Beyond the Box
Beyond the Box with Monica Kelsey is a powerful podcast dedicated to raising awareness, educating the public, and advocating for change in the fight against infant abandonment. Hosted by Monica Kelsey, Founder and CEO of Safe Haven Baby Boxes, this podcast dives deep into real stories, expert insights, and the life-saving impact of Safe Haven laws and baby box programs across the country.
Each episode features compelling conversations with firefighters, legal experts, healthcare professionals, policymakers, adoptive families, and even mothers who have used Safe Haven Baby Boxes. Together, they shed light on the challenges, victories, and ongoing efforts to provide safe, legal, and anonymous surrender options for parents in crisis.
From heartwarming rescue stories to policy discussions shaping the future, Beyond the Box is a must-listen for anyone passionate about saving lives and supporting vulnerable infants.
Beyond the Box
#3: From Surrendered Baby to Police Officer with Matthew Stewart
What happens when an abandoned baby grows up to protect the very streets where they were once left behind? In this deeply moving conversation, South Bend Police Officer Matthew Stewart shares his extraordinary journey from being the "newspaper baby" – abandoned in a cardboard box in an apartment complex breezeway on Christmas Eve 2000 – to becoming a guardian of his community.
Matthew's story unfolds with remarkable candor as he recounts how tenants heard his cries, leading to his rescue and subsequent adoption. The timing of his abandonment – just before Indiana implemented the Safe Haven Law in 2001 – highlights how different his story might have been had his teenage birth parents had access to safe surrender options like baby boxes. Born at home without medical care and kept for a week before being abandoned, Matthew's very survival seems miraculous.
The conversation takes an extraordinary turn as Matthew reveals how, during his police training, he discovered that the detective who investigated his abandonment case still worked with the department. This full-circle moment provided answers to questions he'd carried his entire life. With remarkable grace, Matthew shares his perspective on connecting with his birth parents and half-siblings, demonstrating forgiveness rather than resentment for the desperate circumstances that led to his abandonment.
Host Monica Kelsey, founder of Safe Haven Baby Boxes and an abandoned infant herself, creates a powerful space for authentic connection as they discuss shared experiences of adoption, identity, and finding purpose beyond difficult beginnings. Their conversation illuminates how two people once left behind have transformed potential tragedy into lives of service, family, and remarkable resilience.
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all right, this is monica kelsey from beyond the box. We are on episode three with my uh special guest, matthew stewart from south bend, indiana, that I've been waiting to interview you like I really have.
Monica Kelsey:Like this has been. The moment that I heard your story, and it was probably middle of last year I was like I have got to get to South Bend. Well, actually I wanted you to come to me, but it was too far. So I don't think South Bend Police Department would have allowed you to take their car to Woodburn, indiana, to do a podcast with Monica. I mean, yeah, I'm kind of a big deal, but not really. You know, probably not to the people in South Bend. But so for those who don't know who you are, who didn't see the story last July, why are you so important here in South Bend?
Matthew Stewart:Oh, that's deep.
Monica Kelsey:I'm already deep in that's a hard question, no.
Matthew Stewart:So last year I lateral to this department while I was training. Last year I lateral to this department While I was training. I told a story to my FTO that actually involves someone he knew. So when I was born, I was left in a cardboard box in an apartment complex here in the city and there was a report taken and I was taken to the hospital and that was really it. Well, I told my training officer, officer Morgan, what had happened and he, so he had no idea, he had no idea.
Matthew Stewart:But he ended up looking it up in our reporting system and found Gene Eyster's name attached to the report. Well, that was the detective that basically investigated the whole case, eventually closed it. But so then.
Monica Kelsey:So you were left in a cardboard box at an apartment complex here in South Bend, Indiana.
Matthew Stewart:Yes.
Monica Kelsey:Yeah, how old were you?
Matthew Stewart:I think I was a week old see where we got.
Monica Kelsey:So your sir, your birth mom, kept you for a week, yeah, and then and then placed you in a box. Was there a note?
