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Decades in the Dark · The Knife: A True Crime Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: And I just sat there as half sobbing, half wondering
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: what happened to our baby? How could this have happened
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: to him?
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: Welcome to the Knife. I'm Hannah Smith. I'm patia Eton.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: This week we speak with a man named Bert Rosen.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Bert and his wife Carolyn lived through every parent's nightmare
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: when their son Matthew vanished one day in two thousand
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: and one. For nearly twenty five years, they had no
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: idea what had happened to him, and then an unexpected
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: phone call changed everything. After twenty five long years, Bert
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: and his family finally got some answers. We talked with
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Bert about the years leading up to Matthew's disappearance and
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: what happens when someone deal with a mental health crisis
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: is criminalized.
• 1:03
  Speaker 3: Let's get into the interview.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: Okay, my name is Burt Rosen. I am happily married
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: to Carolyn, my wife of fifty three years. We've got
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: four children, two boys, two girls, Matthew, Jeremy, Anna, and Rebecca.
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: Carolyn and I were actually fixed up on a blind
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: date by a mutual friend when we were sixteen years old.
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: By the third date, I was ready to tell her
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: that I was in love with her, and eventually January
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: one of nineteen seventy three, we got married. Two years later,
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: Matthew was born.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: Tell me about Matthew as a baby and as a child.
• 1:42
  Speaker 3: What was he like.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: So, Matthew was just super happy, go lucky, He was inquisitive.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: He was just a great little kid. And from the
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: time we brought him home from the hospital, he slept
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: from seven pm until seven am, and he was rambunctious,
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: just like all little kids are. And then growing up
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: you really began to see how intelligent he was. That
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: was showing up in his grades in elementary school, that
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: continued on through junior high school. And so when it
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: was time for high school, Matthew went to Oakton High School,
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: which was in Fairfax County, Virginia, played on the high
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: school football team. And so just as a kid growing up,
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: all the way through all the way through to his
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: high school years, everything is what I would consider to
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: be the normal growing up experience. He graduated from Oakton
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: High School. I want to say in eighty.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: Eight there's no indication for you, as his parents that
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: anything is a mess. When does that change.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: Yes. So when Matthew graduated, most of his friends either
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: went to a UVA University of Virginia or to Virginia Tech,
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: and so he ended up enrolling in Virginia Tech. And
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: everything was seemingly going quite normal during those years. So
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: Blacksburg was about six and a half seven hour drive
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: from where we were living in Pittsburgh, and we would
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: go down and visit him on weekends, or he would
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: come home to Pittsburgh and you bring home his laundry.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: I hope everything would be washed, ride and folded by
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: the time he went to school back to school after
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: the weekend. But it was in his third year that
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: we began to notice things were changing a little bit.
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: There was just a slight change in his behavior. But
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: the real aha moment came when Matthew had sent a
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: letter home to us telling us that he wanted to
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: withdraw from Virginia Tech because he didn't think he was
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: getting the education that he was paying for. He wrote
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: a letter to the dean asked me to proof the letter,
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: and immediately that switch flipped.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: This letter looked as if it had been written by
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: someone who maybe didn't have great command of the English language,
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: parts of it didn't make any sense, and Bert was alarmed.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: This was so out of character from Matthew that Burton
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: his Carolyn urged their son to go see the school doctor,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: and to their relief, he did. But Matthew was already
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: a legal adult. So all of the information that they
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: have from that doctor's visit is from Matthew. And what
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: Matthew told them was that the doctor deemed that he
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: had bipolar disorder and suggested medication.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: The doctor had suggested that Matthew go on lithium, which
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: he was resistant to do but has often prescribed for
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: people with a bipolar disorder. Look, by the very nature
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: of lithium, it has to begin to build up in
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: your system. It's not something you take like an aspirin.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: In a few minutes later your headache has gone, so
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: it has to build up a little bit. Well, he
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: only took it for about two weeks, and during that
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: two weeks he didn't like the way it made him feel.
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: He would say he felt a little lethargic on it all,
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: but it really wasn't doing anything more than that, and
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: so he decided to take himself off of it. And
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: Matthew said and I come home, and so we drove
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: down to Virginia Tech and brought him home. And the
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: only way that I could describe this is the son
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: that came home was not the sun that went away
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: to school.
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: At that point, did you know that he had stopped
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: taking his medication or that it was that something you
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: learned later?
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: He had told us I've stopped taking it.
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: Bert knew his son. He'd watched him grow up, helped
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: him with homework, and attended his football games. But Matthew
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: had changed. There had been red flags while he was
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: at college, like the time his professor called Bert and
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: said that Matthew was making other students uncomfortable. Then, of
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: course there was the bizarrely written letter to the dean.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: But now Matthew was home and they were witnessing this
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: new version of him with their own eyes. Bert said
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: that Matthew would often just sit and stare blinkly. Their
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: family would eat dinner together, but Matthew would sit there,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: completely unresponsive. If the doorbell rang, it was like he
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: didn't hear it. He was physically present, but seemed as
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: if his mind was somewhere else, Somewhere Burt and Carolyn
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: couldn't reach. Matthew was a legal adult, Burton Carolyn had
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: no authority to make medical decisions for him. All they
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: could do is plead with him to see a doctor.
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: They had no access to his medical records. They wanted
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: to help him, but didn't know how he.
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: Would be staring at the television. I mean, he was
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: not violent at all, but he would stare at you
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: in a steely sort of a way, just enough to
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: make you uncomfortable being in front of him. We never
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: felt the threat of danger, just discomfort, and so Caroly
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: and I thought the counsel of someone who had some
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: expertise in the types of things that we were experiencing,
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: and what he said is, Burton Carolyn, you've given up
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: control of your home to your son, and unless he's
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: willing to get some help, you may face the difficult
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: decision of having to ask him to leave for the
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: sake of the rest of the family. Well, we never
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: could have imagined that that's a decision we would have made,
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: but that's exactly what ended up happening. We told Matthew
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: that the way in which he was behaving was not acceptable.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: This could not continue, and unless he was willing to
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: get some help. He could not continue to stay at home.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: And when this is going on, this conversation taking place,
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: what is Matthew's level of understanding or acceptance that he's
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: suffering from mental illness or possibly bipolar disorder.
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he would not have acknowledged that there was any
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: sort of a mental health disorder. Matthew refused to get
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: any help, and then we said, then you're not going
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: to be able to continue to live here, And so
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: we watched him pack his rollerboard suitcase walk down the street,
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: not knowing where he was going to be going other
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: than he could not continue to stay at home.
