CHARLOTTE, N.C. _ The day she found out her first child would almost certainly need both legs amputated, a doctor asked Rochelle Benton a pointed question:
Do you want to get an abortion?
And frankly, she was a little bit offended.
"I'm like, 'What's wrong with him?' " she recalls. " 'He's gonna be fine. I mean, his heart works, his organs look fine.' So I wasn't afraid."
That's because she was born with the same genetic condition _ an extreme form of an incredibly rare disorder called tibial dysplasia that leads to missing tibia bones. She'd had both legs amputated above the knee when she was 18 months old.
It'd be a little bit difficult, she remembers thinking about her baby, but if I've survived this long and I live a happy life, why shouldn't he?
Since then, Rochelle's faith in Landon's ability to survive and thrive has been unflagging. Yet there were things she couldn't foresee on the day of that pivotal sonogram _ an insecurity she hadn't felt yet, pain she hadn't yet endured, and a profound turnaround to come.
"Basketball," she says, "has completely changed everything."