Matthew Stewart:I don't think so. No, I was just bumbled up in some blankets and some clothes what, what day was that?
Monica Kelsey:you know?
Matthew Stewart:it was, oh, I think it was christmas, christmas. I'm not 100 sure um, okay, so this would be 2000 2000.
Monica Kelsey:Okay, so christmas eve of 2000, the safe haven law came into effect in 2001 yeah so this was prior to the safe haven law. So this would have been a complete abandonment, with no options available for your birth mom. Now, how and I'm probably getting way ahead of the story here uh, but have you ever found your birth mom?
Matthew Stewart:yeah, so I've talked to both of my birth parents. Uh, mostly over text, um, and I mean no hard feelings. Like I know, sometimes things don't work work out for his plan, but maybe if there was a baby box it would have been different. You know, I bet you so you were adopted.
Monica Kelsey:Yes, so you're adopted.
Matthew Stewart:Two, two great parents yeah, yeah, very good we have.
Monica Kelsey:We have matthew, we have a lot in common. Like this is crazy, like wow. So um. So, christmas eve you were left in a cardboard box on an apartment complex. Who found you? Oh, was it just somebody walking by?
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, so there was two tenants in the apartment complex. They heard me crying in the hallway because I was just left in like a breezeway.
Monica Kelsey:So you were inside, you were not outside, in the elements.
Matthew Stewart:Right. So there's like a breezeway in these apartment complex that go to each door. I was left inside there and two people living there heard me crying. They came out and was like holy crap, there's a baby out here. So they just called 911 and police and fire responded.
Monica Kelsey:So police and fire respond. They obviously take you in, probably to the hospital be checked out, and then turns you over to the department of child services, correct? So from there you probably went into foster care so that's kind of weird.
Matthew Stewart:So I was in the hospital for like evaluation, uh, and the the hospital staff nicknamed me the newspaper baby, because it was all in the paper of what had happened. Do you have?
Monica Kelsey:those articles.
Matthew Stewart:I do.
Monica Kelsey:I hope you do. I was going to hope you do keep those, because one day those might mean something to your kids.
Matthew Stewart:So in my my adopted mom, she, she wasn't able to get pregnant, so she had been in touch with uh doctors and adoption services. Well, they called her and they said hey, have you heard about this newspaper baby? She says, yeah, yeah. Well, do you want to adopt him? And they just came and adopted me, pretty much holy smokes like that doesn't happen today.
Monica Kelsey:Yeah, Holy smokes. So you uh grow up, then Are you an only child.
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, so my dad had two kids before he married my mom, um, but they were, they were quite, quite a bit older than me. So, yeah, I was, I was in the house, just me and my parents and your parents.
Monica Kelsey:Gosh, what a blessing. You know what a blessing. So in December of 2000, you're found in a cardboard box in an apartment complex in South Bend, and now you are protecting the streets here in South Bend. So it's not so much beyond the box for me, it's beyond the badge for you, it really is.
Monica Kelsey:You know what I mean. Like like you were out there, like defending you know the city in which, in so many words thrown away, you know I have a lot in common with you. You know I was abandoned as an infant. You know, back in 1973, there was no safe haven law either. I'm a lot older than you, are for sure, for sure. But you know the story is the same. You know my, my birth mom, you know was was very young, couldn't care for me and a lot of circumstances surrounding it, and but she left me at the door of a hospital, and so your birth mom left you in a safe place where someone would find you. My birth mom did the same. I mean, there's so many babies out there that are left in unsafe places where these parents, you know, just toss them in dumpsters and trash cans. That's not your story.
Matthew Stewart:That's terrible.
Monica Kelsey:Yeah, and it's not your story. It's like your mother loved you, your birth mother loved you enough to keep you safe, and that's exactly what she did, and so, okay, so let's go a little farther into the story, because this is just man. You're just rocking my world right now. So so you, you get adopted, you graduate high school. Obviously you want to probably be a police officer your entire life, you know. Yeah, well, actually you probably wanted to be a fireman, didn't you? No, oh, come on.