• 7:49
  Speaker 3: You know, when you talked about telling him you need
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: to seek help or you won't be able to keep
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: living here, what kind of help were you hoping he
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: would get? Was it pharmaceutical? Was it seeing a therapist?
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: Well, he needed to see someone, and the help that
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: we were referring to was going to see a counselor
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: whether that would have been a therapist or something else.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: We wanted to see someone who might be able to
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: professionally help him work through whatever it was he needed
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: to work through. And I'm not sure that we knew
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: exactly what that was back then.
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: Matthew managed to obtain student loans enroll it to Kane University.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: He rented an apartment near the campus. Burton Carolyn would visit,
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: but when they did, they could tell that Matthew was struggling.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: The apartment was in a bad state, dishes piled up
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: in the sink. Matthew's appearance became increasingly unkempt. But what
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: could they say. He'd managed to stay in school, and
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: now graduation was right around the corner. Bert said he
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: and Carolyn were receiving all kinds of order forms in
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: the mail for caps, gowns, and graduation rings. Matthew's and
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: pending graduation was a bright spot, a sign that maybe
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: things were looking up.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: And so we went to a wintertime command at the
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: Plumbo Center and we sat in the nosebleed section, and
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: as they got closer to calling the ours, I made
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: my way down closer to the stage so we could
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: snap a few pictures, and we did, and then afterwards
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: we all went out to dinner, thinking that things had
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: settled down in his life. But the next day I
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: got a call from the chaplain at the Allegheny County
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: Jail and he said, Bert, we've got your son here
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: in jail, assaultant vetter and a police officer resisting arrest
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: with violence, and they named off a litany of other
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: things that they had charged them with that I don't
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: recall anymore, And so we ended up going to a
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: midnight bond hearing. On Christmas Eve.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: Matthew had been arrested at the school's registrar's office when
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: he'd gone to pick up his diploma, and it turned
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: out he was a few credits short of actually graduating.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: But since Matthew's behavior on campus was known to sometimes
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: be erratic, the school had preemptively arranged for a law
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: enforcement to be present when he arrived. And it's true
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: when Matthew found out that he wasn't actually graduating, it
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: was upsetting to him.
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: The way that.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: Bert described it, the officer put her hand on Matthew's
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: arm in an attempt to calm him down, and when
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: he shrugged her off, she fell to the ground. Bird's
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: understanding is that Matthew did not intentionally push or shove
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: the officer, but regardless, she fell and Matthew was arrested
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: for a sultan battery and resisting arrest.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: They walked Matthew in and now for the first time
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: we're seeing our oldest are firstborn, and he's in shackles.
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: So Matthew stood in front of the bench and the
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: judge said, Matthew, let me ask you a couple of questions. One,
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: how do you support yourself? And Matthew said with my feet.
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: Now nobody who's thinking logically would tell the judge that
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: I support myself with my feet. You'd know. They're talking
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: about what's your livelihood, your income, so on and so forth.
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: You can almost beget to see that the judge was
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: getting annoyed. He didn't want to be dealing with this
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: Christmas Eve. What we were hoping, though, was that he
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: was going to see something in Matthew that might suggest
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: that Matthew needed a psychological evaluation. Well he didn't. I'd
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: love to know what actually happened at the Registrar's office
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: that day, And when all was said and done, the
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: state was now the one pressing charges and they gave
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: Matthew a court date to return. Matthew took off, never
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: went back, and that resulted in a bench warrant being
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: issued for him, which to this day, as best we know,
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: is maybe still there unless there are some statute of
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: limitations on a bench warrant.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: It was nineteen ninety two, on that Christmas Eve that
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: Burton Carolyn watched Matthew stand in front of a judge
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: when they'd had a moment of hope that perhaps the
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: judge might order a psychiatric evaluation, one that could help
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: them help Matthew to better understand his mental state, maybe
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: help them chart a path four. But that didn't happen. Instead,
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: the judge brought charges and increased Matthew's bail, and Matthew
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: eventually bonded out and skipped his next court hearing. Matthew
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: never returned to his college apartment. He went home with
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: his parents, but in less than a year he was
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: gone again, and this cycle continued for years until sometime
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: in the late nineties, when Matthew left and made his
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: way to New York. For a time, Matthew stayed in touch,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: sometimes by email emails that Burton Carolyn were able to
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: trace to a Burger king in Midtown Manhattan, but Matthew's
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: communication became less and less frequent, until after a few
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: months it stopped altogether. Burt and Carolyn felt helpless, but
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: in two thousand and one something serendipitous happened. Bert was
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: in New York on business when he got an unexpected
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: call from Carolyn. She had Matthew on the other line,
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: and he'd agreed to meet up with Bert.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: And so, now if you could picture the back and
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: forth conversation, because we're not conference calling at this point,
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: she's describing to me where he is, an I am
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: within one hundred yards of him, and so now we
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: are moving towards each other thanks to Carolyn guiding in
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: the back and forth conversation. And I was so angry
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: with him for all that he had put our family
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: through that I wasn't sure when I saw him whether
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: I was going to hug him or if I wanted
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: to deck him. I really wanted to do the latter.
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: I was just so mad. Well. When I finally did
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: get up to him, and now our eyes are locking
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: as we're getting closer together, I realized immediately how bad
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: he looked, how he smelled terrible. I gave him this
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: hug and took him back to my hotel room, which
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: was the Marriotte right off of LaGuardia Airport, and when
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: we got in there, he just fell on the bed
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: and he went to sleep for the night, and I
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: just sat there and half sobbing, half wondering what happened
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: to our baby? How could this have happened to him?
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: So the next morning we went down to breakfast and
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: I asked him, do you want to come home? And
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: he said, I am home. And after some exchange back
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: and forth, he said, the streets of New York is
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: where I live now. No apartment, no nothing. And so
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: I said, well, at least let me give you the
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: toiletries that are in my suitcase if you won't come home,
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: and the address of the shelter in New York. And
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: so I would later find out that he did go there.
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: And I went back home, watching Matthew walk off into
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: the distance, just like Carolyn. I watched him walk down
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: the street in Pittsburgh. So now in all of that,
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: I've come back home. He has stayed in New York.
