When “Special” Equals “Sick” Update:

Seven Years After Exposure, Living with Lead Poisoning Is a Struggle to Gain Services and Respect

by Caitlin Szontagh, Chicago, Illinois

Seven years later…

It has been seven years since I first shared our story with you. Seven years of fighting for my son. Seven years of begging people to see him for who he really is.

Caitlin first shared her family’s story with us in 2018. Click the image above to read her original account.

When Marshall was only eight years old, the school told us what we already knew deep down. His diagnoses were not just “labels.” They explained he struggled to sit still, he ran out of classrooms, he lashed out, sometimes he said he wanted to die. My baby. Eight years old. Suicidal. No mother should ever have to hear those words. They told me he needed “intensive, individualized services.” They promised me he would get support.

But he never did.

The very district where Marshall attended his very first day of school turned its back on him. They watched him grow from a bright-eyed preschooler into a boy who struggled, yes, but who also fought every single day to keep going. They saw his history. They knew his story. They witnessed his progress. And still, when the time came to finally step in with the help he desperately needed, they pushed him out.

Even though his father and I shared 50/50 custody, the district that had been his home since his first day of school suddenly decided he “wasn’t a resident.” They finally admitted what I had been begging them to acknowledge for years—that Marshall needed a one-on-one paraprofessional just to make it safely through the school day. But instead of giving him that lifeline, we were forced to withdraw him.

The only school community he had ever known abandoned him when he needed them most.

Now Marshall is 11. And the truth is, things are not easier. His pain is bigger, heavier, louder. His attention span is almost gone. He can go from calm to furious in seconds. He runs out of classrooms. He yells. He fights. Sometimes he hurts people. And every time, I hear the same thing: “He’s a bad kid.”

But he is not a bad kid.

Marshall, age 11. Quick reactions may be an advantage on the field, but they’re not always encouraged in the classroom.

Marshall is one of the most kind and empathetic souls you will ever meet. He is funny. He is thoughtful. He loves sports. He loves his friends. He notices when someone is sad before anyone else does. He is the first to offer a hug, the first to ask if you’re okay. When he is calm, he wants nothing more than to make people happy and feel loved. His heart is pure, and it feels everything so deeply.

But that is not what the world sees. They see his outbursts. They see the aggression. They see the chaos. They do not see the little boy who is trying so hard to hold himself together in a world that overwhelms him. They do not see the child who cries at night because he knows he is different.

School should be the place where children feel safe and supported. But for Marshall, it has been the opposite. Every day, I worry about his safety. I worry about the safety of his peers. I worry about the teachers who are trying but do not have the resources. And most of all, I worry that my son will grow up believing the world when it tells him he is “bad.”
He is not bad. He is hurting. He is lost. And he needs help.

I am exhausted. I am frustrated. I am overwhelmed. I am heartbroken. No mother should have to fight this hard for her child to be seen, to be safe, to be given the support he deserves.

But I will never stop fighting.

Because Marshall is worth it.

Because he is not a problem to be solved.

He is my son. A kind, empathetic, beautiful boy.