Matthew Stewart:It's weird. So I was, I wanted to be a mechanic, what? And I was doing that and I was like, man, this, this isn't, it just wasn't for me. So I mean, I still work on stuff, but that not to that extent.
Monica Kelsey:So you wanted to be a mechanic, but you just settled to be a police officer. No, I wasn't, that's great for the residents of South Bend, Indiana. I'm just kidding.
Matthew Stewart:No, I just I don't know, I don't know what happened. I just I started at the jail, at our county jail. I was like, yeah, I'll try it. And I loved it and yeah then that's kind of when I was like, okay, I want to be a police officer and just fell in love with the idea.
Monica Kelsey:You fell in love with the idea at a jail.
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, it was, and that's an interesting place to work.
Monica Kelsey:I am sure that nothing great happens at a jail. No, I mean, I don't know where you would find your will and way at a jail, saying, oh yeah, I want to do this for the rest of my life, but here we are, right, yeah, so you grow up, you become a police officer and then you're working here and you tell your your training officer hey, you know, you remember that story about this newspaper baby back in you know 2000 yeah, that's me. And so he digs in, he finds this information and then you find out that somebody on the department that still works here or had he retired, but he had was was still around yeah now, obviously you guys connected, yeah, because the stories are out there.
Monica Kelsey:But what was that like? Like knowing that he was the one that took care of the case?
Matthew Stewart:it was weird yeah, it was something I didn't ever really think would happen, because I threw my childhood. I was confused, angry, like so you knew, yes, yes. So as soon as I understood my, my parents told me like hey, here's what happened when you were, when you were a baby, um, and I, like, they had left nothing unknown to me. That's, that's good, but there was a lot of unknown to them, right, right. So so all they knew was I was abandoned, uh, I was available for adoption and they adopted me. But so, once this all came out, yeah, it was very surreal meeting Gene. It was just something that I always kind of wondered about, like who found me? Who took care of the case? Who? Like? There were so many questions that I couldn't answer Right, unless something like this happened.
Monica Kelsey:So so you meet him and does he have the same connection with you Like did he remember the entire story?
Matthew Stewart:Oh yeah, yeah, he remembered more than I thought he would Well.
Monica Kelsey:I mean, he's old right, Don't tell him. I said that he would never. I've never even met the guy. Yeah, he's's gonna be like, what is she talking about? I'm not old, but uh um. So you meet him and clearly there's got to be a connection yeah, he's a really good guy, is he?
Matthew Stewart:yeah, I I was really nervous at first, like meeting him like this is kind of weird, but it was just like old friends being up, kind of what it felt like really that's so interesting, but it's this.
Monica Kelsey:This kind of story doesn't happen. It just doesn't like. This is just so unique and and different, but so much um, from tragedy to triumph like you're really living. You know, uh, kind of your story, not what was your story. It's like this is your story now. You know. Kind of your story, not what was your story. It's like this is your story now. You know, I love when people are and they've had a bad childhood or they've had something happen to them. I love it when people don't become victims and you clearly are not playing victim, you are clearly just taking your life and kind of moving on. I know how you felt growing up, you know yeah, I'm sure you do feeling unwanted.
Monica Kelsey:you know, and you know my story is a little different than yours. Well, I guess I don't know, because I don't know the story behind your birth mother, you know, placing you there, but for me, mine came from tragedy and then, you know, abandoned me. Mine came from tragedy and then, you know, abandoned me and never looking back. I love it when people don't play victim, and you're. You're clearly not doing that. You've taken this, this life that you've been given, because it could have been, it could have turned out really bad for you.
Monica Kelsey:As for myself, and so you know, I look at it as this is a gift. You know, my life is a gift now, and what I do from today on is, is, is my life. It's not what it used to be. I, I'm not that person. You know, I'm Monica Kelsey. I'm the founder of safe haven baby boxes. That's who I am today, you know, and so I. I see that through you, I, I've only known you for literally a matter of minutes, but you just come across as you're just thankful for for what you have, you know, and uh, but okay, so you met gene, and do you guys still have a relationship?