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: There was little Bert could do but watch as Matthew
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: once again disappeared into the busy streets of New York,
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: not knowing if he would be safe, if he would
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: be fed, or when they'd hear from him again. So
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: Bert returned home without his son, and just a few
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: months Later, in two thousand and one, something terrible happened.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: Matthew's mother, Carolyn, was involved in a near fatal car accident.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: Carolyn suffers from something called hypoglycymc neuropathy, which can cause
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: her blood sugar to drop suddenly and without warning. Carolyn
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: had been driving on the Pennsylvania Turnpike when she'd fainted.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: And when she did, somehow she managed to drive thirteen
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: miles on the turnpike. She doesn't remember paying a toll,
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: but just driving through the toll booth, and when she
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: got to this particular exit, it's one of those that
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: almost looks like a candy cane. It goes straight ahead
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: and then it loops its way back and you've got
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: this large grassy knoll there. Well. What witnesses told us
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: later was that her car hit that hill at about
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: eighty miles an hour without breaking, which then means it
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: launched her. It turned into a launch ramp. She came
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: down on the other side of the interstate. They had
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: a life flight or to the hospital, and that would
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: end up being an extended hospital stay followed time and recovery.
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: We would later get a call from Matthew asking if
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: I would come to Philadelphia and pick him up. He said,
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: he walked from New York City to Philadelphia and he
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: wanted to come home for Thanksgiving. And I told him
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: that I'm not going to come pick you up, but
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: we'll wire a bus ticket to you and you can
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: catch the bus and we'll pick you up at the
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: bus station here in Knoxville. And so that's what we did. Carolyn,
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: against the doctor's recommendation, left the hospital early so that
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: she could be at home.
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: There was relief in having eyes on Matthew, but being
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: in his physical presence came with a lot of unease.
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: Carolyn's injuries from the accident were extensive. She was in
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: a clamshawll like body brace. She'd crushed three vertebrae and
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: both ankles in the accident. Bert had taken time off
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: to care for her, but eventually had to return to work.
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: He and Carolyn were hopeful that Matthew might step into
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: help now that he was back home, but that hope
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: quickly faded.
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: And so now we're back to again. Matthew, would you
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: mind fixing me something for breakfast? And Matthew just wouldn't respond,
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: He wouldn't do anything. Later, we would all be out,
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: and Carolyn would tell me that Matthew was pushing her
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: wheelchair and she was actually scared that he was going
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: to push her down the escalator or something else. And
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: so finally she said, Matthew, I cannot heal while you're
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: here in the house, and when your dad gets home,
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: I'm going to ask him to ask you to leave.
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: This just can't continue. And so I got home. I
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: did end up asking Matthew to leave. It was a
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: rather heated exchange between he and I, and we would
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: end up asking him to leave. He went over to
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: one of his siblings apartment and they remember hearing him
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: on the phone talking about trying to get out to la.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: In the past, when Matthew left, he would periodically update
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: them on his location, but this time there was nothing.
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: A week went by, then another, Burt and Carolyn were
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: beginning to panic. They consulted with the pastor of their church,
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: who tried to comfort them by saying that Matthew would
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: check in eventually, But he was wrong. Matthew did not
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: check in. It was as if he had vanished. Now,
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: instead of focusing on Matthew seeing a doctor, the entire
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: picture had changed. They just wanted to know where he was,
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: to know that he was alive.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: We ended up putting him on the missing Persons list.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: The acronym for that is NamUs, which you could look
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: it up. That's a national database of missing persons, and
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: the Salvation Army also has a Missing Persons Bureau, so
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: we registered him under both of those, and then I
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: started googling him. I had him googled in every which
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: way to Sunday, but nothing ever turned up, And so
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: every morning that's how my days started searching through the
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: Google alert, and if there was something that seemed even
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: remote that it might be him, that would result in
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: some phone calls tracing it down to see if it
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: was him. They were all dead ends. So you have
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: these years of wondering is he dead or alive, and
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: then you just tell yourself it would just be good
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: to have some closure. Nobody wants their child to be dead,
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: but you don't want to keep looking forever if that
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: turns out to be the case. So just some closure.
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: Let us know that he's dead, or perhaps we'll find
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: him somewhere. But now one year's gone by. Two years
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: have gone by, and Carolyn started opening the front door
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: and looking out on our little porch where we have
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: a swing to see maybe Matthew has shown him. Maybe
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: today's the day we're going to find him sleeping on
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: the front porch because he came home in the middle
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: of the night all those years, even though with the
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: advent of cell phones and most people using the cells
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: as their primary means of phone, we kept our landline
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: all of those years, so that if Matthew decided to
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: do four one one and decided to try and find us,
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: he could And.
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: What were his siblings? You know, as parents, you're waking
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: up every day starting your morning with checking your Google
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: alerts and following up on any little thing you can find.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: What do his brothers and sisters make of this particular
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: time around, how long he's been gone, how long he's
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: not been in contact.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: At some point in time. But I don't remember exactly
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: when the practice started. Matthew's birthday's October fifteenth. They would
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: begin to get together right at Matthew's birthday time and
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: just say, you know, let's just kind of remember Matthew.
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: Sometimes it was more somber than others, but it was
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: always commemorating Matthew's birthday to let him know that he
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: was never forgotten. Every year there was a Christmas ornament
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: for Matthew. Every year there was a Birthday card for Matthew.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: Were they believing that he was likely deceased? For some people,
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: coming to their own conclusion could be a coping thing,
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: or for some people it's like, well, this is what
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: I think is going on. He's never stayed up contact
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: to the song. Was there general feeling that he was
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: out there.
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: Somewhere, Yes, But the question would be do you think
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: we'll ever see Matthew again? And all we could say
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: is we hope.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: So Matthew's family never stopped hoping, But soon a decade
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: had passed with no word from Matthew. Reminders of him
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: were all around them, a lot of them good family photos,
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: the memories from happier times, and others not so good,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: like unpaid bills for his student loans showing up in
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: the mail. Berg continually checked the Missing Person's Database NamUs,
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: as well as the Salvation Armies Missing Person's List, always
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: looking for Matthew. But in the blink of an eye,
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: a second decade had passed. By twenty twenty two, Matthew
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: had been missing for twenty one years, the world had
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: gone on turning but left a hole where Matthew should be.
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: Bert was planning his retirement and knew that he wanted
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: to do something he was passionate about, so he and
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: Carolyn co founded their organization hold On to Hope, to
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: help families with missing loved ones.
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: I was the CEO of a homeless shelter here in Knoxville,
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: and it's like, what am I going to do next?
