We never had a pet before. It was a fall day, I vaguely remember seeing pumpkins in a field. I’ll take the black cat and the tiger striped cat. I loved the kittens. They were so soft, I loved stroking their beautiful glossy fur. They were my cats, I picked them out and I loved them. 

Matt hurt my cats, but it was okay. I made a safe little cubby hole for them to hide in. But I couldn’t always protect them. Sleep stopped me. I woke up again to the awful wailing of the cats. God, make it stop. Matt wrapped his arms underneath the front two arms of my cat and bent over squeezing them. They would cry, he would laugh. One day my indoor cats were gone. Mom said they both ran away. I think Matt killed them, but I don’t want to know. Mom always said hate the autism, but don’t hate Matt.