Matthew Stewart:yes, we talk here and there um. He's busy, he's retired, so he's oh he's yeah, he's probably sleeping in but I'm busy. I've got two little babies, so do you?
Monica Kelsey:Yeah, so the generation continues.
Matthew Stewart:Well, this is actually the first generation of Hegedus stewards, so that's cool.
Monica Kelsey:So so you're obviously, you've got two kids, you've got a family, and let's, let's go back to your birth mom. So you say and I'm not going to, don't answer anything that you don't want to answer but, um, so did she tell you the story? I mean was, was she? Was she in a moment of crisis that we would never understand, or was this out of desperation?
Matthew Stewart:I mean, I I really think she just didn't know what to do because at the time, uh, both my my birth father and my birth mother had killed one child from a different relationship. So you have a full sibling. Yeah, I have quite a few siblings, full siblings. No, they're all half siblings.
Monica Kelsey:Okay.
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, okay. But so they both each had a young child already, right, and they were in their teens. So I'm sure they were thinking what the heck do we do here? You know, we can't take care of another baby. From reading the report it sounded like they were just kind of making ends meet at the time. I mean, we've all been there. But so, yeah, I think she just didn't know what to do. She thought, well, I can't take care of another baby. And obviously I had different thoughts when I was younger.
Matthew Stewart:Like well yeah, I just did. What makes you? But growing up I realized like, ok, she was at a tough spot, right, and I mean at the time she did what she thought would be best and it worked out, you know.
Monica Kelsey:Well, and again she left you in a safe place, Right.
Matthew Stewart:So it's not like she just left me outside the complex in the negative, whatever degree weather.
Monica Kelsey:She loved you.
Matthew Stewart:I'd assume. So yeah, yeah.
Monica Kelsey:I think you could probably more than assume. I'm pretty confident that she did so. Did they find her back then, or was it later in life that you found her? Yeah, they did find her don't say something you're uncomfortable with.
Matthew Stewart:So she had called the hospital and said, hey, how do I like, what are the adoption services like? How do I basically give up a child, a newborn baby, and then hung up. Obviously, she got the answer. She called the hospital and says no, she didn't, and then hung up.
Monica Kelsey:Obviously, she got the answer?
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, she called the hospital and says no, she didn't.
Monica Kelsey:Oh, she did.
Matthew Stewart:She hung up because she was like what?
Monica Kelsey:am I doing.
Matthew Stewart:Maybe it was like a second guess. I don't know if I can do this, but that was hours before she took me to the apartment complex here in South Bend. So I think eventually she told her parents that, hey, I was the person that left that baby there, and more or less turned herself in.
Monica Kelsey:So how long after that? Do you know from when she had, because it blew up Like it was all over the newspaper.
Matthew Stewart:Everyone was talking about me. That sounds a little conceited.
Monica Kelsey:It's probably true with the media today.
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, so I'm guessing it was kind of like okay, I got to get this taken care of and over with, so I'm sorry. What was the question?
Monica Kelsey:You sound like me. I do these squirrel moments. I get yelled at all the time because somebody asks me a question and I'll start talking. I'll be like what did you just ask me? So I was just asking how long after? Oh.
Matthew Stewart:I don't see at all. Yeah, I'd venture to say, a few days at least so.
Monica Kelsey:was she older or was she still young, living at home?
Matthew Stewart:So I think they lived in a trailer park or like a mobile home or something I can be way off.
Monica Kelsey:I think it was a trailer park. But they lived together. Mom and birth mom and birth dad lived together. Your first birthday together.
Matthew Stewart:Wow, yeah, um, I don't know how old she was, to be honest, so I I I don't believe she was 20. She was in her teens still wow, does it today?
Monica Kelsey:does it bother you?
Matthew Stewart:no, I mean I've got my own family. I've got a lot going for me to that I've got to worry about your mom and dad still alive, yeah, yeah, you know.