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: What are we going to do next? And so we
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: started hold On to Hope in twenty twenty two. Well,
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: one of the families that we would end up working
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: with was someone who thought their son had come to
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: carm where I was working, and their email made a
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: circuitous route and eventually ended up with my assistant Cathy,
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: who said, Bert, you're going to want to read this. Well.
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: I did reach back out to that family, and long
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: story short, I said, we've not been able to locate
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: your Sonny has not been here. My wife and I
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: know a little something about what you might be going through,
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: and if you would ever like, we'd be glad to
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: chat with you once a month on a zoom call,
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: which we've done for over two years. We got a
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: text message from them while we were visiting family in Florida,
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: saying we've learned that Brandon passed away. That was their
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: son's name. Turns out that Brandon died of a drug
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: overdose five days after he disappeared, and they had been
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: searching for him for two years. In Vain, they held
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: a memorial service for him. Carolyn and I went to
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: the memorial service, and it was driving home from that
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: memorial service that Carolyn said, you know, what if what
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: happened to Brandon is the same thing that happened to Matthew.
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: What if he's been dead all these years and our
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: searching has been in Vain.
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: Bert had retired at the tail end of twenty twenty
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: three and dove into his work helping families with loved
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: ones through hold On to Hope. But driving home from
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: this memorial service in twenty twenty four, it really changed
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: their search for Matthew. They realized that if Matthew was dead,
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: if all of these years of searching had been in Vain,
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: they wanted to know. Bert had a contact in law enforcement,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: former Knoxville Police Chief David Rouche, who had since joined
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. Bert called him up, seeing
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: if there was anything David could do to help.
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: I reached out to David, saying, all the years that
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: I was CEO and while we were both in Knoxville,
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: I never asked any favors of you. I thought it
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: was bad form. I'm not there anymore. Now I'm asking well.
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: David then assigned a special agent in charge who came
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: to our home, and now things are beginning to move
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: at a little bit more rapid pace. The first real
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: tip that happened out of nowhere my cell phone rings
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: one afternoon, a woman identifying herself as being with the
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: Pittsburgh Police Department telling us that they're taking Matthew off
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: the missing person's list because they just spoke to him
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: thirty minutes ago. She said, well, I probably shouldn't tell
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: you this, but he's somewhere in Alaska. That was the
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: first time Alaska had ever shown up, which was so
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: foreign because Matthew hates cold weather. How on earth would
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: he end up in what of the cold as places
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: imaginable when he hates the cold.
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: For the first time in nearly two and a half decades,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: Burt and Carolyn have a real lead information that could
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: possibly reunite them with Matthew and they run with it.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Burton Carolyn hire a PI and call police departments in Juno, Fairbanks,
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: and Anchorage looking for a name Matthew Rosen, and eventually
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: they get a hit. There is a man by the
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: name of Matthew Rosen confirmed to be living in Alaska,
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: but was it their son? They couldn't be sure.
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: We called the Alaska State Police. The person that we
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: spoke to, who is an investigator, said we're not allowed
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: to give you that information. Now I'm back to our
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: investigator again, who says he lives here in Knoxville. And
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: he says, just so happens, a very dear friend of
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: mine retired from the Alaska State Police after twenty eight
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: years of service. All these dots are beginning to lune
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: up now, so he introduced us to him. His name
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: is Trace Lewis, and he ended up being the person
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: who went through all of the loopholes that you have
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: to go through, and ultimately there is something in Alaska
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: called the Alaska Permanent Fund. Every Alaska resident gets a
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: check every year so long as you are a resident. Well,
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: they publish the names, they don't publish any other information.
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: But they do publish the names. Well, he went back
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: and he found that Matthew was on that list and
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: it applied for the fund four years prior, but did
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: not apply for the next two years after that. We
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: waited it out a little bit longer because you have
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: to apply between January one and March thirty one. Let's
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: see if he applies in twenty twenty four. He did well.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: That allowed him to go detect other information, which ultimately
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: led to him coming back to us and saying, we
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: have Matthew located. We've got an email address for him,
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: a phone number for him at a street address. Now
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: we're ready to go to Alaska on the basis of that.
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: And he said, but there's four feet of snow. You
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: don't really want to go to Fairbanks and four feet
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: of snow, and gave us all the reasons. I'm being
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: more practical. Carolyn's chomping at the bit, saying, look, we
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: just got to go, but we ended up waiting because
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: for medical reasons.
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: But you did not reach out to him that email address.
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: You just kind of stayed in the background.
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: Okay, Yeah, for fear that if we reached out to him,
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: and in fact, he was trying to go under the
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: radar and didn't want us to find him, that that
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: would just cause him to go again and take off somewhere.
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: In April of twenty twenty four, Bert, Carolyn, and their
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: two daughters, Matthew's sisters, booked themselves tickets on the same
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: flight to Alaska. They settled into their seats. They were hopeful,
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: they were anxious. They were filled with questions that could
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: only be answered by going to Alaska and looking for Matthew.
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: The selves, the joy of finding him. What if it's
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: not him, How will he react after not seeing us
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: for twenty five years? What is this going to be like. Meanwhile, well,
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: intending people, we're giving us a variety of suggestions. One,
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: don't go alone, have someone go with you just in case.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: Another person suggested that if nothing else, we at least
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: have Mace with us, so if he comes to the
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: door and he's aggressive, we could be prepared to at
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: least do what we need to do. An investigator told
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: us that Alaska has some very strict trespassing laws, and
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: so he said, you know, Matthew may not come to
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: the door. If you knock, you may see him peek
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: out a window, or something, or he may come out
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: and have a conversation with you on the front porch
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: and ask you to leave, and if he does, you're
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: obligated to go. And he said, I'm a little concerned
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: about his mental well being and so just be very
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: very careful. Meanwhile, well, Carolyn said, I know, my son,
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: We don't need to be concerned about any of those things.
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: The plan was take the flight, get into Fairbanks slightly
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: after lunch, get our rental car, go drop off our
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: luggage at the hotel, and then go drive to the
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: address that we have for Matthew. And that plan was unfolding. Well,
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: the weather was all good, everything was conducive to doing that.
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: When we checked into the hotel and we're ready to go,
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: we got in the car and we went. It's really
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: two straight shots from the hotel that we were staying
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: at to where Matthew is. Now. We had seen the
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: aerial view of where Matthew's address was, and what it
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: looked like was a big field that was somehow off
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: the main drag. As we're driving, as you would often
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: see in rural locations, especially where the weather is bad
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: like it is in Alaska. They've got seven eight and
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: nine mailboxes side by side, all on the side of
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: the roads, so the postal car er could just mail mail, mail,
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: mail mail, and then it's up to everybody else to
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: walk out to the street and grab their mail.
