My MVP (alternately titled "I Can't Even Deal")

When you're raising a child with special needs, there's a lot of things you just don't let yourself dream about.

Prom, high school graduation, college, grandkids.  None of it is for sure, so you just try your hardest to focus on how good today is instead of wondering what they will be able to do tomorrow.  For me, one of those Just Don't Go There things was sports.

When Gabe was really little it didn't bother me at all.  We aren't really a sports loving family.  But in the past 18 months it has become unavoidably obvious that, while we don't own any jerseys or cheer for any certain teams, Gabe was indeed a sports loving kid.

He doesn't care what it is, if there is a ball involved, he's in.

So my Mother Heart has been dreading the day we had to tell him he couldn't play.  

Then his cardiologist totally shocked me by saying he is cleared to play up to a varsity level in nearly any sport.  So when we got to Arizona I found the least competitive team I could and signed him up.

We were all really excited, but let me be totally up front that when we pulled up to the field the first day, I wanted to turn the car around and go home.

It was hot and the other kids were running and what if he got tired or what if the other kids teased him and what if he just couldn't do it.

But I didn't turn around.  Gabe played and he loved it beyond my wildest imagination.  The kid is a natural.

Even if he did run to second base instead of first.

And now I will unapologetically expose you to an absurd amount of pictures of Gabe doing his thing.  I can't help it.  It would be a crime to keep this all to myself.