Monica Kelsey:I love it when people say is that your real mom or is that you know? It's like that? Yeah, that is my real mom, you know. She adopted me, she loved me, she cared for me. That is my real mom and um. But I understand why people get people you know mixed up with the birth mom and the adoptive mom thing.
Monica Kelsey:But you know, when we're adopted, this is our real parent. At that point, you know, it's like these aren't fake parents, they're real rentals. Yeah, oh gosh, you know, you know, being a first responder, there's probably some parents that I would like to rent out to other parents. You know, like, like, let's fix this problem. But, um, okay, so, uh see, there's my squirrel moment. I just kind of like go off and come unhinged, um, so what is life like for you today? I mean, um, you're, you obviously have a family, but and you work as a police officer here in south bend. But you know what, what do you like to do fun? I mean, like, I like to fish.
Matthew Stewart:Really, that's kind of my zen, um, when the weather's nice, uh, that's really about it. I mean my, my daughter's two, my son will be one in june, so I, I just really like hanging out with them and it's fun.
Monica Kelsey:Have your birth parents met you. No Through text.
Matthew Stewart:I've met my sister and grandfather. That's it.
Monica Kelsey:Did they know about you?
Matthew Stewart:back then. My sister did not. She thought I was pranking her because we met on Instagram.
Monica Kelsey:So did you reach out to her?
Matthew Stewart:I did, you did. I said hey because my mom told me we were going. I was like, hey, do I have any siblings? It was just kind of a question. One day, right, she goes, you know what you do, and she opens up all of her paperwork and is like here's a name. My sister's name is Aurora. That's not a very common name, so I looked her up on Instagram. I was already following her, which was weird.
Monica Kelsey:Get out of here.
Matthew Stewart:No, I swear. So I sent her a message. I said hey, I don't know how to say this, but I'm your brother.
Monica Kelsey:Might as well just wipe it. Let's just get it out.
Matthew Stewart:I was 13 or 14, so I didn't know what to say. She goes you're pranking me.
Monica Kelsey:Stop messing with me, yeah, and then, like a week later, we met and it was awesome. Oh my gosh. You know you sound a lot like me because, uh, when, when I found my, my biological mother I found her when I was 37, I actually stumbled upon her by accident and yeah, and so, um, I, I wanted to know everything about me and literally, like I was just like you, I was like I'm going to, I'm going to call, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that, and some of it backfired in my face for sure. But I understand why. It's almost like you want that connection, you want to, you want to look like somebody. Does that sound crazy to you? No, it doesn't to you, probably to other people, I mean, it's like we don't look like anybody from our family. You know, we know that we're adopted. I knew that I was adopted my entire life growing up. My older sister is actually Mexican.
Monica Kelsey:Oh wow, yeah, and so. And then my younger sister is the bio child, you know, because they had two adoptive kids and then they got pregnant when they weren't supposed to. And so I always say that you know, I was planned, she was not, you know, she was kind of an accident, right, and, but I never looked like my my. Everybody kept saying, oh, you look just like your mom, not your dad, and I'm like I don't really look like either of them, to be honest with you.
Matthew Stewart:OK.
Monica Kelsey:Yeah, but I always wanted to. You know, I always wanted to see who I looked look like, and then when I met my biological mother, I didn't look anything like her. I actually look like my biological father's family, which is heartbreaking in itself, but I think for all adoptees, I think that's kind of something that we struggle with. You know is looking like someone. Have you okay? So this is a secret, it's just between you and me. Have you stalked your birth mom? Do you know what she looks like? Did you look her up on social?
Matthew Stewart:media. Yeah. So actually I kind of upset my parents because I found they they told me both of my parents names. So I looked them up. I said is this my mom or my birth mother? Is this my birth father? My mom confirmed. I was like, oh okay, well, later I I did basically we were talking about. I scrolled through all the pictures. I'm like, wow, they both have you know, well, my dad and my birth father has me and my sister and that's it. But my mom has three other, three other kids, like well, I've got a lot of siblings, yeah. But yeah, and sometime went by and I ended up texting my birth father. Sometime went by and I ended up texting my birth father was like, hey, uh, I don't know if you know me, but I'm your, I'm your biological son. Basically, hey, what do I have to look out for? I mean, I have a heart attack at 30, like you know, kind of thing. And yeah, that surprised my parents, did?