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: What was it like in the car?
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: Was it? It was just quiet. It was quiet. Everybody
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: kind of lost in their own mind, except that Rebecca
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: had Google Maps and so she was giving the directions
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: where to go. But it was quiet. No music on,
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: no nothing, just following the street. From the moment we
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: picked up the rental car till we drove to the hotel,
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: it was just quiet. But before we left we had
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: all prayed together and that was us just saying, okay,
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: we don't know what the future is going to hold here.
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: And then we went on our way. So we're driving
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: down this road. It's a three and a half mile
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: stretch and all you've got is your direction and then
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: oncoming traffic the other way and the mailboxes on the
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: side of the street. As we're approaching where we need
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: to make the turn. We're about a quarter of the
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: way into the turn and Rebecca yells out, there's this
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: figure walking towards the mailboxes. She said, that's Matthew. I
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: would know him anywhere. Now she hadn't seen him since,
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: you know, in all these years, i'd know him anywhere.
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: So we finished the turn, turned around like we're going
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: to make a U turn to go back out to
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: the main street, pulled off to the side, and now
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: we're facing the mailboxes and this person that's standing over there,
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: Carolyn opens up her window and she says Matthew, and
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: he looked up. So we get out of the car,
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: and in this case, Carolyn was front seat passenger. I
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: was on the driver's side of the two girls. We
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: all get out of the car. Well, my two daughters
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: and I began walking up towards where Matthew was so
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: we could see each other a little bit more clearly.
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: And I said Matthew and he said yeah. I said,
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: it's your dad. And we just stood there frozen for
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: a moment. One of the girls said, could we come
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: up and give you a hug, and so the three
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: of us walked up and gave him a hug, but
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: not Carolyn. Carolyn was frozen next to the passenger door.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: She just couldn't move. So, now if you could imagine
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: the two girls and me hugging Matthew right there by
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: the mailboxes, and Rebecca's waving saying, mom, come on, come
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: on up, and Carolyn couldn't move, she couldn't speak. After
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: we hugged for a little while, Matthew left. He didn't
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: break away from the hug, but the hug was over.
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: He walked over to Carolyn, threw his arms around her,
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: and all you could hear was this profuse, loud wailing
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: coming from Carolyn. She just hugged him and she wasn't
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: letting go. I mean, this was a bare hug that
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: she had on him, and she was just wailing. And
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: after that finally subsided, Matthew said, so you want to
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: come to my place and hang out. At that point
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: we knew that we had a good enact. The girls
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: would with Matthew the quarter mile back to his mailbox.
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: We would follow along in the car and we would
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: end up spending the rest of the day with him.
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: And what was the first of several days to come.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: And so you have this reunion with Matthew at his
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: mailbox and then he invites you in. Can you describe
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: where he was living to us? What did it look
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: like and feel like?
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so it looked like a cabin. It looked very rustic,
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: but from the outside it looked clean. It wasn't until
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: we walked in the cabin that we realized that this
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: is a very sparse cabin. One small sofa where you
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: can sit, one chair that he has against a wall
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: where he has a makeshift desk. He's got lights, he's
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: got a stove, he's got a refrigerator, and he has
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: no running water. We would learn that Alaskans refer to
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: this as a dry cabin, and it's fairly typical, so
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: it's not like there was water that he couldn't afford.
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: Once you get a certain way past the University of Alaska,
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: there's no infrastructure and no running water for any of
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: the people that live out there. Just as we were
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: pulling up and walking into his cabin, a car pulled
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: into his driveway. This was a Safeway who was delivering
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: his groceries, and so we took the groceries in and
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: then we helped put them away in his refrigerator, in
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: his freezer. But again, all of the dishes stacked up
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: in the sink. They were dirty, but he wasn't. There
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: was a brightness in his eyes, something that we hadn't
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: seen in a long long time. Fingernails were clean, his
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: shirts did not look like there's something that had been
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: thrown into a corner and thrown on. I mean, he
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: had no idea we were coming. So as he walked
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: to the mailbox, shirt was tucked in, had his belt on.
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: The cabin was small, rustic, with no wander and an outhouse,
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: but it seemed like a place that Matthew truly felt
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: like home. He was taking care of it, and he
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: was taking care of himself. But Bert did notice something strange,
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: two large logs in the front of the house that
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: appeared to have fallen and then been left there. Matthew
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: told Bert the logs were protection from evil spirits. Back
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: inside the cabin was a shelf full of notebooks. Bert
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: asked Matthew about them.
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: I asked him a question about a Google post that
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: I had seen where an author by the name of
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: Matthew Rosen in Fairbanks had published a self help book
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: through a publisher in Pittsburgh, and I thinid, no, there's
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: no way, and he said, yeah, that's me. I've published
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: two self help books that are available on Amazon, and
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: he said, here's a copy for you. So it's a
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: four hundred and fifty page hardback book, and that one's
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: called Twinkle, and then the other one is called Stellar Repeller,
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: which is a smaller paperback book. Both are self help books.
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: Matthew spends his days talking to himself. He said he's
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: had no human contact in little over four years, except
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: to say thank you to the person that delivers his groceries,
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: or if every now and then he treats himself to
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: a cup of coffee and has to go to a
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: local restaurant. Whatever interaction you would have to order your
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: coffee is all he's had. He said, I haven't had
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: any human contact. I don't talk to anybody. I don't
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: do anything. I sit here, I write. I try and
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: get up at six am every morning and be in
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: bed by one am. They get a lot of sunlight there.
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: And he said, then I walk and I read and
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: I write.
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: Matthew's writing is more like poetry than pros. It's repetitive.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: I've read a sample on Amazon that says, me, the me,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: the you, the you will choose to in this as such,
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: me the me, the you want to win.
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: But regarding the book, ever since we have found Matthew
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: Carolyn talks to him at least twice a day, sometimes
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: for an hour each time they talk, sometimes longer. He
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: talks to all of his siblings during the week thirty
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: minutes or so wherever they can catch the time because
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: they're all working, and I'll talk to him about once
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: or twice a week as well. What Carolyn said as
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: she listens more and more to Matthew, she believes that
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: the way Matthew has been able to cope with his
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: life and be doing as well as he's presumably doing
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: is by writing these things down, and that has become
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: his way of helping himself. That has become his self help.
