The Best Kind of Different: Our Family's Journey With Asperger's Syndrome (4 page)

I was listening to the last spring training game of the year on the radio when, about halfway to Houston, I heard, “The big news today: Curt Schilling has just been traded to the Philadelphia Phillies.” I was almost an accident statistic before I had a chance to be a bride; I could barely keep my car on the road.

When I got hold of Curt, we only had a few minutes to talk. He was taking off to meet the Philadelphia team in Miami on the final day of spring training. I would continue the ten-hour journey to Houston, pack the house up, get the first flight out of there, and once again find us a place to live in a new city. I wouldn’t even get a chance to say good-bye to anyone.

As hard as it was to fathom relocating yet again, I was very happy about this move, in part because it would put me back on the East Coast, not too far from my parents. I’ve always hated being far from my family, and this was almost like being traded back home.

I
T’S AMAZING HOW ONE
decision by one person can change everything in your world. While Curt was throwing in the Phillies bullpen the very next day, in a downpour of rain, his new pitching coach, Johnny Podres, took notice. “You throw way too hard to be a closer,” the coach said. “You’ve got a Hall of Fame arm, kid. We’re going to make you a starter someday!”

Those two sentences changed our lives forever. Curt really began to shine. He was on his way to becoming one of the greatest starters in baseball, all because one guy decided to give him that chance.

The 1992 season was a successful one, and the following November, we got married. The ceremony was in the church I’d started going to when I was in the second grade, just down the block from my parents’ home in Dundalk, Maryland. In the beginning, I’d gone because a friend of mine went. My family didn’t do church. Ever. I suppose I was searching for something, some kind of deeper meaning to life.

Without fail, I went every Sunday. When I was very young, my mom would walk me across the street and right to the door, and she would be waiting for me when I got out. When I got a little older, I went on my own. I went all the way through to confirmation. There was this really devout wonderful older congregant who watched over all the kids. I called him Uncle Tommy from the day I met him, until the day he died in the late 1990s. He was a lifelong friend and someone I can’t imagine having lived without.

“Will you be my acolyte?” he’d ask again and again.

“Okay,” I’d say, and there was something about it that made me feel accountable in a good way.

Church and spirituality have been big parts of my life ever since. One of the beliefs instilled in me in church was that it is important to do for others. When you do something for someone in need, the feeling you get is infinitely better than anything else life has to offer.

In 1993 I was happy to have the opportunity to begin helping others. That’s when Curt and I were introduced to Dick Bergeron, a patient with
amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. ALS is a cruel disease in which patients progressively lose muscle function—and their dignity—while their minds remain intact. We were both so affected by his story and his struggle, we desperately wanted to do something. A great woman named Ellyn Phillips, president of the ALS Association, offered us the opportunity to spread the word as spokespeople, an offer we happily accepted.

That was also the year Curt began to establish his reputation as a “big game pitcher.” I have so many memories of that year, on and off the field—going to the playoffs, watching my husband break a National League Championship Series record by striking out the first five batters of the game, hearing my heart pound like a hammer, all because of this energy he created.

Ironically, I almost didn’t get to see some of the most exciting moments. The wives weren’t officially allowed on the road, in hotel bars, or anywhere that might be considered the players’ space. The team leaders of that early 1990s Phillies team were a selfdescribed “Macho Row,” who stayed out late after games and, in my opinion, showed no respect for their wives. If a young player like Curt didn’t do what they did, he’d find himself the target of their immature behavior. (I could write a book about those guys alone. All I can say is that karma is a tough thing, and in the end, they all got what they deserved.)

Curt didn’t want any part of that, and he had a saving grace: He could handle their making fun of him, because the bottom line was that they wanted him to have the ball in their most important games. There was a game in Pittsburgh—the final game, when Philly would clinch the National League East pennant. One of the veteran wives said to us younger women, “You get in your car and go.”

“But we’re not allowed,” I said.

“Well, I’m going and so are some others,” she insisted. “You don’t know if you’ll ever get this close to a World Series again. You want to see this!”