Monica Kelsey:he did your birth father not take it well no, he was, he was fine.
Matthew Stewart:So he knew though Probably by looking at me yeah, we look pretty similar, do you? I mean, we both got freckles and same shaped face, really, yeah.
Monica Kelsey:Wow, oh my gosh. Okay, so you call him, but did he know about you?
Matthew Stewart:Did he know that she left you At the time? Are you talking about back in 2000?
Monica Kelsey:When you called him and said hey, you might be my birth father. Did he even know that you existed. Yes, so they were together at the time.
Matthew Stewart:Did they make the decision together to do this. No, no, for me the report didn't seem like it. Um, it kind of seemed like she freaked out and just did it on her own because he comes home from work and it's like hey, where's, where's the baby?
Monica Kelsey:so okay, so were you born in a hospital no, I was born in their home or you had no medical care for the first seven days. No, what?
Matthew Stewart:Yeah.
Monica Kelsey:Oh, my goodness. Okay, well, now I understand how she could have gotten away with it with nobody knowing who she was, you know?
Matthew Stewart:Yeah.
Monica Kelsey:Wow, okay. So. So he didn't know that you were gone, but he knew that you were, that I existed. Yeah, right, okay, wow, okay. So he didn't know that you were gone, but he knew that you were.
Matthew Stewart:That I existed, yeah, right.
Monica Kelsey:Okay, wow, okay. So your mom then just leaves you and dad comes home and bio dad comes home and says where's baby at?
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, she ended up telling him what happened and they were like, well, deal with what comes. I guess I'm sure there was some. There had to have been some regret, you know. Yeah, of course, again, like I can't blame her, because I mean, who knows, I might have done the same in this situation, freaked out and I don't know if I can take care of another baby, Right, and I don't know, maybe if we had a baby box it would have been different. Like seriously, yeah, You're probably right. Yeah.
Monica Kelsey:You are probably right. If only the law was around one year before. Yeah, wow, wow. You know there's. It's interesting and I don't know if you know the statistics on abandoned babies in America, but there's a baby found dead in our country every three to four days. That's terrible.
Matthew Stewart:We found dead in our country every three to four days, that's terrible, just so sad it was.
Monica Kelsey:Past week we found a dead baby in a dumpster in Modesto, california, one in Lynchburg, lynchburg, virginia, and it's like San Antonio, this year alone, has had three just one city has had three and it's like and these are all locations that don't have boxes. Now, indiana you know Indiana I launched Baby Boxes back in 2016. And we, prior to Baby Boxes, we were finding, you know, two to three dead babies in Indiana a year abandoned. And I launched in 2016 at my firehouse and we haven't had a dead baby since I launched in 2016. And we've had either 33 or 35 babies just in Indiana in baby boxes. It's just incredible, when you work a program, how the program works.
Matthew Stewart:Right.
Monica Kelsey:You know, but for both of our birth moms they, this wall didn't exist, right, and you know. Now you know you. We kind of look back and it's like they really didn't have any options. They really didn't. No, it was here. You go, figure it out, go from the paramedics, yeah, yeah, figure it out. But I didn't know you. That's the first time I had ever heard that you weren't born in the hospital.
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, I believe it was in the bathtub.
Monica Kelsey:Yeah, you are like literally like a miracle sitting here, Like how a baby can be without medical care for seven days. I mean, she obviously knew what she was doing and she was a teen you know so, and there was not Google right back in 2001 or 2000. Was there Google back in 2000?
Matthew Stewart:That's a good question, maybe if you had a desktop.