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: But she said, the more I talk to Matthew, the
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: more I understand his book.
• 37:56
  Speaker 3: Well, it's interesting because it makes me think about how
• 37:59
  Speaker 3: you talked about that moment years before when you were
• 38:01
  Speaker 3: in the courtroom and the judge asked him, how do
• 38:04
  Speaker 3: you support yourself? And he said with my feet. There's
• 38:07
  Speaker 3: something about him writing these books and calling them self help,
• 38:11
  Speaker 3: these books that are sort of full of his musings
• 38:13
  Speaker 3: and sort of poetic writings, where it's very literal in
• 38:17
  Speaker 3: the way that he's called them self help. It's sort
• 38:20
  Speaker 3: of a documentation of how he has helped himself by
• 38:23
  Speaker 3: writing these books. And in some ways, you know, I'm
• 38:26
  Speaker 3: sure that there is a lot that goes into this
• 38:29
  Speaker 3: and it's complicated, and I imagine that this is not
• 38:32
  Speaker 3: the life that you had imagined for your son when
• 38:34
  Speaker 3: he was young, right, But in some ways it's impressive
• 38:38
  Speaker 3: the way that he has built this life for himself.
• 38:41
  Speaker 3: You know, yes, he's isolated and he's writing these books
• 38:44
  Speaker 3: in this cabin that might not make sense to other people,
• 38:48
  Speaker 3: but the fact that he found his way to Alaska
• 38:50
  Speaker 3: and the fact that he's living in his cabin and
• 38:52
  Speaker 3: his self sustaining and is able to clothe himself. And
• 38:55
  Speaker 3: I don't know if he seems happy or not, but
• 38:57
  Speaker 3: in some ways, I'm like, wow, he really figured it
• 39:00
  Speaker 3: out a way to make a life for himself.
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: He has. And one of the things that the private
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: investigator in Alaska was telling us, because he has had
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: a lot of similar cases, is that for some people
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: when they go on lithium, it helps, but for some
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: people who go on and then come off of it,
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: they're worse than had they never gone on it to
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: begin with, and that actually they learn how to cope
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: without taking the medication. Well, from everything we know from
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: Matthew thus far, that's what he's done. And so now
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: in tracing back to where I started, where we heard
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: him on the phone to La. So consider he only
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: gets SSI, no other funds. And so he went from
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: LA to San Francisco to Colorado, to Virginia, to West
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: Virginia to New York, to Boston to Philadelphia. And he
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: said the only flight he ever took was from Boston
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: to Anchorage. And then he decided, after being an Anchorage
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: for a little while, that he really didn't like it there,
• 40:09
  Speaker 2: and so he went to Fairbanks because Fairbanks seemed like
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: a nice place. I don't know how you do all
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: that on five hundred dollars a month, but he's very frugal,
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: counts his pennies, and he would tell us that there
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: were times when if he went to one of those locations,
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: if he felt safe sleeping on the streets, then he
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: just slept on the streets. If he didn't feel safe,
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: then he'd go into a shelter. And when he went
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: into a shelter, he could get his meals. It didn't
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: cost him anything to be there.
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: Today, Burt and Carolyn have a relationship with Matthew that
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: a decade ago they could have only dreamed of. It's
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: not the life or a relationship they probably pictured, but
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: Matthew seems to be a piece. He speaks with his
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: parents on a regular basis and his siblings. There's even
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: a family holiday on the horizon.
• 41:00
  Speaker 2: We're planning on having him come here for Thanksgiving. He'll
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: probably just stay over until after Christmas and go back
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: home the first week of January. And then all of
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: a sudden, I had this aha moment where gosh, if
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: you don't have real ID or a passport, you can't fly.
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: So I said, well, let me call him and ask him.
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: And so once I kind of beat around the bush
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: a little bit, he said, Dad, I have real ID.
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: Don't worry. He said. Now nobody knows this, but I'm
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: the one that actually came up with the idea of
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: real ID. But I have it. It's current. He has
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: a cell phone and a computer, which is how we
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: zoom daily. His cell phone is a fifty dollars a
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: month unlimited plan that he uses as a hotspot for
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: his laptop, and he functions completely in that fashion. When
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: we were in downtown Fairbanks, I was asking for directions.
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: He said, I'll go up here and turn left. And
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: I'm saying, how do you know your way around all
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: of these places? And he said, well, I just kind
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: of do. So. I don't know what he's done during
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: those years two hour walk from where he lives to
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: downtown Fairbanks, but apparently he's walked it several times.
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: Does he have any social connections in the area that
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: you're aware of?
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: And his no, none, okay.
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: No, none anywhere. Actually, he said, I've never had a girlfriend,
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: never had any significant relationships. I don't make friends where
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: I go. But one of the other things with this
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: is that there were several poignant moments while we were
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: all there, enough to a point where it brought tears
• 42:30
  Speaker 2: trickling down his cheeks, which he said, those aren't tears
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: because I don't have emotions. I don't cry over anything.
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: And yet there he was crying. And on the last
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: day that we would be with him, we had predetermined
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: the night before that we were going to take his
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: bicycle to get fixed when the weather's decent enough. There
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: there are some bike trails that take you all the
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: way down to the university, and he said, yeah, I
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: just haven't had time to fix it. Well, dad interpretation,
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: I haven't had time to fix it means you can't
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: afford to fix it. And so we said, why don't
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: you let Mom and I take you tomorrow get your
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: bike fixed, and then we'll go spend the day together
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: and we'll pick your bike up at the end of
• 43:13
  Speaker 2: the day. When we got there the next morning, his
• 43:15
  Speaker 2: bike was outside right by the front door. He was
• 43:18
  Speaker 2: dressed and ready to go, as was the case on
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: all the other previous days. So as we put the
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: bike in the back, he sat in the rear seat
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: directly behind Carolyn on the passenger side of the car.
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: He said, before we go, there's something I need to say,
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: And now tears are streaming down his eyes, and he said,
• 43:39
  Speaker 2: I need to apologize for all the pain, all the hurt,
• 43:43
  Speaker 2: all the suffering that I've caused you all these years.
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: Will you please forgive me? And it was just a
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: meltdown moment. Matthew told us that several years ago, he said,
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: someone came out to the house he thinks it was
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: Alaska State Police and told them that I had been
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: reported missing and that they were out there to verify
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: whether or not he was actually the Matthew Rosen that
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: we had been looking for, and he said, your parents
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: and your family are looking for you. Do we have
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: permission to tell them where you are? And he said, no,
• 44:20
  Speaker 2: you can't tell him. You can tell him I'm okay,
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: but don't tell them where I am. We would later say, Matthew,
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: why did you do that? He said, well, I didn't
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: know if, after all these years, that if you knew
• 44:36
  Speaker 2: where I was, if that would be helpful or hurtful.