She had a point. To sit through all those home games and then not be allowed to watch the most important moments in person? Not be allowed to celebrate? Sure enough, I got in my car and I went. We won the National League East that night. We were going to the playoffs. It would be eight years before we went to another postseason, so I’m especially glad I went.

I say “we” went to the World Series because when you’re married to a baseball player, it’s as if you’ve both been hired by the team. It’s kind of like when a couple says, “We’re pregnant,” when it’s obvious who’s carrying that baby. It still belongs to both of them, the same way the baseball life belonged to both of us. Often I’ll say that “we” were traded, or that “we” were on this team or that team. That’s what you say when you’re a baseball wife. As a wife you may not be on the payroll, but you’re the one who takes care of everything in life that your husband can’t do—be it packing or parenting. Very few professional athletes’ marriages work any differently.

In Philly, it wasn’t easy being a rookie wife. It was a very veteran team, with players who’d been there a long time. Back then, that was more common on many teams. The wives were no different. In the same way the rookie players had to earn their way up the ladder, the wives did as well, and often there was more hostility in the stands than in the clubhouse. That’s one of the hardest things about being a baseball wife. You find yourself in new cities, whether just for a short while or for a few years, and you know no one. As if that’s not hard enough, the other wives are reluctant to bond too strongly with new women—especially women who are just the players’ girlfriends—because you never know when your men will get traded. And you also never know when the women will get traded for younger models. It’s very hard to get close to a woman and become really good friends and then see her gone the next season.

But by the 1994 season, a whole new wave of young players had come in, and at twentyseven I was suddenly one of the older wives. Curt and I were incredibly happy with where we were in our lives, and despite the hectic pace
of everything, we both felt very ready for parenthood. Curt wanted it more than anything, especially since he was the last living male Schilling after his father died. He wanted an heir, and I would finally get the chance to be a great mother, just like my mom had been.

And that was how it happened that one minute we were a young baseball player and his wife, constantly on the go, and the next we were a family—constantly on the go.

I went into labor for the first time on the Friday night of Memorial Day weekend in 1995. After a few polite attempts to get Curt to come downstairs, I finally went to the loft where he was on the computer and shouted at him, “I’m in #$@&ing labor!” He went from the chair to the bottom of the stairs, and I’m pretty sure he didn’t touch even one step on the way down.

Here was a guy who could confidently pitch in front of a hundred million people in fifty different countries without losing his nerve. But childbirth rattled him something fierce. He had to have my dad drive us to the hospital.

The next day, we gave birth to our first son. Inspired by the ALS patients we had come to know and care so much about, we named our son Gehrig Clifford Schilling. It was our way of honoring them for their courage and the life lessons they’d taught us. Lou Gehrig had an untimely death. Our little boy would bring life to the name Gehrig.

From the start, Gehrig was relatively easygoing as a baby and slept well, which made it convenient to tote him around from spring training to home to anywhere else we needed to go. He was adaptable, which was a good thing, because our life in baseball was always in flux and I felt totally discombobulated all the time. I found it difficult to keep track of where we were supposed to be and when, with everything I needed for my little baby. It took me four months just to get to the point where I was able to take a shower, feed him, and get to the ballpark in a reasonable amount of time.

Naturally we had Gehrig playing baseball from the time he could stand relatively steadily. He always enjoyed it, and also loved watching his dad play.
From a very early age, Gehrig was comfortable in our unusual world, I suppose partly because he was always so outgoing, and also because he knew how to act years beyond his age. He could easily converse with both kids and adults. If we took him into the clubhouse or to an ALS event, he’d behave himself remarkably and seem very mature, talking graciously to grownups when they stopped to ask him questions. He acted like he was made for this life. In my mind, he became the standard of how kids were supposed to behave in these situations. It was a standard that would complicate things later as I tried to understand Grant.