Monica Kelsey:I know, like, where's my phone? Can somebody Google? Was there a Google in 2001? But you know, there wasn't. There wasn't resources for them, and so for us to be sitting here talking to each other literally is a miracle in itself. You know, it's just crazy. But you know, as you were talking, I was watching some of the articles that you had done last year and the more you talk, the more I understood. It's like we get it Right. You know, we understand. You know how we feel. You know, for me, I was, you know, whisk into this world by violence and then throw away like trash and it's like um, I was that poster child of an unwanted child, you know. And, and so for me, the I do deal with abandonment issues. You know my husband of almost 30 years, I still you're not going to leave the area and it's like I know he's not going anywhere. Well, you, better not, because I can't train anybody?
Monica Kelsey:else, like in this timeframe, but, but it's. It's like the abandonment issues that I have. It doesn't come from anywhere that I'm conscious of knowing where it would come from, and so, um, but do you feel that way sometimes?
Matthew Stewart:I'm sorry, but no, I don't. I don't, um. I mean I don't want to say I'm over it. I don't know if you can really get over all of that, especially for you, um, but it just kind of moved on. I mean, it is what it is, right, right, and so. So I came into this world and it'll be the same when I go out of it, you know.
Monica Kelsey:Well, let's hope it's not the same. Well, you will be in a box.
Matthew Stewart:Yeah, I'll be in a box.
Monica Kelsey:But what's next for you? Like, what do you? I mean, you're a police officer, you're a dad. Well, what do you? I mean, you're a police officer, you're a dad. What's next for you? What do you see yourself doing in five years? I mean, do you speak a lot about your story or Not?
Matthew Stewart:really.
Monica Kelsey:I mean, it's just kind of blew up and then you're like you know what? That's cool, but I got to go.
Matthew Stewart:I mean, it's just kind of part of who I am, you know, and if people ask me questions'm not gonna say I don't want to talk about that. I'll tell you whatever you want to know. But no, I don't. I don't really talk about it much unless it's brought up right. Um, in five years, where do I see myself?
Monica Kelsey:that's a good question do you still see yourself as a police officer in south oh?
Matthew Stewart:yeah, yeah, I'll probably I'll do my whole career if my health permits it. I love here.
Monica Kelsey:I mean, it's been a blast has it yeah do you know anything about your medical history, now that you brought it up, no, no see, it's like I don't either, and you know when for us going to the doctor. It's like they just check all the boxes and start running a ton of tests.
Matthew Stewart:It's like we actually have an advantage over people you know. Give me a medical history. You know about as much do.
Monica Kelsey:Yeah, we've been friends for like five minutes dude, but uh, but yeah, it's that's kind of how it is, you know, and honestly it's kind of an, like I said, it's an advantage for us, you know, to to not know, because they run more tests to find out what it actually is. So well, you know, I appreciate you speaking with me. I'm really new to this podcast thing.
Matthew Stewart:It's okay, it's been great.
Monica Kelsey:Well, I appreciate you know you taking the time out of your day and spending a little time with us at Safe Even Baby Boxes on the road. It's Monica Kelsey Beyond the Box on the road. I don't know something like that. They keep telling me to say that I don't know what to say, so whatever.
Monica Kelsey:But I appreciate you coming out and talking and and saying a little bit about who you are, because I think others can learn from you I hope so yeah, well, I hope it's not for nothing, right yeah I hope it's not for nothing and and, uh, I I do think that you know, one day you're going to look back and you're going to be thankful that you, you did open up a little bit for me. Me, it's almost therapy to talk about it. I'm not a victim by any means and I don't have trauma from being adopted like some adoptees have. But I do have a story you know, just like you do. But that's not who I am, you know, and so I love how you kind of are a lot like I am. You really, you really are, and you're a first responder. I think that's just in our blood. We just kind of roll with it. It's like whatever, let's just roll with it. So, anyways, well, thank you, I appreciate you for coming on, absolutely.
Matthew Stewart:Thank you.
Monica Kelsey:Well, this is Monica Kelsey, from Beyond the Box on the road in South Bend, indiana, with a police officer who is now beyond the badge.