• 44:40
  Speaker 2: And I concluded that it would hurt you more to
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: know where I was than to just keep searching, And
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: so I decided to tell them, no, I don't want
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: them to know where I am. And he said, really,
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: I never thought i'd see you again. In fact, I
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: pretty much had figured Mom and Dad that you guys
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: had passed away by now, and that would just be
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: the way it would be. The hotel that we rented
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: was a two bedroom apartment with a living room and
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: a kitchen. And then the idea struck, since we've got
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: the kitchen, instead of going out to a restaurant, maybe
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: he gets a home cooked meal. And so we went
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: out to the store and then we came back and
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: Carolyn made dinner, and so as we're all sitting around,
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: Matthews said, I haven't had a home cooked meal since
• 45:28
  Speaker 2: I left home, and I never thought i'd have one again,
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: especially not one of yours. He said, gosh, I sure
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: miss that.
• 45:38
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: And so the idea of him coming for Thanksgiving was
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: something we raised, not him, but he didn't bat an eyelish.
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: He said, it would be great to experience a Roseen
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: family Thanksgiving, and it wouldn't be too bad to get
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: a little bit more of your home cooking mom.
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: That's like such a sweet moment for you guys. And
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: he does it end up coming back for Thanksgiving, And
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: now you guys are in touch and it's like, you
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: guys knew what he needed in that moment, even after
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: not having seen him twenty four years. What is your
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: motivation for sharing your family's story.
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: I think it's twofold one. It's similar to what I
• 46:18
  Speaker 2: had said to my daughter when she was a little
• 46:21
  Speaker 2: upset that I was kind of letting the cat out
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: of the bag beyond our immediate family. And she has
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: some challenges of her own health wise, And I said, Rebecca,
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: if you suddenly found that you were healed of all
• 46:34
  Speaker 2: the infirmities that you experienced. Wouldn't you want to let
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: everybody know that you've been cured, you've been healed. And
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: I said, that's what it's like here. I can't help
• 46:45
  Speaker 2: but talk about it. But the other side of that,
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: and the other motivation is that if this is just
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: another story of son disappears, parents find son, family reunion,
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: we would miss the larger part of this. And it's
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: one of my motivations and that hope is such a powerful,
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: powerful tool, And that was one of the reasons that
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: Carolyn and I started Hold On to Hope because we
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: knew what it was like for people trying to hold on,
• 47:16
  Speaker 2: and so part of telling the story was really so
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: that we could further advance the work that we do
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: with hold On to Hope. Especially when you consider on
• 47:24
  Speaker 2: that name as database. It's about six hundred thousand names
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: that are on that list and the number of people
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: who are going through just what we're going through. So
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: don't give up hold on to Hope.
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: I think that's such a strong and really heartful message.
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: And I really appreciate you sharing your story, and I
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: appreciate Matthew's openness to you sharing it as well. So
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: we've never done a story like this, and we want
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: to make it super clear that certainly deciding to live
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: a more solitary lifestyle or suffering from mental illness is
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: absolutely not a crime. But for Bert and everyone who
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: loved Matthew, and also for law enforcement, this was also
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: a missing person's case. Absolutely, and the story actually speaks
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: so closely to the whole point of going, you know,
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: quote beyond the headlines. There are many moments in this
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: episode that require that. Yeah, I mean when Bert talked
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: about I think it was two or three times they
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: asked Matthew to either get help or leave, they drew
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: this hard line. You know that still came from a
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: place of love and wanting him to get better, and
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: also just a lack of understanding how to best support
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: him at that time.
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, that's so complicated. I'm glad you brought
• 48:49
  Speaker 3: that up because I could see how it would be
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: really easy to pass a quick judgment on someone in
• 48:54
  Speaker 3: that scenario. But you know the reality is is that
• 48:58
  Speaker 3: you're right. It was a long time ago they didn't
• 48:59
  Speaker 3: have as much information, but even today, there are mental
• 49:03
  Speaker 3: health experts who would give family members this advice if
• 49:07
  Speaker 3: the person in their family is an adult who has
• 49:11
  Speaker 3: full control over their decisions about their medical and psychological treatment.
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: Sometimes that is the advice that's given is distance yourself.
• 49:20
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's so difficult and brutal, but it's obviously
• 49:24
  Speaker 3: a really complex situation.
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and there can be an issue of a lack
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: of other options and resources, even if you don't want
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: to have to give them an ultimatum. And it's like
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: they were going through so much themselves in their household
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: with Carolyn recovering from this terrible car accident. There are
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: just these sort of realities to people's lives, and these
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: things happen in many layers, and so yeah, like you said,
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: easy to pass judgment until you know the whole story
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: and start to think about it a little more closely
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: to what they were going through at the time.
• 49:59
  Speaker 3: Yeah. So one of the things that I want to
• 50:01
  Speaker 3: talk about is lithium because that's the medication that Matthew
• 50:05
  Speaker 3: was prescribed after seeing a doctor at his school. You know,
• 50:09
  Speaker 3: this is all according to what Matthew told Bert, right,
• 50:12
  Speaker 3: because we obviously don't know his medical records, but that
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: he started taking it, didn't like it, and then quickly
• 50:17
  Speaker 3: went off of it, so I started to look into
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: lithium a little bit more. And you know, it's interesting.
• 50:22
  Speaker 3: When it first started to be used in the nineteen
• 50:24
  Speaker 3: forties to treat people suffering from manic depressive disorders, it
• 50:28
  Speaker 3: was kind of this revolutionary treatment. It was the first
• 50:31
  Speaker 3: treatment that had been found that had somewhat long lasting effects.
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: There hadn't really been one before, and the result of
• 50:39
  Speaker 3: that was that so many people endured horrible treatment, being
• 50:44
  Speaker 3: locked away in asylums. And also, you know, there were
• 50:47
  Speaker 3: treatments that today would not be done, such as giving
• 50:50
  Speaker 3: people lobotomies, which is not effective and incredibly damaging to
• 50:54
  Speaker 3: people's brains. And so for many people, when lithium came
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: on the scene, it was a huge advancement and felt
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: like this sort of miraculous treatment that did allow many
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: people with manic depressive disorders such as bipolar to live
• 51:09
  Speaker 3: a functional life in society. And it's used today still.