When I became pregnant with Gabby, Gehrig loved the idea of becoming a big brother. He was excited from the minute we told him I was pregnant. My water broke while Curt was on the road playing in Chicago, and eight hours later, on May 22, 1997, I gave birth to a little girl. Curt arrived just in time.

He couldn’t hang around the hospital long, though. He was pitching that day. He had a few hours to go home, check on Gehrig, and grab a couple of hours’ sleep before heading to the ballpark. It didn’t go so well for him that day; he couldn’t make it out of the second inning. All the papers had headlines such as, “Oh Baby. Schilling Can’t Deliver. “

We named the baby Gabriella Patricia. She was our second—ultimately of four—to have a name beginning with
G
. No, it wasn’t our favorite letter of the alphabet. We named her that because, at the time, Gabriella Sabatini was a successful tennis player, and we thought she was just the embodiment of what we wanted our daughter to be—athletic, smart, attractive, kind, and selfassured. Every teacher Gabriella has ever had has told us we named her right, because she lives up to her nickname, Gabby. She can talk and talk and talk.

As a baby, Gabriella, like Gehrig, was quite easy. She slept, woke up, ate, and went right back to sleep. You could wake her up, play with her, and put her back down without any fuss. And also like Gehrig, she was conveniently adaptable to the baseball life. You could keep her up late, and she’d just sleep
later the next day. She and Gehrig really spoiled me; they made me expect Grant to be exactly the same.

Gabby is and always has been a happy girl. Her heart is huge and she is happy for everyone. She’s always been a social butterfly, hard to keep at home. Right from the start, Gabby idealized her big brother. He came up with the games and she played them. Naturally, sometimes he picked on her; that’s just what older siblings do. But all things considered they got along incredibly well.

The funny thing was that with one baby, I’d felt disorganized all the time, but once Gabby showed up, I became the most organized I had ever been. I figured I was getting the hang of this parenthood thing. I could take them on road trips, knowing that as long as I had a couple of action figures and books, they would stay in the stands as long as I needed them to, occasionally stopping their playing to sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” At home games they raced to get to the Phillies’ kids’ room.

The bottom line was that wherever I went with Gabby and Gehrig, it was easy. I let them know there were rules for flying, for baseball games, for parking lots. One reminder was usually all that was needed. I figured this was the way all kids were. Boy, was I in for a surprise.

T
WO YEARS LATER
, in spring training, we decided that we were ready for baby number three. We found out on Easter in Atlanta, with all of our family there, and I went into labor right after the season ended.

On October 13, 1999, we had the newest addition to our family, a boy. We named him Grant Ward—another name beginning with
G
. Well, I’d always loved the name Grant. And we were on a roll with that first initial. Ward is my dad’s family’s middle name, and my sisterinlaw Allison’s new married name was Ward. So it was a perfect name and tribute.

Now I had a fouryearold, a twoyearold, and a newborn. Let the fun begin!

Gabby and Gehrig were so excited to have another sibling. Gehrig would have a little brother, and Gabby would have a baby to care for. She was really like a second mother to Grant. When he started talking, he called me “Mommy” and her “Momma.” At first I didn’t realize there was a distinction. I thought he was always calling for me. But I soon found that if he said “Momma” and I answered, he’d get mad. No, he wanted Gabby, thank you very much.

Gabby mothered Grant every chance she got. When the three of them were together, there were times when they played well, and times when the older two seemed to like to make Grant scream because they could. They were all suddenly very high energy and a bit difficult to keep under control. But they were adorable, so they could get away with a lot.

Just as I was getting used to the rhythm of our life in Philly with three little kids, halfway through the 2000 baseball season, we got traded, this time to the Arizona Diamondbacks. For the first time since 1992, I had to pick up and move us more than halfway across the country—only this time I was moving a lot more than just me and two dogs. I had to push myself into high gear, quickly finding a house for us to live in, arranging for utilities to be hooked up, securing a pediatrician, packing, moving, and unpacking. My mother was able to help on the East Coast end, and she and my dad came to stay with us for the remaining two months of the season, which was a great help.