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's an incredibly powerful drug, but with that
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: come intense side effects. Not only does it take weeks
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: of use to start working, but you can experience fainting,
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: wait gain, trouble breathing, confusion, memory loss. I mean, the
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: list is long, and for that reason, lithium has a
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: really high non adherence rate, which just means that people
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: stop taking it. Actually, a twenty twenty one Dutch study
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: of older patients who were newly prescribed lithium reported that
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: thirty six point three percent of them discontinued within a
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: median of eighteen months.
• 51:49
  Speaker 3: That's a pretty significant percentage.
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And I feel like that's so important for us
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: to point out because Bert notes that Matthew decides to
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: stop taking lithium, and I think I think that it's like, well,
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: if you have this drug available to help you, why
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: wouldn't you take it? But it's just never that simple,
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: and you know, he's having to make a decision to
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: either put himself in a place where he thinks he
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: is maybe better off without it. And I can't say
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: whether that's true or not, but I can say, looking
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: at the data, a lot of people decide to stop
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: taking it.
• 52:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah, And obviously everyone's different, but it's interesting in this
• 52:25
  Speaker 3: case how Matthew has really been able to figure out
• 52:28
  Speaker 3: how to make a life for himself without medication.
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: And you know, when we were in our first preliminary
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: conversations with Bert ahead of the interview, we did ask like,
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: how would Matthew feel about you sharing this story because
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: he is at the center of it. Yeah, and Bert
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: said that he had Matthew's okay to do that and
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: that was really important to us going into it.
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 52:50
  Speaker 3: Absolutely. Talking about mental illness, I want to shout out
• 52:55
  Speaker 3: the National Alliance on Mental Illness. You can go to
• 52:57
  Speaker 3: the website at NAMI dot org. They estimate that two
• 53:01
  Speaker 3: million people with mental illness are booked into US jails
• 53:04
  Speaker 3: every year. There's a lot of collision with mental health
• 53:08
  Speaker 3: crisis and the criminal justice system, and this episode is
• 53:13
  Speaker 3: just one of so many examples of how that is
• 53:16
  Speaker 3: harmful and not helpful and can really spiral someone's life
• 53:20
  Speaker 3: even further out of control because then oftentimes families are
• 53:24
  Speaker 3: left on their own to try to figure out how
• 53:27
  Speaker 3: to help their loved one not only navigate their mental illness,
• 53:31
  Speaker 3: but then also navigate the criminal justice system on top
• 53:34
  Speaker 3: of that, which even if you're not struggling with a
• 53:36
  Speaker 3: mental illness, is difficult to navigate and figure out, takes
• 53:39
  Speaker 3: time and resources. So you know, there's information about all
• 53:43
  Speaker 3: of this on the National Alliance on Mental Illness. One
• 53:46
  Speaker 3: of the things that they do is that they're trying
• 53:48
  Speaker 3: to create programs that they could train police forces, and
• 53:53
  Speaker 3: they're calling it help, not handcuffs, you know, better ways
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: to respond to mental health. And I don't have a
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: lot of information about the effectiveness of those programs, although
• 54:02
  Speaker 3: I know that they were trying to institute one in
• 54:05
  Speaker 3: New Orleans in twenty twenty one. But it's good things
• 54:08
  Speaker 3: to be thinking about and talking about, and I think
• 54:10
  Speaker 3: that we should be talking about it way more in
• 54:12
  Speaker 3: our society because so many people are not being helped. Yeah. Absolutely.
• 54:16
  Speaker 3: Oh one other thing I wanted to mention when I
• 54:19
  Speaker 3: was looking into lithium, ended up listening to this interview
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: by this doctor, Walter Brown, And he wrote this book
• 54:27
  Speaker 3: a few years back called Lithium, A Doctor, a Drug,
• 54:29
  Speaker 3: and a Breakthrough, And it's sort of about the history
• 54:31
  Speaker 3: of lithium and treatment. And he's been a psychiatrist psychologist
• 54:36
  Speaker 3: for a long time and treated different patients with manic
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: depressive disorders, and so he has personal experience talking about
• 54:42
  Speaker 3: using the drug and the effectiveness and the issues with
• 54:45
  Speaker 3: it as well. But he talked about some of the
• 54:48
  Speaker 3: research into bipolar disorder and one of the things that
• 54:53
  Speaker 3: is not proven but he mentioned which I thought was interesting,
• 54:56
  Speaker 3: is that there is this correlation to people who are
• 54:59
  Speaker 3: manic to oppressive and who are also very creative, and
• 55:03
  Speaker 3: they don't understand what that is. But there's some research
• 55:08
  Speaker 3: into there being a genetic connection, like some sort of
• 55:12
  Speaker 3: genetic thing that's both causing the manic depressive disorder is
• 55:16
  Speaker 3: also causing people to be incredibly creative. There's a higher
• 55:22
  Speaker 3: percentage of poets amongst people with manic depressive disorders. Wow,
• 55:28
  Speaker 3: that's so interesting.
• 55:29
  Speaker 2: I had no idea.
• 55:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and I mean it's not proven, I don't as
• 55:32
  Speaker 3: far as I'm aware, but there have been some things
• 55:35
  Speaker 3: written about this correlation, so it's kind of interesting.
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: So Bert and Carolyn Rosen, Matthew's parents, are the co
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: founders of an organization called hold On to Hope that
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: provides compassionate support, encouragement and hope to those with the
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: missing loved one. You can check them out at hold two.
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: That's the number two Hope dot org.
• 55:55
  Speaker 3: That's our episode today. Thanks for listening.
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: If you have a story for us, we would love
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: to hear it. Our email is the Knife at exactlyrightmedia
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: dot com, or you can follow us on Instagram at
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: the Knife Podcast or a Blue Sky at the Knife Podcast.
• 56:09
  Speaker 3: This has been an exactly right production. Hosted and produced
• 56:13
  Speaker 3: by me Hannah Smith and me Paysia Eaton.
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: Our producers are Tom Bryfogel and Alexis Samarosi.
• 56:18
  Speaker 3: This episode was mixed by Tom Bryfogel. Our associate producer
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: is Christina Chamberlain. Our theme music is by Birds in
• 56:25
  Speaker 3: the Airport Artwork five NSA Lilac executive produced by Karen Kilgarriff,
• 56:29
  Speaker 3: Georgia Hardstark and Danielle Kramer.